Dive Brief:
- Middle schoolers in Montgomery County, MD, will get four hours of digital citizenship instruction this year, with their younger and older peers being added to the program over the next two years.
- The Washington Post reports the initiative comes out of a partnership with Common Sense Education, a nonprofit that offers a turnkey curriculum to help schools prepare students to use technology responsibly and stay safe online.
- A 2013 effort in the county’s public schools focused on online civility following negative comments on social media directed at former superintendent Joshua Starr and other district officials.
Dive Insight:
Every school should be conducting some type of digital citizenship education during the school year. Even schools that do not have bring-your-own-device or 1:1 programs ask students to use computers to complete class assignments. Most middle and high schoolers today have their own phones. Many schools have had to deal with murky lines concerning cyberbullying when it comes to where administrators should step in and discipline bad behavior.
It is not enough to distribute student handbooks that outline good digital citizenship. Lessons about critical thinking should be embedded in traditional classes as students learn about online research methods and elementary “stranger danger” lessons can be extrapolated to help students think about being safe online. Cyberbullying awareness is important, but it should not be the only element of comprehensive digital citizenship education.
