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© 2012 MediaSmarts
Jane TallimCo-Executive DirectorMediaSmarts
Presentation by Jane Tallim at the Building Healthy Relationships: Alberta’s Bullying Prevention Strategy Think Tank, June 11, 2012.
Not for public distribution.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Vision: To ensure children and youth have the critical thinking skills to engage with media as active and
informed digital citizens.
mediasmarts.camediasmarts.ca
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© 2012 MediaSmarts
Reflect Deconstruct Analyze Reconstruct
The educational approach of MediaSmarts is grounded in the pillars of media literacy. In the case of digital culture, this involves providing opportunities for reflection, where students examine issues relating to online media; deconstruction, where they ask critical questions so they can fully understand the potential and the pitfalls of various platforms and technologies; and reconstruction, a creative process where they use technology to share their own perspectives.
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© 2012 MediaSmarts
USE * UNDERSTAND * CREATEUSE
Skills and competencies for digital literacy can generally be categorized under three main principles: Use, Understand, and Create.
Use ranges from basic technical know-how to more sophisticated skills for accessing and using knowledge resources and emerging technologies.
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* UNDERSTAND *
Understand: is the critical dimension of digital literacy: the skill set that helps us make informed decisions about what we do and encounter online. These essential skills -- where youth consider the ethical aspects of their online relationships and actions -- need to be taught as soon as kids begin to go online.
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* CREATE *
The ability to create with digital media is what moves us from being passive consumers, to active contributors to digital society. Creation – whether in the form of blogs, tweets, wikis or any of the hundreds of avenues for expression and sharing online -- is at the heart of communication, collaboration and innovation. It is also at the heart of facilitating pro-social use of technology by youth.
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Citizens in the digital age
► Keep themselves safe
► Do the right things
► Take responsibility for others and the digital community
(Willard, N. 2008)
Digital literacy forms the foundation for digital citizenship, which encompasses the responsible, ethical and safe use of digital technology by young people as members of society – and as citizens in a global community. Think of this as character education for the digital age.
Part of this character education focuses on now networked technologies impact relationships, which, of course, includes online bullying and harassment.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Cyberbullying Overview
► Someone is identified
► Intent to harm
► Likelihood or fear of repetition
(Peplar/Craig)
Deb Peplar and Wendy Craig of PrevNet have identified key features of electronic bullying where a perpetrator:
• Identifies a target
• with the intent to harm that individual
• and there is a high likelihood or fear that it will be repeated
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Verbal/Emotional Abuse
Social Exclusion Spreading Rumours
Making Private Things Public
Cyberbullying Overview
When schoolyard bullying behaviours such as verbal abuse, social exclusion, spreading rumours, and making private things public take place through pervasive and immediate networked technology, the effects can be significantly more devastating and more lasting than for face-to-face bullying.
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Cyberbullying Overview
Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children
26%
44%
Cross, E.J., R. Piggin, J. Vonkaenal-Platt and Douglas , T. (2012)
We know that there is considerable overlap between online and offline bullying, with twice as many youth who are persistently cyber-bullied saying the bullying started offline and then continued online, as those who say it started online (26 %). PREVNet estimates that only 1% of youth are victimized solely through networked technology.
And we know that the belief that most cyberbullying is anonymous is incorrect: a study of girls who had been cyberbullied showed that only one-fifth of them did not know the identity of the perpetrator who was most often a friend, classmate or people that they had met online.
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Cyberbullying Overview
Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children
When it comes to gender, although girls are more likely than boys to perpetuate and be victimized by cyberbullying, recent research indicates that boys are catching up, becoming increasingly more likely to be perpetrators or targets as they get older.
A high percentage of both boys and girls report witnessing cyberbullying – which as we know has important implications in developing responses to this issue.
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Cyberbullying Overview
“Youth say that 95% of what happens online was intended as a joke and only 5% was intended to harm. It is clear that youth are underestimating the level of harm associated with cyberbullying.”
Jennifer Shapka, University of British Columbia
One other important point to keep in mind as we look at the quotes from youth is that most don’t really relate to the idea of cyberbullying – this is a label coined by adults. They prefer to describe these incidents as ‘drama’ or ‘starting something’ or ‘pranking’ or ‘trolling’. That said, youth often underestimate how harmful these incidents can be, brushing off much of this kind of negative behaviour as ‘just joking’.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Young Canadians Research, 1999-2004
Approximately 12,000 students in grades 4-11
Funded by Government of Canada
Phase I – 2000/2001
Phase II – 2004/2005
The findings that I’m about to share with you are from the latest phase of our Young Canadians in a Wired World research.
