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Here at WPS we are rolling out the Common Sense Media curriculum for the 2019-2020 school year. Not only is each lesson aligned with the ISTE standards but each lesson also takes on real challenges and digital dilemmas that students face today, giving them the skills they need to succeed as digital learners, leaders, and citizens tomorrow. We are also excited about the Family Links that each lesson has attached. Students can then take the lessons they have learned and talk about them with their parents at home.

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Digital Citizenship for Every School | Common Sense Education

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Common Sense Education provides schools with a free, research-based Digital Citizenship Curriculum for grades K-12. Listen to educators describe how the curriculum has positively affected their students and transformed their schools' cultures around issues like cyberbullying, online safety, and media literacy.

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The articles "Digital Citizenship Lessons in Two Minutes or Less" and "Don't Teach Digital Citizenship-Embed it" spoke to me because these are simple, yet real-life situations that can teach students about how to be responsible online without being "preachy". Having real world conversations with the class about my reaction to a Twitter tweet or Facebook post can show them that even as adults we deal with being a digital citizen every day too.

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Model Positive Communication (Julie Sessions)

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Model Positive Communication (Julie Sessions)

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At Porter-Gaud School we like to focus on empathy by modeling positive communication online. The platform of choice for us is Flipgrid. This initially was used in our foreign language classes, but now is used in various subjects throughout grades 1-12. An example in the foreign language classes would be for students to complete an activity and then classmates post positive comments and/or emojis back. Students would also ask questions of students in other classes or grade levels and then focus on answering and commenting back in a positive, meaningful way. Teachers also comment on the lessons. This is done individually with the focus being to model positive communication. Administrators and parents are often invited in the grids and also comment on student and teacher work. This is such an amazing way to have the whole school community involved in modeling empathy through positive online communication. Flipgrid is now used for lessons world wide. We communicate with classrooms all over the world. Since we have instilled a culture of empathy, we feel confident that the students and teachers will model this when communicating with others outside of our school.

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Reaching Parents is really the goal I am struggling with how to lay out and implement. Below I found 7 easy ways. I think if we at leasted attempted half of these, we could be a good place as we move forward! Then the following year attempt for all 7. It is a start at least.

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Make digital citizenship a priority at school and at home.

Whether you're teaching digital citizenship lessons on your own or are including them as part of a district-wide program, getting families involved and on board is essential. We know student learning is strengthened when families and educators are on the same page. Families can reinforce the lessons through conversations and expectations at home. And teachers can help students navigate the digital dilemmas they face in and out of school.

Depending on your school's community, parents' and caregivers' responses to digital citizenship may vary. Some will be relieved to know these lessons are part of the school curriculum; many families already grapple with kids' media use and are looking for any support they can get in teaching these skills. Others might be wary of a program that teaches what they feel are moral lessons.

With so many varied perspectives, it's critical to introduce digital citizenship to families from the start and make it part of your classroom or school culture. The more parents and caregivers know about the program, the more they will be able to take co-ownership of the effort.

Here are seven ways to get families on board with digital citizenship:

1. Introduce digital citizenship at back-to-school night.

From the moment you meet your students' families, let them know digital citizenship is a priority. Point out the Digital Citizenship Pledge poster (login to download PDF) hanging in your classroom (signed by all your students, of course) to kick-start the conversation about how you integrate lessons on cyberbullying, online privacy, digital footprints, and more into your teaching.

2. Send family tips and resources home regularly.

Make digital citizenship and media use resources part of your regular communication to families. You can print out advice articles in English or Spanish to send home in backpacks or post links on your class website, in the LMS, or in the weekly parent email. Check out our Family Tips (available in 10 languages) on Media Balance & Well-Being, Privacy & Security, Digital Footprint & Identity, Relationships & Communication, Cyberbullying, and News & Media Literacy.

3. Tailor your efforts to meet families' needs.

Help parents and caregivers have more buy-in by finding out what their biggest concerns are. You can set up a comment/question box at back-to-school night. Or, if you send out a back-to-school questionnaire, ask a few questions about their challenges and needs related to family media use. Are they struggling with homework and multitasking, finding quality family media, or keeping their kids safe online? This can help inform the resources you share with families as well as the work you do with students.

