Kids Today ... are they Digital Citizens?

Given that it was a 3-day work work for me, my dealings with inappropriate Facebook and text messages were significantly more than normal.  Three in the three days.  Typically, I might have one or two a month, if that.  To boot, all of the incidents occurred during non-school hours, mostly at home or via cell messages.  Yet, these issues creep into the school day because kids are scared or upset and parents are worried about the behavior.

For the people that came forward this week about disturbing electronic communications (both children and parents), I salute them.  Sure, several educators this week spent a great deal of time addressing these issues and will continue to do so next week and beyond.  As educators, we know that a child's learning goes beyond "the 3 Rs". 

However, the best people to monitor and influence/guide our youth's behavior are our parents.  Parents should be having open discussions with their children about what they post online and how they use their cell phone.  Who are the texting?  What are they texting?  Do they send pictures via their phone to others and what are those pictures?  What are their posts on Facebook?  Sure, children of a certain age need to have some level of privacy, but that doesn't mean that everything they do on their phone or computer is private.  In fact, it is not.  What our youth sometimes fail to recognize is that what they do online could quickly become painfully public.

The incidents this week I believe are nothing more than behavior we would have seen without technology; they were just easier to accomplish via this media.  This is where my real worry lies.  In times past, it was more difficult to engage in these behaviors.  20 or 30 years ago, this difficulty would cause some kids to think twice about what they were doing.  Today, not so much.  Sadly, we see examples everyday of adults with the same transgressions. 

If you are a parent, learn how you can help your child to use technology wisely.  Common Sense Media has some great resources for this.  Encourage your child's school to educate our youth on Digital Citizenship (i.e. appropriate, safe, secure, responsible, literate behavior online or via cell technology).