This ongoing project, which started in 2000, gathers qualitative and quantitative data on kids’ use of networked technologies and the impact this has on their daily lives.
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Young Canadians in a Wired World: Phase 111
Teacher Interviews Parent & Youth Focus Groups
With funding from the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, we started the qualitative work for Phase III last year, with interviews with a purposive sample of teachers from across the country and focus groups in Calgary, Toronto and Ottawa with children ages 11-12, 13-14 and 15-17, and parents of kids in these age groups.
Both reports can be found on the MediaSmarts website and we will be following up on the themes that have emerged in a national survey next year.
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2000 Enthusiastic
2004 Irritated
2011 Afraid
The Shifting Landscape: Parents
One thing that leapt out at us when we started analyzing the data from our focus groups was how things have changed over the past decade.
In 2000 the parents we talked to were enthusiastic about the Internet, seeing it as a tool to help their kids learn and get ahead. Most trusted their kids to make good choices and figured they would ask for help if needed.
By 2004, the Internet had become source of frustration for parents, who felt they were spending way too much time refereeing their kids on the family computer –which seemed to be used more for playing and socializing online instead of doing homework.
Fast forward to 2011, parents are finding it difficult if not impossible to keep up with the many different points of entry where their kids can go online. A larger and more significant shift – for not all, but most – is that the Internet is no longer a benefit or an irritant: it’s a source of fear.
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… we have to stay on top of it, because if we don't, the moment we don't we'll lose them, and they'll have gone too far and then we can't get them back.
(Toronto parent)
Fear
The parents we talked with alluded to unknown and unknowable dangers facing their children online – in the words of a Toronto parent:
… we have to stay on top of it, because if we don't, the moment we don't we'll lose them, and they'll have gone too far and then we can't get them back.
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I monitor everything, down to her cell phone, down to everything.
(Calgary parent)
Surveillance
The end result is that invading children’s privacy is now considered an imperative of good parenting, with many adults telling us they ‘spy’ on their children, both directly and through surveillance intermediaries like family members.
Others spoke of reviewing every text, every wall post and every email, to make sure their children were not in a position to take a risk or make a mistake in judgment –like this Calgary mother.
There were parents who still trusted their children, but they were definitely in the minority. And even though the parents who spied on their kids weren’t exactly happy doing so, they truly felt they had no choice but to spy.
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I don't think [teachers] really accept that there's really that many perverts out there. I think they need to be proactive with the students. Don't teach them how to access this and get to there and do that, that's all wonderful, they'll figure that out or talk to friends. They need to talk more about the dark side.
(Calgary mother)
Some of the parents felt that schools and teachers were not helping the situation.
In their minds, schools were the ones sending their kids online for homework, without teaching them about the pitfalls, or what this Calgary mother referred to as the “dark side” of the Net.
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The Shifting Landscape: Youth
2000 Private, anonymous, free
2004 Dodging parents and teachers
2011 Totally monitored
When it comes to the kids, there’s also been a significant shift in how they talk about the Internet.
In 2000, kids saw it as a completely private space that adults couldn’t enter or control - one of the few places where they could explore the adult world anonymously.
By 2004, they were fully integrating online technologies into their personal lives, and using them to try out different identities, deepen their connections to their friends and follow their own interests - sometimes anonymously, and sometimes not.
In 2011, we found a completely different discourse, with young people very aware that they are living in a fishbowl where they are monitored 24-7 by parents, teachers, schools, corporations and even peers.
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Youth perspectives
Yes, it’s my father’s greatest concern. He has to have my passwords for everything I do. He's afraid of cyber-bullying, so he has to have them at all times.
(13-14 boy, Ottawa)
For the youth, parental monitoring is the price of admission – with many of their parents demanding passwords to their smart phones and online accounts and insisting they “friend” them on Face Book so they can see what’s going on.
Equating this kind of surveillance to stalking was commonplace among our teenaged participants, with most using privacy settings and other methods to block nosy family members from their online lives.
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“There should be a point where parents will just like, leave you alone and not have to know every single thing about you. Like I get, the protection side, but they don’t need to know every single thing ...”
(13-14 girl, Toronto)
Youth perspectives
Even though most credit their parents with good – although misguided – intentions, the youth we talked to still find it annoying.
As one Toronto youth puts it, “There should be a point where parents will just like, leave you alone and not have to know every single thing about you. Like I get, the protection side, but they don’t need to know every single thing about you.”
