Real and Digital Citizen

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So after reading and watching the video, the major point that i picked up was a more connected communication with everyone. The article had a focus of classes but the video was focused on communication as a whole.  Social media is a strong tool but when teaching a new generation about a tool that about connection it is better to mimic that communcation with students.  This week i have been wondering about the effectiveness of this method of teaching and the article touches on that why don’t we let people learn this as they go? i grew up in the internet and have plenty of memories of learning all the skills i have now but i was thinking that everyone was the same, that this how people learned about the internet, the article really shed the light that not everyone was willing to learn that way and professors can help those who fall behind or need some guidance to catch up with those who are savants at social media. also the power of a few to help the many, for one of my examples i would point to an old video of a tradition that was created on Youtube by the vlogbrothers, the Decrease of World Suck and it shows the true power that the article and the video are talking about. Social media is usually deemed to be mundane by most “traditional methods” but Social media has had the power to bring down shows, call to attention different topics and brought people together.

Being a Digital Citizen

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Hey Guys! For this week’s blog we needed to connect two works that are associated with digital citizenship. One source was a Tedtalk by Michael Wesch and an article titled Turning Students into Good Digital Citizens by John K. Waters.

One things that immediately popped out to me after reading the article and watching the Tedtalk was that both hit on this point of actually ENGAGING in social media outside of normal communication. In the Tedtalk Mr. Wesch talks about how social media is one of the only forms of media that allows for two-way conversations. What he means by that is when TVs first came out the programs were written by the few to be watched by the many; however, with the invention of social media almost everyone can participate online and have a voice to speak their own opinions. In connection with the article it draws a point on how the idea of literacy in the 21st century is going to change from simple reading and writing to having the ability to communicate effectively online.

Another aspect of both the article and video that caught my attention was the how sharing information has changed. The article says this interesting point that when it comes to participating on social media you have the ability to transcend borders and communicate globally with people that you would have never met any other way. In relation to that the Tedtalk discusses this video on youtube about a man you held up a “free hugs” sign in a mall that went viral. After the video went viral many people were copying what the man did all over the world and if it was not for social media and the video being shared on a global scale the world never would have known about this man and what he did.

One example that I have was something I found on twitter last night that has to do with hate terrorist attacks in Paris. You can find the video here. The video is about a muslim man in Paris who puts up a sign that says “Hug me if you trust me, I’m told I’m a terrorist”. This video really hit me hard because since the attacks many Muslim people have been discriminated against simply because they share the same religion as a group of fanatics. This link; however, is my example on how things can be shared across the world since I never would have say it if a friend of mine never retweeted it.

Another example that I found that pertains to engaging in social media that I found was simply this class #UNIV349DC. In our group discussions in class we have learned that members of our class have been able to communicate with people all over the world to gather knowledge on our topics. Students have talked to people who are directly affected by the refugee crisis and even people that are suffering discrimination for being part of the LBGQT (I think that is right) community. If it was not for this class and having us engage on social media for our topics none of us would have ever made this connections that we have made online.

 

Week 13: We Are The Change

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This week we were asked to read an article and watch a video, which both were about how to have/create an effective digital citizenship, and then we were instructed to compare the two and find some similarities. I found both sources to be really helpful and insightful on what it means to be a good digital citizen and what it takes to get there. A common point that I took from these was that students need to be more informed about the input they have on the world. It is being brought up more in higher education on how to use our sources to make a difference, but both state that even younger children who are growing up with all these technological changes should be introduced to these things. All students have the ability to write papers and learn basics, we need to keep this, but also expand it with the world that is growing. Another thing that I took away from these was that we need to have conversations. Like I said, anyone can write a paper and turn it in, and it could be an amazing paper, but what happens to those thoughts when they aren’t shared with the world? We need to have conversations. These conversations do not necessarily have to be filled with the most sophisticated level of intelligence and facts, but it should be impactful with thoughts outside the box. When we share and collaborate thoughts it can only make us more versatile, this is what we need. The students of today and the future can make the difference. We are the difference. We need to be educated on how to get our thoughts out there so we can be the little bird who shows everyone that with one thought and some action, we can make the changes that we world needs.

