Do you know what it means to be a digital citizen? “As schools and society become more inundated with digital technology, there needs to be a structure that they can teach students (and parents) how to act with respect to this technology” (Ribble & Bailey, 2007). The school board has changed the technology policy so that teachers and students have different levels of access. This is how the Digital Citizenship Program fits in.
Imagine we were living in the wild wild west, back in the 18th and 19th centuries before their laws and rules were properly enforced. Some people chose to do as they pleased, without any regard for their fellow citizens. These people were known as outlaws and while the concept may sound romantic, the idea begins to run thin after you have been repeatedly bullied, robbed, intimidated, and made to feel unsafe. Without digital citizenship, the internet can feel like the wild, wild west. Citizenship is not something that people know instinctively. It is something that we learn, something that needs to be taught. Technology, the internet, the digital era, none of this is going away. As educators we need to examine how we can teach ourselves and our students to become educated digital citizens.