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I think the thing too is that, with my parents, if anything happened to me, they’re going to stand behind me and they're going to make sure this person that's bullying me stops.
(15-17 girl, Calgary)
Youth perspectives
Interestingly, though, despite parents’ fears, kids will go to them when they need help.
Typically, young people will first try to handle situations on their own, knowing that –as this girl in Calgary said -- their parents have their backs if they need help.
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What worked:
► Not surveillance
► Adults in the background, not over shoulders
► Supportive but not intrusive: on call when needed.
Youth perspectives
This was one of the most important messages from the youth: that what worked for them wasn’t surveillance – it was knowing that adults who cared for them were in the background, maybe not paying attention or knowing everything, but ready on call to come in and help, and impose boundaries when necessary.
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Alicia: I figure if I wouldn't want my parents to see it, I won't post it. Like, I’m not going to post a bunch of, a very vulgar status, with lots of swears in it. My parents are on Facebook and I don’t block them from anything, so I’m not going to.
(15-17 girls, Calgary)
Youth perspectives
Not surprisingly, the teens who actually shared the details of their lives with their parents were those who were not routinely monitored.
Trust in this case is mutual; the parents trust their children to behave appropriately and the children respond by providing them with access to their Facebook pages.
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Taylor: Yeah, they like block it unless like the teacher puts their password or something. Hannah: But there are like, ways to like cheat it. Hannah: Yeah, my classmates do that. Hannah: Yeah, like you do like the http... Ryan: No, there's some other website that you use...
(11-12-year-olds, Calgary)
Youth perspectives
For all the youth, monitoring in school is a given, with everything they do online tracked.
In fact during this part of the conversation in all the groups they happily shared the latest ways to get around their school’s blocks and filters. Especially with the 13-14 year olds, it was a mini hacking convention!
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…Teachers should be allowed to read what we write, and if it’s inappropriate, they can make us take it down, but they shouldn’t just block us out from it…
(13-14-year old, Calgary)
Youth perspectives
But the real problem with monitoring, from our participants’ point of view, was the school’s desire to police their interactions with their peers in order to ensure that they did not “swear” or write something “inappropriate”. Rather than giving them the opportunity to communicate and then correcting them when they went off course, schools created an environment where any communication between students was perceived as risky. In order to manage the risk, everything they did and said had to be captured so it could be controlled.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
► one-time interventions
► scare tactics
► stereotypes
► zero-tolerance policies
What doesn’t work
When it comes to cyberbullying, we know that many well-intentioned school-based interventions aren’t working. In fact, according to PREVNet -- about one in seven bullying prevention programs actually make the problem worse.
Schools have to be careful not to embrace interventions that reinforce mistaken beliefs about bullying or fail to take school culture into account. Common anti-bullying efforts that have been shown to be ineffective include one-time interventions, such as student assemblies; frightening students with possible consequences they find improbable or can’t relate to; embracing common beliefs about bullying that gloss over the complicated nature of many bullying relationships; and inflexible zero-tolerance policies.
For whatever the reason, we found that for the majority of youth we spoke with, anti-bullying responses just weren’t working.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Well, with us it's, our inside jokes, we like post to Facebook pictures, friend goes in comments like ‘aw, you ugly girl’.
(15-17 girl, Calgary)
Youth perspectives
Youth believe that, like parents, teachers and school administrators don’t “get”youth culture.
This is especially true when it comes to zero tolerance policies in schools, where many youth complained about adults misinterpreting comments between friends both online and offline as being bullying or racist.
In essence, the same surveillance at school that is meant to protect them in reality pathologizes much of their everyday interactions.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Youth perspectives
I think it goes back to hiding behind the screen. … because they're not face-to-face, they kind of like, feel a little bit more protected … and [can] be a lot more offensive.
(15-17-yr-old boy, Calgary)
We found that the youth we interviewed had a pretty clear understanding of cyber-bullying.
For example, Charles told us: I think it goes back to hiding behind the screen …because they're not face-to-face they kind of like, feel a little bit more protected …and can be a lot more offensive.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
In real life … you don’t have any record of it, but when it’s, you know, online, you can go back and see it … you can use it as proof, you can be like ‘I have the messages right here, this is what they said, this is what I said.’
(15-17 Calgary)
Youth perspectives
They also pointed out that cyberbullying can sometimes be easier to deal with than school yard bullying because it leaves a digital trail. And how the visibility of online dialogue lets them publically challenge bullies and hold them to account.
