Materials and Preparation

• Preview the video “Super Digital Citizen,” and prepare to show it to students.

• Copy the Save the Day! Student Handout, one for each student.

Essential Question

How can people help others to be good digital citizens?

Lesson Overview

Students explore what it means to be responsible and respectful to their offline and online communities as a step toward learning how to be good digital citizens. They create digital superheroes who exhibit exemplary attributes and are able to solve digital dilemmas in a responsible way.

Learning Objectives

Students will be able to ...

• compare and contrast their responsibilities to their offline and online communities.

• reflect on the characteristics that make someone an upstanding citizen.

• devise resolutions to digital dilemmas.

Key Vocabulary

citizen: a member of a community

digital citizen: a member of a worldwide community linked by the Internet

responsibility: a duty or obligation

Warm-up (5 minutes)

EXPLAIN

Explain to students that they are going to watch a video about a character who finds he has some “super” powers in everyday life.

VIDEO

ASK

What were the three “good choices” that Arms helped Guts make in the video?

INVITE

Invite students to think about Arms’s question moving forward: What are your superpowers?

Create a Digital Superhero (20 minutes)

POINT OUT

Point out that Spider-Man is a superhero who uses his great powers to help other people. Spider-Man’s uncle says, “With great power comes great responsibility.”

Optional: Show students the following link about SpiderMan: www.marvel.com/universe/Spider-Man

DEFINE

Vocabulary term digital citizen.

Emphasize that a digital citizen is more than just an Internet user. It’s someone who chooses to act in safe, respectful, and responsible ways online.

EXPLAIN

Explain to students that they are going to create digital citizen superheroes who use their great powers to help people act safely, responsibly, and respectfully online.

CREATE

Create a three-column chart with the terms “Safe,” “Responsible,” and “Respectful” written at the top of each column. Invite students to suggest words or phrases that describe how people can act safely, responsibly, and respectfully online, and then write them in the appropriate column. (Alternatively, have students write their words or phrases on sticky notes and post them on the chart.)

DISTRIBUTE

Handout the Save the Day! Student Handout to each student.

Create

Tell students to complete Step 1, which prompts them to create a superhero for the digital world. Encourage them to ask themselves the following:

• What kind of superpowers would my digital citizen superhero use to help others act safely, responsibly, and respectfully online? What is special about the way my superhero acts and thinks?

• What kind of special costume would my superhero wear to help him or her do the job?

• What would my superhero’s name be? (for example, Dynamic Digital Dave or The Upstander).

REMIND

Remind students to note some of their superhero’s unique qualities.

INVITE

Have students introduce their superheroes to one another.

Create a Save the Day! Comic Strip (15 minutes)

REMIND

Remind students how good digital citizens can harness the power of digital media to make the world a better place.

TELL

Tell students to complete Step 2 of the Save the Day! Student Handout, which prompts them to create a short, three-frame comic strip. They should illustrate a problem in the digital world, and how their digital superhero helps resolve that digital dilemma. Students can create comic strips freehand on the handout using illustrations, speech bubbles, and captions.

SHARE

Share one or two of the following examples, if students need guidance creating a scenario:

• Someone spreads rumors about somebody else online

• Someone cheats on an assignment for school by copying information from a website and saying they wrote it

• Someone uses someone else’s password to pretend to be that person online

• Someone says mean things online

• Someone forwards a message containing private information to someone else

DISPLAY

Display your students’ comics around the classroom, like in an art gallery. Then have students take a “gallery walk,” whether as a class or in small groups. Allow each student the opportunity to describe his or her comic to others.

Wrap-up (5 minutes)

You can use these questions to assess your students’ understanding of the lesson objectives. You may want to ask students to reflect in writing on one of the questions, using a journal or an online blog/wiki.

ASK

What does it mean to be a digital citizen?

What kinds of superpowers or qualities did your digital superheroes have in common?

What does Spider-Man’s motto “With great power comes great responsibility” mean to you, as someone who uses technology?