Learning to be Good Digital Citizens

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Hello everyone! This week’s blog will be like the cherry on top of the dessert. In this blog I will be analyzing the magical world of the internet and how being a good digital citizen has become essential. After watching the video ” From Knowledgable to Knowledge-Able” and reading the article ” Turning Students into Good Digital Citizens” I was able to find very interesting themes that linked back to my experience of searching a professional topic on social media. Both the reading and video gave a really clear and important theme of how important the internet and the different virtual ways to communicate have become essential in our lives. The way that internet has revolutionized our way of living and the way we now collaborate with the entire world has make a huge impact on the power we know have with any electronic device. Being a good digital citizenship will have a big influence on how beneficial we use all the technology we have in the present and how beneficial it will be in the future generations. The article explained how being cautious of how we use the different social medias is part of being a good digital citizen; although that’s only a part of it. Utilizing the social medias to start a movement and make a difference in anything is a great example of how collaboration is essential to be a good digital citizen. There have been tremendous movements done through social media to help different countries in nature tragedies; for instance, there was a lot of examples shown in the video like programs to notified the world of specific updates when a country is experiencing a tragic event. I was really amazed by the information provided by both the video and article. The internet has allow us to change entirely our way of communication and I  believe that by being good digital citizenships we will better our future regarding social media and the internet.

Tech Voices

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Both the video and article talk about how technology is advancing. And that we should implement using it in classes to share information and knowledge as well as engage . They also both put forth the thought to share and collaborate on an idea which happens when things are shared among people who notice or have the same concerns.

How ever the article goes into the aspect of being a disciplined digital citizen. School has given us technology to use for creative purposes but they haven’t taught us how to be responsible while using it, that was left up to us. And that is where the problem begins. The younger  generations after us have been much more irresponsible because no one has really warned them. For example people spreading rumors, cyber bullying, and sharing too much with people. They haven’t learned to think critically.

And still some people don’t think critically before posting things online adults included.

The upside to being a responsible digital citizen is that things that matter to people around the world can be shared and solutions to global problems can be solved or reduced in time.

Creating Digital Citizens

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This week in #Univ349DC, we go back to basics in a sense and discuss what it means to be a good digital citizen in education. The 13 weeks that have passed since embarking on this journey has increased my knowledge base and level of understanding of digital citizenship, so I hope to have a few more relevant and insightful thoughts than in my earlier posts.

The assignment this week is to compare two evaluations on the involvement of digital citizenship in our education systems: a TED talk featuring the thoughts of Michael Wesch and an article written by John K. Waters after the original airing of Wesch’s TED talk, Turning Students into Good Digital Citizens.

The common themes that I were able to find between the 2 were as follows:

The ubiquitous nature of the internet.

The internet is EVERYWHERE.

Wesch’s thoughts on this aspect were stated as “There’s something in the air – nearly the entire body of human knowledge.”

In Waters’s article, this same point  is made by saying that “the internet transcends physical borders” – our engagement has expanded over time to become an unavoidable aspect of daily life.

The limitations of teaching with technology vs. teaching technology.

Via the link in this bullet point, Wesch finds that we aren’t teaching technology to students, we are using it as a means to end in education rather than respecting it as its own entity that could provide valuable contributions.

Waters’s article sees it as important to remember that students are “producers and managers of information and perspectives,” a concept entirely missing from the curriculum in schools as  evidenced by the following image. dcwrong

There is more than the basic safety rules outlined above that we should be teaching students. The article calls for lecturing on “participation in the world-wide conversation” to start.

I personally see this oversight in the educational system as comparable to teaching a student the rules of how to do a math problem without checking for understanding and demonstrating how it can be applied in creative ways to address something bigger.

The responsibility of educators to incorporate digital citizenship into the curriculum.

*This is so important!*

At any level of schooling, the role of an educator is so much more than to teach the basics, they are responsible for sending a student out of their classroom more knowledgeable than when he came in. It is therefore, irresponsible to not teach digital citizenship when it is a constant presence in the lives of all students today.

Wesch simply says that “We can’t live the next 100 years as we have the past 100 years.” As the world changes, so does our knowledge base and platforms and the education of our students should reflect that.

Waters points out via Susan Metros that “we have a responsibility to give them, not only the skills, but the theory and the context to understand the ethical implications of media.”

The ability to foster creativity and growth if used properly.

The possibilities here are endless. The greatest minds of our times could have been even greater with access to the resources that we have now, so that leads me to believe that some of the greatest minds are yet to come. It is important to encourage students.

Waters suggests creating assignments that require the use of 21st century skills as well as the time-hardened skills like reading, writing, and arithmetic.

Wesch seeks to motivate his students to not seek meaning in college, as so may of us are inclined to do, but to create it. “You create yourself, you create the world,” he says.