The youth we talked to were very knowledgeable and displayed considerable resilience when it came to dealing with many of the things adults worry about and use surveillance to address – they described a number of strategies to avoid objectionable content, cut off ‘creepy’ communications from people they don’t know and deal with bullying.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
All the time, every year they have this big meeting … They're like 'You don't know what this means! You could make people commit suicide!' And they have these people like 'I used to be cyberbullied, it was so sad,' … Every year it's like the same presentation … it's just annoying ...
(11-12 girl, Calgary)
Youth perspectives
It’s important for adults to acknowledge and build on this knowledge and resiliency, because in the eyes of many youth, school-based anti-bullying programs are missing the mark. The sentiments expressed by the 11-12 year-olds shown here were echoed by most of the youth.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
If you go to the teacher, and you tell on this person they’re going to call you a snitch and then your life is just going to be worse than it was when it started.
(13-14, Toronto)
Youth perspectives
Our participants didn’t just find anti-bullying programs annoying or boring. They had real problems with the school’s approach to the problem, and felt quite strongly that the kinds of interventions available in the schools actually tended to escalate conflict. From their point of view, the students were reluctant to confide in their teachers because, even when their teachers told them that they could come to them with problems, their teachers were still obligated to go to the principal, which, according to youth, escalated the situation and made the conflict much worse.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
I don’t want … myself to be in someone else’s phone or computer … Or like, other people showing other people, being like, ‘look at this!’
(15-17, Toronto).
Youth perspectives
The meaning of privacy and publicity in online spaces is consciously negotiated by children and youth, and they have developed a number of social rules about what friends should and shouldn’t do.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Lya: If a girl takes a photo of herself … with a bikini top or anything on like that, automatically they would be called a whatever…
Rebecca: S-L-U-T?
Lya: Yeah. And then a guy – hear this – if a guy …has his shirt of in his photo, he’s good looking and such… But if you’re fat, you’ll be called fat.
Jen: Yeah. [Laughter]
(13-14, Toronto).
Youth perspectives
Although some publicity is socially affirming, public exposure also opens up young people to judgment. This is especially true of girls who post suggestive pictures online or send sexually provocative texts. When boys do the same things, their behaviour is seen as “funny” or a “joke”, but girls who expose too much are subject to high levels of social censure from their peers.
There was also a fair amount of discussion amongst youth of all ages at why girls would ever share provocative pictures of themselves online that might later cause them embarrassment or ridicule. Every group seemed to have an anecdote on what one girl referred to as “being known as “the 'naked picture girl' … potentially forever – or until you graduate.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Diana: I just don’t take stupid pictures that I know could ruin my reputation or something. Leah: I don’t think any of my friends would. Diana: Exactly. And if I take stupid pictures on a camera, then I delete it, right?
(15-17, Toronto).
Youth perspectives
Generally, the youth were very conscious of the potential downside of posting their images online.
They also articulated a clearly defined set of rules about what friends post – and do not post – about friends.
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In response to the question what would your message to your parents and teachers be?
Megan: Um, I know what I'm doing.
Peter: Yeah, that's a good one.
Megan: Yes.
Will: But do you know what you're doing?
13-14 yr-olds Calgary
Youth perspectives
Over all, the message we took heard from youth was this: They are resilient problem-solvers and feel confident that they can deal with unwanted content or situations online.
But at the same time, they also want more trust and guidance from adults to help them do this.
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What do teachers tell us?
What was very interesting was that many of the teachers we interviewed echoed these sentiments.
The teachers identified some key factors that limit our ability to help students build digital literacy skills – that includes online relationships -- and offered some solutions, including the need to:
• provide students with authentic learning opportunities that are enhanced through technological tools;
• position teachers as facilitators and co-learners, instead of “drill and kill”experts;
• focus teacher training on how to use technology to enhance learning and meet curricular outcomes; and
• create reasonable policies and less restrictive filters in schools so that teachers can better help students develop and exercise good judgement.
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“For me it would be so much easier if it were just unblocked and the Board trusted the teachers to show the kids how to actually use this material. That’s how I’d prefer to teach.”
Teachers’ perspectives
One key barrier identified by the teachers we interviewed was how school filters and policies that ban networked devices make it difficult for them to teach students the skills they need and want.
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It’s not like all of a sudden you hit 18, and now you can have autonomy. Students do not learn to make good choices by being told what to do and follow instructions… they have to be given the opportunity to make bad choices as often as good choices.
