Teaching Internet Safety- A priority!
Posted by techallen on April 14, 2008
Web 2.0 tools are terrific tools to use with students, but students need to be good net citizens before using these in the classroom. I believe that being safe online is a MUST and parents need to be aware of the uses and abuses online. Teaching your child appropriate behavior online is important and just like in anything else, this should not be the schools sole responsibility. The district or school should offer parents online safety workshops in collaboration with the ITRT and technology committee in the school.
Teachers must also be informed and knowledgeable users before students dive into the world wide web. Resources and tools need to be relevant to the objectives and teachers should be able to navigate through them so they can model proper behavior online. With the web constantly changing, it’s important to talk to children about how they use the Internet and “what if” scenarios, so they know how to properly handle them.
I particularly like this webquest designed for 6th graders. It is very creative and breaks down netiquette and specific roles of student users. Kids learn how to be safe online in a collaborative way!
http://coe.nevada.edu/slefevre/playsafe.html
Terrific Internet Safety websites:
April 16th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Parents should also be monitoring their children’s online activities. The reasons are numerous why it would be stupid not to. If you are looking for a quick and easy, cost-effective solution, check out our PC Pandora.
April 21st, 2008 at 8:42 am
Thanks for your helpful links here!
For more information on children’s Internet safety, check out some of these blog posts. I’d love to hear your comments:
1. Safety Tips for Parents: http://www.covenanteyes.com/blog/2008/03/25/a-parents-guide-to-internet-safety-for-children/
2. Online Predators: http://www.covenanteyes.com/blog/2008/04/03/protecting-kids-online-the-myths-and-realities-of-online-predators/
3. Cyberbullying: http://www.covenanteyes.com/blog/2008/04/07/cyberbullying-the-new-playground/
August 17th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
For a fun way to teach internet and social networking safety, here’s a unit that includes an instructional video and a quiz. It’s aimed at middle school and up.
http://www.auntlee.com/safety/
The video is a selection of silly clips supposedly posted to the MySpace pages of the famous auntlee.com puppy and some of her friends. The clips demonstrate mistakes kids can make – the clips and the quiz serve as a jumpstart to further discussions.
Kids can take the interactive Flash version online, or you can download a .pdf document and print it as a handout. The 10 question quiz covers the topics of cyber-bullying, privacy, safety, dangers of spyware and malware, etc.
The quiz doesn’t really focus on stranger-danger type concerns but rather gently and humorously reminds the reader that it’s possible to hurt people’s feelings, to mislead people who don’t realize you’re joking, to remember that online postings can be seen by anybody and that postings are often impossible to remove once posted.