Piggybacking off of the idea of motivating students, educators can be motivated in return and if the conversation is open, students will contribute ideas. Edward Brazee outlines 5 lessons that he learned from his students about digital citizenship. These lessons were learned in the course of working with students for one year, and he discovered what his students found important. His format of “It’s not (blank), but (blank)” when outlining the views of parents and teachers vs. the views of the children they work with, I found to be spot on. Another point that I didn’t list above but fits better here, is that the internet presents a wide variety of possibilities and perspectives. Brazee learned to not tell students what their perspectives should be, but to engage them in conversation about their own perspectives as well as guide them to other resources.

In conclusion, there is so much work to be done on teaching digital citizenship to our students. But similar to the birds in Wesch’s Aztec story , those of us who know what needs to be done can only make our individual efforts until we inspire others and change the narrative.

 

 

The post Creating Digital Citizens appeared first on Professor In Training.

Blog Post Week 13. Making Students Knowledge-ABLE

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Hey everyone! So wow, I don’t know about y’all but that Ted Talk was extremely inspiring and had so many great points. The article was great too, but I just thought the presentation was so well put together.

Anyways, one of the key main points between the article and the video, was that students are a central part of the future, and it is our educator’s job to educate us on how we can best succeed in the present timeline. That means utilizing social media. Some teachers try to refrain from using social media, but that is ridiculous. The video makes a great point when Michael Wesch shows that most of his students have used social media websites in class. It’s going to happen. So why should educators try to refrain from utilizing social media? We need to be taught how to be good digital citizens, because social media is such a powerful tool. The article discusses how physical boundaries are nonexistent because of social media, and it is true. The example from the video of Kenya during 2007 and the terrible earthquake in Haiti were great examples of how social media actually saves lives. The Marine Corp soldier talked about how powerful of a tool it was, and it is absolutely true. The article and the video definitely share this point in common, when they talk about how powerful and useful digital media and teaching students to utilize these digital tools.

Another key point that the article and the video shares is when they discuss how digital media does not stop critical thinking, but they actually further critical thinking into creative thinking and useful participation. This is evident in the video when Michael opens a Google Doc for his students to discuss what it is like being a student during present times. All of his students used in, and there were more than 350 edits on the google doc. That shows students were actively participating, critically thinking, and socially communicating with each other. The Google Doc was a tremendous example to show how students communicate now. Here students can openly share their thoughts, when in the past, some students would never be able to get their voice heard. All of the professors in the article discuss how it is necessary to teach students how to use social media, and that is because it increases critical thinking skills. One person cannot change much by themselves, but by working as a team they can. The point from the article about how schools already teach us how to read and write, why shouldn’t they teach us how to be better digital citizens and how to use social media? It improves literacy, our critical thinking skills, and most of all teaches us how to connect with others via this useful tool.

Overall, I think both the video and the article made many good points. We are taught how to be good people in normal society, and it needs to be pushed to be a good citizen inside the digital web.

Digital Citizen

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This week my class and I were to read an article about Digital Citizenship and watch a video about being knowledgable about technology and how to properly use it. Here are links to both.

https://thejournal.com/Articles/2012/04/09/Rethinking-digital-citizenship.aspx?Page=4

I liked the digital citizenship article. It talked a lot about what it meant to be a good person online and not only that but what it meant to also participate online. It talked about critical thinking and the importance about the knowledge students take from the classroom and being able to use that in the digital world. I don’t think a lot of teachers even realize the concepts the students are learning can be applied to the digital world. Furthermore what the teachers should be teaching their students to become better digital citizens. I don’t know if the teachers realize and maybe they do, that their students are living in a world in which they must become or learn how to be a good person online in order to be a good person in real life. It has the same principles.

In the video the speaker talked a lot about being innovative. He spoke about what the students’ needs, which I think some of us forget. It was interesting to me to read all these posting about what it meant to be a student or the habits we take, and how I related to almost all of it. I knew what it was like to have a professor not know my name, or only read 48% of the reading material, and not have a fellow classmate skip class the majority of the time. I knew and experienced all of this and much more. And it was great to have someone bring this up because I feel that a lot of this gets bypassed, it gets skipped. Teachers, and not only teachers, are not listening to the voices they are trying to teach how to speak.

The speaker went  over not how to be knowledgeable but how to be knowledge-able. And I think that is a clear difference. I can do this instead of I know of it. That should be taught more and it ties into the reading by being a good digital citizen in that being a good digital citizen one also needs to contribute; not only to be kind and courteous but to pass on knowledge. Engage, be mindful, helpful, share, and laugh.

What it means to be a Digital Citizen

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For this week we are leaning off our group projects and instead looking at what it means to be digital citizens and how we can use social media in our favor. We were given two sources to look at, the first was a news post Turning Students into Good Digital Citizens and the second was a video From Knowledge to Knowledge-Able.