And, despite what parents think, teachers do want to guide students in the full range of online experiences.
As one teacher puts it: Students don’t learn to make good choices by being told what to do and follow instructions… they have to be given the opportunity to make bad choices as often as good choices, with caring adults there to help them learn from their mistakes.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
“Instead of blocking it, [we should be] finding a way to talk about it and then actually having an open discussion and figuring out what’s right and what’s wrong, what’s appropriate and what’s not.”
Teachers’ perspectives
Teachers in schools where access was restricted noted the irony in the fact that although they are expected to teach students how to deal with offline content and conflict, they are not supported in helping their students do so online.
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“… it even took me a few minutes before I realized I was on a website that was sympathetic to the Nazis. It was phenomenally written, in evil ways. It cloaked the true racist and hatred messages under prose.”
Teachers’ perspectives
An excellent example of this is a teachable moment that came from a secondary teacher out west, when one of his students came across a very subtle hate site while doing research in class.
Instead of shutting it down, the teacher had students closely examine the prose until they began to recognize how the language was inciting hatred. The students were fascinated with the fact that their teacher could see something they couldn’t and they wanted to learn that skill too.
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“Well, we can’t tell anyone our password; the only person we tell our password to is Mrs. X; we want to be safe online; we can only use our first names; we can’t use our last names or our ages or our phone numbers; we have to be careful that when we use pictures online, they’re our pictures, because we can’t use other people’s things.”
Teachers’ perspectives
In more open schools, even the youngest students can start to develop essential digital literacy skills. The comment here came from a kindergarten teacher from out West talking about her 5-year-old students.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
“….in a classroom there’s a lot of trust that would be broken if the students were knowingly recording the conversations of their peers and posting them online.”
Teachers’ perspectives
However, the teachers we interviewed also acknowledged the challenges of integrating networked devices into classroom settings, noting how they can complicate the learning experience when students use them to open up the privacy of the classroom for their own purposes.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
“I don’t walk into my own classroom thinking I’m powerless because now they’re going to film me and put me on YouTube …I maintain my professionalism … But I can see how this is a problem … There are personal boundaries that are not to be crossed.”
Teachers’ perspectives
This loss of control over the boundary between the classroom and the outside world also constrains the teacher’s ability to interact with students in an authentic way, as this teacher notes, it’s not about professionalism; it’s about personal boundaries that should not be crossed.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
“[Facebook] is really personal and we really inform teachers to be careful when they use Facebook at home. They are teachers 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.”
Teachers’ perspectives
There was also strong agreement that sites like Facebook are very problematic for teachers, with many choosing not to create accounts and others using very high privacy settings and refusing friend requests from current students.
Both our teacher and youth surveys speak to the need for further research to build our knowledge base in addressing issues such as these relating to networked technology.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Ages and Stages
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Teachers’ perspectives
Like the students, teachers told us that kids need authentic experiences to learn how to be ethical online citizens and that they would like to have more flexibility dealing with online bullying. But the message was also loud and clear that they need tools and training to help them do this.
We have been providing PD tools about online bullying for a decade to Canadian schools. Many ministries of education have licensed these programs, but how well they are being implemented is a big question because, of course, support for PD is increasingly scarce.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
From a policy perspective, these sentiments echo the work of Shaheen Shariff, from the McGill Faculty of Education, supporting the need for a proactive approach, which incorporates critical pedagogies, digital and media literacy, legal literacy and relevant ethical frameworks, to create a positive learning environment where students of all backgrounds are engaged in and working through this issue.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Outcomes for digital literacy and digital citizenship, which encourage youth to reflect on and think critically about their online lives, are included throughout the Alberta K-12 curriculum and can augment promising and evidence-based programs that build positive school climates and address bullying behaviour.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
David Craig and H. Wesley Perkins, 2008
Social Norms
For example, these outcomes can support a social norms approach where students evaluate their own behaviours against a shared set of social values.
This kind of approach is very important because many news reports and anti-bullying programs that try to communicate the seriousness of the program may actually encourage youth to overestimate how common bullying is. If youth believe that bullying is the norm, they are more likely to exhibit and tolerate this kind of behaviour. On the flip side, when youth are made aware of how uncommon bullying is, bullying rates drop.
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“There are growing indications that positive online provision...reduces online risks by encouraging valuable and valued activities.”
(Livingstone, S., & Haddon, L., 2009)
Another way of countering negative messages about youth and technology is to direct them towards and engage them in using technology for pro-social endeavors.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
“Kids were just huddled around and discussing it, and they were excited for the people of Egypt. I swear to God, most of them wouldn’t have known the capital of Egypt before this started.”
