Safe Passage: Teaching Kids to be Safe and Responsible Online
This article seemed pretty self exclamatory to me about the roles of parenting, but for some parents that are not involved in their child's life, it could be a scary reality check. I did agree with the quote that kids think "that if it's on a computer it must be true". They have the illusion of a published document being factual and non-fiction. What most kids are not aware of, is that anyone can publish something on the Internet no matter what their educational background or expertise in that particular topic. One of the biggest ideas that was spread throughout this arcticle was protecting your identity. Having had my own identity stolen in high school, I know the long rode of uphill battles it takes to re-deam your name in crystal clear condition. One thing that I learned new in this article was "File Sharing". I was unaware that you could search for other files on other peole's computers and then make that file your own. Talk about stolen identities and copyright fraud! If you weren't sure about sharing information about your personal identity before, the scare of file sharing should hopefully make the decision for you.
Child Safety on the Information Highway
by: Lawrence J. Magid (2003)
This article is sponsored by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. This article also talked a lot about parenting skills and what to look out for as suspicious behavior of your child as well as ways you can help prevent your child to come across any inappropriate content on the web. This past year, our school had a visit from Robin Stamp who works for the Arizona Attorney General's office in its consumer outreach division. Mr. Stamp came and presented an interactive lesson to the entire 4th grade (using the Smart Board) on the importance of Internet Safety. He also presented the website (NetSmartz4Kids), which helps promote Internet safety and proper rules and guidelines for surfing the web. It is important to remember that no matter how hard we try, the Internet is a large place and can be filled with sites and pop ups that are not okay for our children. Our kids must be aware of these inappropriate sites and must tell an adult if they see anything that makes them feel uncomfortable or isf anyone approaches them on-line in a inappropriate manner. As eductors and parents, it is our job to do everything in our power to protect our kids, but we can't be looking over their shoulder every second, so it is up to them to act "streetsmart" and to make wise judgement calls when it comes to the Internet.
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3 comments:
What a great opportunity for your students to have a guest speaker come in and talk about internet safety. Hopefully, they will take away a better sense of whats ok on the net and what to be wary of when using the internet.
There are so many parents that are completely checked out of what their children are doing. Some are just happy that their kid is out of the room, not bugging them, being quiet, that they "let sleeping dogs lie". I know it sounds awful to put it that way, but it's true. Parenting is not for the weak or lazy, and by the time kids get to the age of surfing the web, many parents are thinking their job is done. Au contraire mon frere! In order for kids to truly be safe online, it takes vigilance on the part of parents.
Amanda, you are quite a poignant writer. I agree with you that we have got to keep our kids "street smart" in the technology age. Unfortunately it's hard to know what kids have been exposed to or taught by their parents. Furthermore, you run the risk of telling them information their parents either don't agree with or didn't want their kids to know. Alternatively, some parents blame you for not doing enough to safeguard their children. As an educator, we are all too often caught between a rock and a hard place.
Do you have contact information for that speaker that came to your school? I think he would be great at the middle school acros the street from my campus. Let me know.
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