4. Empower students to bring digital citizenship lessons home.

A great way to reinforce learning is to give students opportunities to become the teachers. When it comes to digital citizenship topics, there's a lot that students' families could learn. Come up with short, discussion-based activities for students to share at home, or use Common Sense Education's Family Activities, linked on each of the updated digital citizenship lessons. Take a look at the Media Balance & Well-Being Family Activity and News & Media Literacy Family Activity to get started.

5. Share the research.

Parents and caregivers have firsthand knowledge of the impact of devices and media on kids' lives. Even so, research on kids' media use is compelling and eye-opening and can establish the "why" for your digital citizenship program. The annual Common Sense Census offers a wealth of data on kids' media use. You can share the key findings for kids age 0 to 8 or for tweens and teens. Add these to your class website or parent newsletter, or print and provide them at back-to-school night.

6. Do a dig cit check-in during parent-teacher conferences.

There's a lot to cover during parent-teacher conferences, but a little info can go a long way. If you have technology in the classroom, give a brief overview of the expectations and norms you've established with students for device use and online communication. If you don't have time to get into many specifics of your approach to digital citizenship, simply have an advice article printed out for parents and caregivers to take home with them.

7. Address parent concerns with a school-wide presentation.

By giving families an opportunity to ask questions, get advice, and voice their concerns about kids' media use, schools can strengthen the relationship between educators and families. Let your school leadership team or PTA know about Common Sense's ready-made presentations to use at school-hosted events for parents and families. Presentation topics include choosing quality family media, learning with technology, cyberbullying, social media, mental health, and more.
Family Engagement Resources

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7 Easy Ways to Get Families on Board with Digital Citizenship | Common Sense Education

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Whether you're teaching digital citizenship lessons on your own or are including them as part of a district-wide program, getting families involved and on board is essential. We know student learning is strengthened when families and educators are on the same page. Families can reinforce the lessons through conversations and expectations at home.

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If students don't learn these important skills (digital empathy, authenticity, collaboration) by performing the tasks themselves then it will be just another abstract idea that only become real when they run into problems. Using an app like See Saw opens the door for discussion and encourages authentic learning of Digital Citizenship skills. What I like most about this app as referenced in the article "Don't Teach Digital Citizenship-Embed It" is that it allows for the addition of media to be accessible within a classroom feed. The public nature of this makes students really think about what they post. I also like that students can post their creations and then discuss together to learn how to produce positive feedback. This positive feedback in turn promotes positive learning experiences and therefore make them good digital citizens:).

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Catching them in the act (Melanie Howard)

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Catching them in the act (Melanie Howard)

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Loved the suggestion from the Digital Citizenship in Two Minutes or Less article to catch a student being kind/helpful, then asking their permission to share the interaction on your class twitter account. Real life good citizenship = positive digital citizenship

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Seesaw  - I am a Seesaw ambassador, but have not even considered how powerful it is for teaching digital citizenship.  I love the idea discussed in the article "Don't Teach Digital Citizenship - Embed it!.  It is on my game-plan list for this school year.

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As experienced teachers, we've been conditioned to reach for curriculum when we have something new to bring to the classroom. But as digital age educators, we also know that kids do best when they can learn something authentically, by figuring out their own answers to real-world problems that are relevant to their lives. You can't teach everything this way, of course, but some concepts - especially those that students will use in their day-to-day lives, now and in the future - lend themselves well to the authentic learning approach.

It was a major a-ha moment when I realized that digital citizenship is one of those things. As one of the ISTE Standards for Students, digital citizenship is a key skill for living and working in a connected world. And I've found that if my students don't learn this important skill set in an authentic way, it will be just another abstract idea that becomes real only when they run into problems down the road. I want to help them avoid those kinds of major mishaps if I can by teaching them how to be good digital citizens now.

The other great thing about authentic learning is that you don't need to devise a separate unit to learn a subject. In fact, I realized that I was already teaching digital citizenship in my classroom. I didn't need to add another lesson to my day. I just needed to be more intentional in the way I was already teaching and using technology in the classroom.

For the past two years, my class and I have been using an app called Seesaw: The Learning Journal for our digital portfolios and workflow. Here are some of the app's features that encourage authentic learning of digital citizenship skills:

Classroom feed. Seesaw lets students add just about anything, from pictures and video to projects using other apps, to their digital portfolios. All of this work is visible not only in their individual portfolios, but also on a classroom feed. This means that all students are able to see each other's learning in the classroom, which helps reinforce and augment their learning process. From a digital citizenship perspective, it's also important that the public nature of this feed makes them really think about what they put in their posts, knowing that their peers, their teacher and even their parents will be able to see it.

