Safe Learning in a Digital World

Image Credit: Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke from Pixabay

Safe Learning

Being a safe learner means that you do things to protect your own and other people’s information. There are lots of ways which you can do this by thinking about what you do online. The adults who we know and trust, like teachers, parents, a grandparent or aunt or uncle, care about keeping us safe and want to help (Raising Children Network, n.d.). To remain safe online you need to have skills, such as technical knowledge and attributes such as critical thinking (NSW Department of Education, n.d.-d). The Department of Education (n.d.-d, para. 8) suggest using the acronym THINK which makes you think about your actions - is what you do True, Helpful, Inspiring, Necessary, and Kind when you use the internet?

For example, you want to play a game on the internet, like the ones on Digital Passport and it asks you to enter a username. When you use THINK you can work out that it is not Helpful or Necessary to add your full name or date of birth in the username as that is personal information which could identify you in the game. Sharing this information is not safe.

Practice Time!

Can you practice the skills of what is safe to share online? Play the game Share-Jumper by Digital Passport (Common Sense Education, n.d.) to use the skills set out in THINK.

You can also try to make the Tower of Treasure (Google, n.d.) secure by creating safe ways of storing information. Good luck!

Play Interland - Be Internet AwesomeInterland is an adventure-packed online game that puts the key lessons of digital citizenship and safety into hands-on practice. Play your way to being Internet Awesome.

Digital Passport™ is an award-winning suite of engaging interactive games that address critical issues for students in today's digital world. Teach your students the ins and outs of digital learning, online communication, and online safety, and help them build lifelong digital skills.www.digitalpassport.org/share-jumper.html

Credit: Common Sense Education - Digital trails

Digital Footprints

Have you heard what a digital footprint is?

When you look around the internet, the internet is looking back at you (NSW Department of Education, n.d.-c). This information gathered about you is called your digital footprint. Unlike footprints on a beach which get washed away, your online footprint stays forever. The data, or information, which is collected every time you go online can be used to help you log in faster another time, however, it can also be used to by companies and people online to damage your reputation. Posts which you have deleted or images which disappear from view after a short period of time on programs like Snapchat, are still online and remain part of your digital footprint; once information is online it stays there forever (NSW Department of Education, n.d.-c).

One study conducted in Australia (Buchanan et al., 2017) showed that primary school is a great time to be thinking about the long-lasting implications of what is done online. Thinking habits which show in your digital footprint now, can be life-long dispositions.

Now that you know, you can be in charge of creating what you want your digital footprint to look like!

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