2-2 Digital Footprint and Citizenship

• Reflect on your own digital footprint and personal thoughts on digital citizenship, as well as the necessity of teaching students about digital citizenship in school. Also, discuss your thoughts on an appropriate age of introduction to digital citizenship.

My digital footprint is pretty boring and small.  I am very careful about what I share with invisible viewers.  Unfortunately, it took a major scare in my life regarding my oldest daughter that made me very aware of unstable and obsessed people.  My daughter was 13 when she started being stalked by someone who was older.  We went through years of torment before someone finally listened and it stopped.  However, the potential and threat is still there because the offender lives close by. I am very outgoing in person but digitally I am very private.  I have learned a lot about technology and implementation of technology in a very effective and meaningful way.  I have become more aware that technology should have a true purpose or meaning rather than being there just to say it's there.  Again, personally for personal use I do not utilize technology as much as people think but for educational purposes I believe in utilizing it at every opportunity, in every subject and for many different reasons.

Digital citizenship is very important.  People do not realize that what they print is permanent and traceable.  Not to mention that words can be misconstrued because there is no human interaction. Not only can words be damaging but pictures can be as well.  There is also the necessity to give credit when credit is due.  There are many facets to having netiquette and being a good digital citizen.  Making it a point to not say anything you could regret or re-writing something without giving proper credit to the original author is critical.  Anything that you put in digital format can be viewed by many people and you must be proud to say that you wrote that or produced that.

It is necessary to teach students the importance of digital citizenship.  This is something that I believe should be taught as soon as students are allowed to start producing digital work.  The earlier they know the importance of being a good digital citizen the easier it is to avoid unnecessary circumstances.  Students need to be informed that even though something may be deleted such as Myspace and Facebook sites does not mean that it is gone.  We just need to be more cautious and aware of how things are more easily manipulated and misused than ever before.  It comes down to just being "plain smart".