Promoting pro-social activities
One of the most exciting aspects of networked technology is its potential for connecting students with the world outside their schools and communities. One particularly inspiring example came from an elementary teacher in the North who hooked his students up to a live feed of citizens from Cairo during the Arab Spring and watched their excitement, knowledge and interest grow as the movement progressed.
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There are lots of excellent websites that can be used to foster pro-social engagement with students, such as TakingITGlobal, mindyourmind.ca and define the line.ca.
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Facebook provides a ready-made platform for students so they can rally around issues, such as this anti-bullying page that was developed by French youth.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
RBM
Promoting pro-social activities
The rights and responsibilities that are essential to Digital citizenship support programs such as Unicef’s Rights Respecting Schools program which shows promise in mitigating bullying behaviour. This program, which is being introduced into Canada by UNICEF, does not specifically address bullying, but what they have seen in schools in the U.K. that participate is that bullying does decrease.
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RBM
Promoting social-emotional learning
casel.org
Developing social and emotional learning competencies is also an essential. As defined by the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional learning, theseskills include recognizing and managing our emotions, developing caring and concern for others, establishing positive relationships, making responsible decisions, and handling challenging situations constructively and ethically. They are the skills that allow children to calm themselves when angry, make friends, resolve conflicts respectfully, and make ethical and safe choices.
Empathy is one of the most important emotional skills. Efforts develop empathy in children, such as the Roots of Empathy program, have been shown to reduce bullying. Because of the reciprocal nature of many bullying relationships, we can also teach youth to think about the possible unintended meanings of what they write and say and to recognize and defuse conflicts when they occur. Finally, we can help students to deal with bullying by turning to teachers, parents, peers or counsellors for support.
.
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Restorative justice
Restorative justice approaches are also a growing movement in schools that examine social issues in terms of relationships between individuals, and they could play a very important role in cyberbullying programs.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
► empathy
► how to avoid escalating a conflict
► how to cope with bullying
► how to get help
Building strategies
Building resiliency in young people is also needed to minimize harm. Many of the youth in our study demonstrated strong resiliency when it came to cyberbullying and harassment from peers, but they still need strategies and support to effectively deal with cyberbullying and for establishing healthy relationships.
This is especially true for youth who witness bullying behaviour online. As you know, the response of witnesses, whether to intervene, to join in, or to simply do nothing, can make a tremendous difference in the impact of a bullying incident.
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Whole community approach
To successfully create cultures of respect and empathy in our schools, parents and the wider community must be included as integral members of this culture.
But most important, we have to involve students as mentors and leaders in developing meaningful approaches to online issues.
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Teachers’ perspectives
I think my role has shifted… to more of a facilitator of learning experiences in my classroom.
…hopefully the teacher realizes that education is a two-way street.
One of the biggest problems with cyberbullying is that much of it takes place under the radar of adults in a youth culture that is amplified through digital technology.
To help us better understand this culture – so we can better support youth – we have to recognize that we are all teachers and learners. Teachers who are willing to share this with students are more likely to be comfortable – and effective -- in a networked classroom.
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Youth are viewed as the target
audience
Youth are viewed as an intermittent
resource— the focus group
Youth are viewed as a volunteer
source
Youth are viewed as decision makers, equal partners, and
agents of social change
Adults are viewed as authoritarians—out of touch with
youth
Adults are viewed as an intermittent
advisor—someone to go to in times of
need
Adults are viewed as mentors—
someone to learn from in both good
and bad times
Adults are viewed as trusted guides
and lifelong learners—they both
teach and learn from youth
www.youthinfusion.com
The new paradigm
This is where our education system can benefit from models in the youth engagement sector, where young people are acknowledged as decision-makers, partners and agents of social change, and adults assume the role of trusted guides and lifelong learners alongside youth.
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Fostering digital citizenship
► Help young people better understand the issues
► Teach practical problem solving
► Foster ethical decision-making
► Encourage youth leadership(Willard, N. 2008)
The teachers we interviewed all agreed on the importance of placing teachers in the position of facilitators who work with their students to:
• Help them better understand digital issues
• Build resiliency and practical problem-solving skills
• Foster ethical decision-making and
• Encourage leadership in their online and offline lives.
© 2012 MediaSmarts
Vision: To ensure children and youth have the critical thinking skills to engage with media as active and
informed digital citizens.mediasmarts.ca
