Digital Citizenship

How and when can I integrate promotion of digital citizenship and responsibility into my math or chemistry classes?

Society now views that it is the responsibility of the schools to educate this generation on social responsibility and that student’s online life can and does have effects in the real world. Student’s online audiences are bigger and that they need to understand “how to be clear to avoid misunderstandings when there is no way to see reactions, facial expressions, etc.” (Ribble and Miller) Educational Leadership in an Online World spoke of cyberbullying and that California gave power to school administrators to suspend students in cases of cyberbullying. Nine other states have anti-cyberbullying laws. Teachers are learning how to be digital citizens and teaching about being a good digital citizen at the same time. In Digital Citizenship for Educational Change, Ribble urges breaks digital citizenship into nine areas:

• ·        digital access – full participation in society,
• ·        digital commerce- buying and selling goods,
• ·        digital communication- when to email and when to Tweet,
• ·        digital literacy- how to learn,
• ·        digital etiquette- appropriate conduct,
• ·        digital law- things that are not allowed,
• ·        digital rights and responsibilities- free speech,
• ·        digital health and wellness- stretch and eye strain,
• ·        digital security (self-protection) – don’t share super personal data.  

Ribble provided several websites that offer support for digital education including Common Sense Media, a much talked about website this week by fellow students Muddy Kinzer and Olivia Lewis.

I want to promote good digital citizenship and netiquette in my class, but even the nine areas I have listed, they are not an easy integration into math content and only slightly easier in a chemistry class. I found the Lester B Pearson School Board has a blog that talks about how to integrate digital citizenship discussions into a math classroom. They have three main suggestions, students blogging about their thought process, students participating in classroom discussions on Edmodo/Schoology/ Google Groups, or to have students make a digital portfolio of their best work using Google Sites. All of these put a cross-curricular blend to the standard symbolic logic content. I am interested in the portfolio idea and would have to create a space with my district’s chosen platform. With math often things are right or wrong and having students post math solutions could make mistakes just as permanent as a portfolio of success. Mistakes that the student could be heckled about for years. As Phineas and Ferb say, “The internet is forever”.

References:

Digital citizenship in the math classroom. (April 2015). Retrieved November 9, 2017, from http://dcp.lbpsb.qc.ca/digital-citizenship-in-the-math-classroom/

Disney’s Phineas and Ferb. Retrieved November 19, 2017, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_-XDGkfDSM

Ribble, M. (2012). Digital Citizenship for Educational Change. Kappa Delta Pi Record, 48(4), 148-151

Ribble, M. and Miller T., (n.d.). Educational leadership in an online world: connecting students to technology responsibly, safely and ethically. Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks, Vol 17:1. Retrieved November 8, 2017, from https://spu.instructure.com/courses/24664/files/759118?module_item_id=170214

A Quest for an Authentic Real-World Feel in Math and Chemistry

My question this week is how can I bring an authentic, real-world feel to my classroom through technology? It shouldn’t be a hard question unless I am asking about math, or the second most math-filled science, chemistry.

My initial research took me toward creating a blended or a flipped class (Fulton, 2012) which I have witnessed as a chemistry class. Watching the video lectures as homework allowed students to get help and extra instruction in-class and work collaboratively. It is closer to a workplace model, as when I was an engineer, I tended to read or watch videos about things I need to learn at home and then go to work to do my work and collaborate with my co-workers. I am not sure if students would think a flipped class as feeling authentic. They certainly might enjoy it as feeling different than what they are used to.

In the Google Hangout discussion, David Wicks recommended I look into “serious gaming”. I found an article that described serious gaming for social decision-making. They described taking a room full of people and breaking them down into small groups to role-play the different sides of an issue. The groups get a much clearer sense of the problem and can recommend resolutions to stakeholders (Susskind & Kim, 2016). For some discussions in science, this may work well. David had offered an idea that there may be a chemistry serious game. There is. Zachtronics produces the game SpaceChem where the player runs the chemical synthesizer for frontier colonies. The player has to figure out how to construct the process to construct the molecules. It has been very popular, very addictive, I have heard of its use at the collegiate level but its learning curve for initial play is steep and it costs per license. It is much more like real-world chemical engineering than anything else I have seen.

One of the guidance articles I read this week intrigued me with its emphasis on online learning and encouragement of teachers to be prepared to teach an online course for K-12 students (Kennedy, n.d.). This article encouraged me to look for applications that could handle messaging, documents, reports, videos, pictures, homework and everything as an online class needs a robust classroom online infrastructure to rest on. In my search, I found the article How to Do More With Less (Pape, Sheehan, & Worrell, 2012). It recommended tools for all different areas of studies and ones that could message with students and parents.

 I intended to look at my question through a lens of how to make my classroom feel more like a workplace. Workplaces have all kinds of different feelings and structures even within different rooms of the same building. What I did and the technological tools I used in the repair engineering department were different than the tools and the environment I had across the hall in the software engineering department. Maybe having different feeling classes, like a blended class or online class, can imitate the real-world. It is hard to say what will feel authentic to my math or chemistry students in my future room and district. My peers have affirmed my blended and flipped class readings. I am eager to try flipping and/ or blending my class, using online tools, trying some “serious gaming”, using some POGIL activities in what seems to be a never-ending quest to find what will feel authentic for my classes.

References

Fulton, K. (2012). Upside down and inside out: Flip Your Classroom to Improve Student Learning. Learning & Leading With Technology, 39(8), 12-17.

Kennedy, K. (n.d.). Cross-Reference of Online Teaching Standards and the Development of Quality Teachers for 21st Century Learning Environments. Retrieved November 1, 2017, from https://spu.instructure.com/courses/24664/files/759126?module_item_id=170183

Pape, L., Sheehan, T., & Worrell, C. (2012). How to Do More with Less: Lessons from Online Learning. Learning & Leading With Technology, 39(6), 18-22.

Susskind, L., Kim, E. (January 2016). Playing 'serious games,' adults learn to solve thorny real-world problems. Retrieved November 03, 2017, from http://theconversation.com/playing-serious-games-adults-learn-to-solve-thorny-real-world-problems-52405