Before winter break, I still plan on sharing the online resources I have found about Internet safety. I am currently looking at some additional resources based on the suggestions of my classmates. I strongly believe that middle school students need to be taught the importance of Internet safety. Each year we have encountered a few students who have made bad choices when it comes to social networking sites. In some cases, students have added inappropriate pictures to their MySpace or Facebook pages and then were upset when those pictures were posted or shared elsewhere. I have also heard of students actually meeting with people that they “met” online. This is such a dangerous situation. I am hoping that by sharing these resources, my middle school students will think twice before they make decisions about the use of social networking sites.
Since I teach United States history, my students conduct research throughout the year. One goal that my students are becoming quite comfortable with is research and information fluency. Even though we have been working on this goal all year, I am finding that some students need additional help in this area. Some of my learning disabled students seem to need the most help with locating organizing, analyzing, evaluating, synthesizing, and ethically using information from a variety of sources and media. These students still struggle with identifying reliable and valid information on the Internet. They also struggle with the concept of putting the information into their own words to avoid plagiarizing. I am continuing to work with small groups of students to help them find great resources and take notes on the main ideas. I feel that for some students this will be an ongoing struggle.
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I think students of all grade levels need to learn about internet safety. I hear stories all the time in our high school of students sending inappropriate pictures and then being upset because they get shared with other students. I have also heard of bullying online. Our principal is very good about bringing in these students and giving them a good talkng to. Well more like screaming to. Sometimes it works and it stops. I think it is also important to teach students how to handle being victims of these sort of internet things.
ReplyDeleteHi Jodi,
ReplyDeleteYou commented on my post this week and it looks like we are creating a similar goal. You read that I teach elementary and want to start kids on the right foot, but I feel like your grade levels it is even more important. It's that age when kids don't look before they leap and realize that the internet has some dangers they shoud be aware of. Aside from the dangers involved with social networking a couple points I wanted to mention that maybe you could pass on when you cover internet safety is being contracting a computer virus through email or downloading programs. Also something that kids don't hear about but will probably see in their life is the fraud and scams on the web. To me these are the kind of things that nobody tells kids that could end up creating real problems for them later. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.
Jason
Jodi,
ReplyDeleteI think Internet safety is a very important issue. Not only do I teach middle school, which is a very impressionable age, but I have a seventh grade son. He wanted to have a Facebook page, and I realized that educating him was a much wiser decision than prohibiting him from social networking. Thankfully, he's a real guy, and doesn't have a strong interest in communicating (I know, a sterotype). Once I gave him permission, he found Facebook much less attractive. In other words, "you can't fight city hall", and if we work to build responsible cyber-citizens and approve of social networking, maybe this new form of communication will be less provocative, and used by youth in a more responsible manner.
Kim