
Digital Citizenship and Information Literacy
As students use technology more and more for communication, entertainment and learning, it becomes more and more critical that students learn to recognize the risks that exist online, as well as learn how to use the information that they find in responsible ways. We hope that the following resources are great tools for families to use at home, when discussing safe and responsible behavior online:
Digital Citizenship and Cyberbullying:
- Attorney General's Internet Safety Site
- A Thin Line: MTV's website against cyberbullying (great for older students)
- Conflict Resolution for Digital Natives - by Devorah Heitner, who has worked with our District in the past year.
- 10 Things You Should Know about Teens and Sexting - Megan Maas
- Texting Trouble: When Minor Issues Become Major Problems - Devorah Heitner
Respecting Your Digital Identity:
- Common Sense Media's video lesson about understanding your digital footprint.
Social Networking Tips:
- Net Aware Reviews - a guide for parents to learn about all of the popular social media kids are using every day. It's really detailed with what features are available on each and potential danger to kids using them.
- Digital Safety Tips - tips on keeping kids safe online, social media and password safety. It covers all of the common safety issues on one post.
- Five common sense social networking rules for kids
- Facebook's safety tips for teens.
- Spawned Podcast Featuring a great chat about Kids and Email
Gaming and Minecraft:
- A Family Minecraft Policy by Alexandra Samuel
- Minecraft Generation - in NY Times by Clive Thompson
Common Sense Media
Common Sense Media is a terrific provider of digital citizenship curriculum —an excellent resource for students, parents, and teachers alike to learn about social and digital media issues. You may find these Common Sense Media resources particularly useful:
- Advice for Parents
- Digital Literacy Curriculum - The curriculum used by our technology coaches with students.
Below are some additional resources for specific popular social media sites.
- Connect Safely's Guide to Instagram (updated 2016)
Snapchat
- Snapchat's Guide for Parents
- Connect Safely's Parent Guide to Snapchat (updated 2016)
Ask.fm
- Connect Safely's Parent Guide to Ask.fm (updated 2015)
- A parent's guide to Twitter.
- Twitter's own safety tips for parents.