Teacher approval. I have the power to approve or deny any student submission before it makes it onto the classroom feed. I use this dynamic as a way to set up some useful classroom discussions: What happens when your teacher is no longer there to be your filter? What happens when it's not just your classmates, but your employers who can see your online presence? These are real-life situations presented in a safe place. The is the first step in helping students cultivate a positive digital identity.

Commenting. Students can comment on each other's work - a feature I can choose to turn on or off. I always start the year with commenting in the off position. Why? I've tried allowing commenting right off the bat before, and it failed miserably. Students would make comments like " "Awesome!" " " "Cool!" " Emoji, emoji, emoji. These comments were much more distracting than they were valuable to anyone's learning.

But I know that giving and taking constructive feedback are skills my students will need in the future. So I start out with a lesson that lends itself to thoughtful feedback. During this lesson, we talk about expectations and examples of what we want to learn. Students then post their creations, and we discuss together how to give another student feedback that is both valuable and respectful. I also give them sentence starters, such as, " "Your post taught me that," " " "This made me think ofbecause," " and " "I really liked. Have you thought of?" "

Once we practice as a class a few times, I turn on the commenting feature. Just like the work itself, their comments come to me first for approval or denial. If approved, they post to the classroom feed under the original submission.

Overall, I have been so impressed by my students' ability to give insightful suggestions while keeping their comments respectful. But when I run across a comment I don't want to approve, I have a one-on-one conversation with the student. I show him or her the comment and explain why it is not appropriate or does not meet expectations. Only then do I deny the comment and ask the student to go back and try writing a new one.

Class blog. While the classroom feed is self-contained and limited to only approved viewers, Seesaw also has a blog feature that allows students to connect globally with other classrooms around the world. This is another great opportunity for my students to have authentic discussions about digital citizenship under the guidance of their teacher.

The open blog spurs them to think about their audience before they post and Seesaw even offers tips to help out with this. Posting to a global audience is much different than posting to your peers in the classroom. We discuss how it is important to be clear and concise with our words when we post to this wider audience. My students are also always quick to point out that our readers may not be native English speakers or may be from another culture. We practice by revising each other's posts with these things in mind as well while correcting spelling and vocabulary.

Once we learn how to post on the blog, we move on to how to give feedback and comment in a respectful manner for the global audience. This is when we get to decide what our digital presence will be: What kind of class do we want others to see? Who are we representing when we post on our blog? Ourselves? Our teacher? Parents? Our school? The world?

By having these conversations with my students in an authentic context, I plant the seeds in their brains that will one day remind them to ask these same questions of themselves before writing that blog entry or posting that picture.
Heather Marrs is a third grade teacher and ed tech teacher leader at Eagle Rock Elementary School in southern Oregon. She is a wife and mother of two, who enjoys spending time with family, dancing and all things ed tech. Follow her on Twitter @hmarrs24 Want to learn more about how to teach digital citizenship? Read Digital Citizenship in Action: Empowering Students to Engage in Online Communities by Kristen Mattson.

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Don't teach digital citizenship - embed it! | ISTE

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As experienced teachers, we've been conditioned to reach for curriculum when we have something new to bring to the classroom. But as digital age educators, we also know that kids do best when they can learn something authentically, by figuring out their own answers to real-world problems that are relevant to their lives.

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I teach 2nd and had some challenges of Ss playing games, watching silly videos when suppose to be working, but I asked the older grade level teachers.  Wow!  How frustrating for them.  No wonder so many of the Chromebooks sit in the charging cart and are not used much.  I get it, but I also know that we have to find some answers.  We have discussed many whole group ideas for teaching DC, but I am going to use Edpuzzle and create a some lessons with reflection specific to these offenses.  This will differentiate Digital Citizenship for those Ss that may need more guidance in particular areas.

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Different approaches for different learners (Terrie Nabavi)

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Different approaches for different learners (Terrie Nabavi)

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As we work to integrate the Common Sense Media Curriculum at WPS we have considered our teachers as learners. This includes a multi-layered approach to support teachers as learners through this process. For the self-motivated, the summer link to the website training will be provided. We will also have a face to face meeting and discussion and offer extra personalized sessions to give all of our learners and avenue to find success.