The first post was about how we could teach our students how to use the internet effectively. How students can learn how to use social media in a way that could benefit them with information rather than just jibber jabber. The idea is for students to learn that social media can benefit them and how they can use it. That was the main point, because of course students know how to use Facebook, so to speak, but what teachers want to do is have their students use it as a tool. To really start thinking critically about what can be said and how it can be used. To use social media in a way that they are being professional. Also how teachers can and should use these tools in their classrooms. That it is not only the students job to engage but for the teachers to help the students get started and to understand how it can be used.

The second post talked about how we know how to use technology already, but we need to learn how to use technology in a way that will benefit us. The speaker, Michael Wesch, also said that we are all connected. People all over the world can communicate. We weren’t able to do that a few years ago, and now someone from the U.S can talk to someone in Italy easily. He said “technologically” we are able to connect with others through cyber space, but it is actually hard to connect with others. There is a process of getting views and being shared. “Technologically” it is easy to do, but technically it isn’t. Not only that but our students are not engaged, they are a bit ignored. He even did a study with his class about how it feels like to be a student. Then he talked about how we could use technology to help change that.

So both of these posts indicate how important it is for teachers to represent these tools to their students. How technology is changing how we see the world. It is a much smaller place, we are all now connected. Most importantly how technology can be used to benefit ourselves and the world.

Another Look at “Digital Citizenship” (Blog 2)

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The assignment for this week strayed from our usual topic. I was not required to do more research or engaging in social media, instead the assignment leaned more towards traditional academics. I read an article titled “Turning Students into Good Digital Citizens”  and watched a TED Talk titled “From Knowledgeable to Knowledge-Able.” The next step is for me to compare the two and bring in examples to support my ideas.

In summary, these two sources are talking about the difference of being present in a world of media and knowledge as opposed to being a participant in a world of media and knowledge. Digital citizenship is more than just being present online. Rather, people have a responsibility to participate in a meaningful way in the hope of making the world better. The Internet is extremely powerful because it allows people a public voice that was not as accessible before the Internet. I talked about the feeling of a “void” when posting on the Internet. But in reality, even if I personally feel that my content isn’t being read, it is still on the Internet for anyone and everyone to see. The Internet may feel like a void, but my content is still accessible; my voice is still free to affect the world in whatever small or large amount that it does.

This is true for all users of the Internet; it is not exclusive to content-creators. The megaphone that the Internet can be is available to anyone who has access to it. If users of the Internet choose to put content onto the Net—whether it’s by a blog post (like this class), videos on YouTube, photos on Instagram, tweets on Twitter, or statuses on Facebook—then their voice is put out for the world to hear. Digital citizenship calls us to use this access to this public voice to good, meaningful use.

There are some instances that I’ve witnessed on the Internet where the collected voices of online-users were used in order to help a person or a cause. Earlier this year, a young student named Ahmed Mohamed, 14-years old, made a clock and it was mistaken for a bomb. He was arrested by Texas law enforcement and called a threat to his school. After the outrage of the racial profiling done against Ahmed, social media exploded with support for the student.

ahmed

The hashtag #IStandWithAhmed became widely used by people on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram (as far as I know). Eventually, the collective voices and the hashtag became so viral that reactions from big names everywhere were responding. President Obama, himself, even tweeted from the @POTUS account on Twitter! Eventually, Ahmed was released and was able to receive all the support that was given to him by the public.

ahmed 2

Another example that I can think of that shows how people on the Internet can use their voice to help another is by the website GoFundMe. GoFundMe is similar to the website Kickstarter in the aspect that both websites ask for donations from people. While Kickstarter is for creative projects looking for backers, GoFundMe is more for personal funding such as medical bills. Below is an image of a man named Matt who is looking to get skin removal surgery after a losing weight has left him with an excess of skin. I remember seeing a video that he posted of himself shirtless to share himself and his story. He let himself be vulnerable and to promote health and self-love. His video gained a lot of attention by people on social media, and he was featured in several magazines including People. I found that he started a GoFundMe in order to help himself in a way that he cannot financially do on his own.

matt gofundme

Anyone who could donate would do so, and if someone could not donate, they would at the very least share it so that their cause gets a boost and hopefully reaches people who can donate to them. While the aid is most beneficial from people who can donate, people on the Internet still have the power and the choice to share the link to help other people.

As millennials, we grew up during the transition to where the Internet became very big and very fast in a short span of time. We know the affect that the Internet carries already, and that affect can be passed onto us. We can’t sit idly by on a media that is so large and can help and change so much. As the article and the video both stated in their own ways, we have the tools to participate, but we must make the effort to do so.