The question this week is: Why is it important to educate young adolescents about digital citizenship? This is a big question with a lot of different answers. For me, the most important reasons have to do with etiquette, accountability, and safety.
Some of the earliest teaching and learning are about social etiquette. We model "please" and "thank you," we tell them that it isn't nice to hit or push or bite. Children are taught to share and to address adults respectfully. They learn that nobody likes a whiner and the difference between an indoor voice and an outdoor voice. Clearly, etiquette is highly valued in society. Unfortunately, social niceties seem to disappear on the internet. The problem as I see it is that digital etiquette is not taught and reinforced in the same way that social etiquette is. Children are allowed online without digital etiquette instruction and very little supervision. The parent is not there to say, "If you don't have anything nice to post, don't post anything at all," nor to attach any consequence for rude online behavior, "I saw what you posted about Billy and I'm highly disappointed. You need to post an apology and you're grounded from the internet for a whole week." Etiquette is learned--who's teaching it? Why is it important for students to learn digital etiquette? For the same reasons that it is important for them to learn social etiquette.
Accountability is also a learned trait. The problem with accountability is that young adolescents are incapable of understanding fully the long-lasting effects of their choices. Online activity exacerbates the problem because once something is posted online--it is there forever! If a child gets into a fight on the school playground, discipline is meted out, apologies are made and then the incident exists only in the memories of the people who observed the fight. If the fight is recorded and uploaded, then the incident can be recalled at any time and for any reason. It becomes a possible permanent part of the child's identity. Our students do not understand the possible impact that these digital records can have on the perceptions that others have of them for years to come. So, while they are incapable of being fully accountable because they lack the ability to imagine the full consequences, the permanence of the internet makes it impossible for them to escape the consequences of poor choices made in adolescence. Although adolescents need to be educated about online accountability, adults need to figure out how to maintain the same partial-agency that we allow adolescents in the real world.
The same inability that makes it difficult for adolescents to understand the full consequences of their choices also makes it impossible for them to fully comprehend the dangers of the internet. We need to educate them about the dangers, but I don't think education is the full answer because adolescents feel invincible--and that is not necessarily a bad thing. Children need to be aware of the danger, but parents and other adults should have a stronger presence online because we recognize the danger in ways that adolescents just can't.
Writing this entry has made me realize that educating young adolescents about digital citizenship is only part of the answer. We also have to get more adults involved. This is a whole new world. We've got the Pirates and the Pioneers all navigating the same uncharted lands. We have a chance to be Pioneers and lay the foundation of digital society. If we take that chance, we will greatly lessen the harm that can come to our children from digital Pirates.
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