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I love the idea of helping colleagues develop their PLNs. Twitter is an excellent resource, but some of the more reluctant teachers are not there yet. Most of them are on Facebook, though, and there are some powerful professional groups. A few of my favorites are Seesaw for Teachers, Shake Up Learning, MYP Design Teachers, and Teach with Tech. I love this article from Edutopia about using social media to engage our school community.

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School Website

Schools are busy places, and parents need a trusted place to find the right information. But information is not enough -- gone are the days of the website being just a digital brochure. Now it needs to facilitate two-way communication. We just updated our website this year to include these key features:

1. It must be mobile friendly. It must work on phones and tablets as well as desktops. No exceptions.

2. It must be easy to update, preferably automatically. For example, the information we add into our Google calendar automatically updates on our website. For static pages, make sure the content stays current.

3. Link your other social media initiatives on your website. Parents should be able to easily find your official Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube profiles from your webpage. Then use your webpage to share the content from those profiles.

4. The hardest but most important part is that your site must provide a sense of your school's culture. People visiting your school website should feel like they are visiting your campus.

Facebook

Peter Sutton told me in a workshop that "if you are not telling your school's story on Facebook, someone else is." He was right. When I checked, I found that a student had already set up a Facebook page with our name.

Use Facebook to celebrate the great things happening at the school!

Promote sports, arts, and cultural events.

Post blog articles, news items, and announcements.

Publish fundraising goals.

Share educational memes.

Should you use Facebook ads? We found good success in promoting our posts. For a minimal cost, it places them into the top of the timelines for your friends and their friends.

Be sure to monitor your posts. Which posts have more views and likes than others? While it isn't a popularity contest, you want to keep track of whether you are actually reaching your audience. Have more than one person as admin, but don't bring in too many people. Make sure they answer comments and direct messages. What happens when you get a bad comment? If it is inappropriate, we delete it. If it challenges or disagrees with us, we use it as an opportunity to educate and inform both the poster and the public. We will follow this with a private message inviting them to come in and discuss the issue. We also fully support Facebook's requirement that users be 13 or older.

Twitter

Our teachers use Twitter to celebrate what they are doing in their classrooms, ask questions, share resources, and document their learning. It's had a profound effect on our staff. By creating a school hashtag, we are able to thread all of our school-based tweets. I used to think I needed some kind of official Twitter authorization to create a hashtag. You don't. Just make a memorable one that describes your school, and start using it. Twitter use by our staff grew slowly at first. Then we compiled all of the tweets onto our internal digital daily bulletin using our #TISMacao hashtag, and it allowed non-Twitter users to see all of the posts. Twitter use is growing rapidly now! See this blog article for more details. Also, see how staff members Zack Palmer, Louise Phinney, and Nick Chignall are using Twitter.

We are just starting to explore engaging our parents and local community with Twitter, as well as reaching out to a global audience.

LinkedIn

At this point, we use LinkedIn to recruit potential teachers and reach the working members of our TIS families. We follow the major employers in our area and develop our networks within the business community. In addition to posting about major school events, we also share articles related to leadership, corporate social responsibility, and team building. We use it to announce our corporate fundraising, sponsorships, and partnerships. We post much differently on LinkedIn than we do on Facebook.

YouTube

I can guarantee that there are already many videos of your school and students on YouTube. Once again, if you are not telling your story, someone else is. Since you may not be able to police the other videos, you should have an official YouTube channel. Check us out on YouTube!

WeChat

A popular platform in Asia, WeChat is the medium TIS uses to connect with our Chinese-speaking families.

Blogs

Remember that old newsletter? We don't have it anymore. At first, we switched to a digital PDF version, but then we got rid of that as well. Now our news is a blog, constantly updated -- we post articles and announcements as they are written. Every teacher has his or her own blog. Administrators have blogs, as we try to lead by example. Our next step is to engage further through integrating our blogs with social media.

Overall, our move toward digital engagement has been successful. Our community is much more connected. Our parents stay informed through our website and Facebook. Our teachers interact and share through Twitter, and we continue to seek new ways to engage our community through the tools that are available to us.

How about you? What ways are you engaging your school community? Which issues concern you about social media?

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Engaging Your School Community Through Social Media

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Schools are busy places, and parents need a trusted place to find the right information. But information is not enough -- gone are the days of the website being just a digital brochure. Now it needs to facilitate two-way communication. We just updated our website this year to include these key features: It must be mobile friendly.

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Be Internet Awesome is Google's educational program to assist students on becoming good digital citizens while learning about phishing, online bullying,  etc. The program is fully aligned with ISTE standards. The lessons and activities use gamification to help students understand the key issues being addressed in each section.

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The Internet Keep Safe Coalition is dedicated to protecting children, families, and schools by assessing, advising, and certifying organizations that collect, use, and share personal information and data that is protected by law.

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Be Internet Awesome is a multifaceted program that includes a fun and free web-based game called Interland and an educational curriculum to teach kids how to be safe and responsible explorers of the online world.

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I really enjoyed the idea shared in the post titled, "Be a Model Digital Citizen" in which Alice Keeler promotes Digital Citizenship with her students by rewarding them with badges.
Everyone likes to be recognized and a badge is a trendy and digitally relevant means by which teachers can recognize their students as they strive towards Digital Citizenship. I am imagining a classroom in which the teacher has set expectations for how students will engage in the digital world and accompanying badges to distribute to students when they reach the given milestones.

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If you are providing a professional development workshop you may want to consider trying to gamify the event. I have created a template using Google Sheets that allows you to create a list of activities the PD participants will engage in. Assign a difficulty level, XP points and a badge to each task. As the participants complete the activities they can check them off and level up!

CLICK HERE for the template

Prior to the PD event you will want to make a copy of the template and rename the title to something specific for the event. Break down each of the agenda items that you want to cover into smaller tasks. This will help the participants to keep on task. Having more things to check off will help them to realize how much they are accomplishing.

One way to provide differentiation in a professional development session is to provide the participants choices. For each task rate the difficulty numerically; one for easy, three for difficult. Automatically this will be translated to difficulty stars. Providing a variety of tasks at different difficulty levels can allow participants to self select activities that will challenge them.

The badges tab of the template has some default badge images. If you would like to create your own badges try saving the images to a Google Sites page. After saving the page edits, right click on the image and choose "Copy image URL." Paste that URL into the badges tab. You can add badges to the list or override the badges provided.

Make sure each badge has an agenda number associated with it. If the badge is not being used, assign it agenda item zero.

By replacing the word edit in the URL with the word copy this will prompt each participant to create a copy of your PD gamify spreadsheet. Create a short URL using http://goo.gl or bit.ly or tinyurl.com. This short URL is what you want to share with participants. They will each have their own copy for them to mark off what they have accomplished.

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Gamify Your PD: Badges and Level Up - Teacher Tech

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If you are providing a professional development workshop you may want to consider trying to gamify the event. I have created a template using Google Sheets that allows you to create a list of activities the PD participants will engage in. Assign a difficulty level, XP points and a badge to each task.

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Personal Fitness Class Discussion (Leslie Williams)

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Personal Fitness Class Discussion (Leslie Williams)

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In the summer school personal fitness class that we offer to high school students, we focus on physical, emotional, and mental health and wellness. The unit discussed this week focused primarily on mental and emotional health with an emphasis on stress (both positive and negative). Included in that discussion was the topic of technology and how it contributes to or takes away stress. The students watched the video attached and had small group as well as whole class discussions about technology's impact in their lives. It was great for them to acknowledge the generalizations the video provided and had them reflecting on their own technology use. It was definitely not a one-time discussion point but one that we will continue to ask about the right tools for them to use to complete tasks and help with stress.

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Inside A Tech-Free School Where Tech Executives Send Their Kids

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After reading up on digital citizenship, empathy can be the catalyst that informs the core of what we are fostering and modeling. If we understand that not attributing authorship has a harmful effect on the authors. If we know that propagating rumors is akin to repeating unverified or false information. And finally, and most importantly, if we know that failure to foster a safe environment online comes down to creating ideal conditions for abuse and pain, then we know that being able to empathize with others can address these core ideas.
Empatico is an incredible platform that we can use to support students ages 6 -11. but the ideas can be used in all aspects of a school community.

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Created by Empatico, the Empathy Framework is a tool that takes the current science one step further by recognizing there are also different levels of application. These include practicing empathy toward oneself, toward others and toward the rest of the world.