Data Privacy: Find Out What Facebook Knows About You

The fact that algorithms operate behind the scenes of Facebook is something we all know, but do you know what types of information they are collecting about you? Check out Propublica’s piece, Breaking the Black Box to find out more about this important topic, and perhaps install the Chrome extension to find out more about what Facebook knows about you.

Next Week is Digital Citizenship Week

Digital citizenship is an important and very relevant concept that we all continuously face. I’ve included some ideas for modeling and engaging with students around this concept that might help you get the ball rolling.

1- Do not check email more than twice a day and not first thing in the morning.

2- Explicitly state why you are (or are not) using digital tools within your lessons. This will help students understand your thinking, and potentially help them relate to the pedagogical moves you make to help shape their focus and engagement.

3- Revisit your classroom routines and policies around tech use with students. Start by asking them:
How are these elements helping you in your learning within the class?
How might we improve our collective adherence to theses elements?

FYI, to celebrate Digital Citizenship Week we will be showing Screenagers during Student Parent Teacher conferences.

How’s Your Class Management w/ Phones Going?

By now all of us have clear routines related to phone use in our classes, whether it be a phone tower, box or basket all of these methods go a long way towards appropriately navigating the distractions phones present. Below is a conversation that takes this one step further with Sherry Turkle related to the psychology behind such distractions…check it out!

https://www.wnyc.org/widgets/ondemand_player/wnyc/#file=/audio/json/538202/&share=1

Do Digital Natives Exists?

It’s Complicated Part 4- Sexting

Last week we looked at boyd’s introduction section on the rhetoric surrounding digital natives- digital immigrants, and explored the venerable position this type of labeling can bring for ourselves as educators, as well as our students. This week we will continue our learning by looking at the topics of misuse and privacy by looking at sexting. A recent article in the Atlantic Monthly, Why Kids Sex references dana boyd’s work from It’s Complicated, and exemplifies just how much teenagers and adults a like are grappling with this topic.

This weeks questions for inquiry are:

When teenagers use a smart phone to share nude or semi nude photos with friends, is it a matter of questionable behavior or illegal activity?
What is our role, if any, as educators to help them navigate this complicated situation given what we explored three weeks ago regarding networked publics (persistence/visibility/spreadability/searchability)?

Three resources to inform your thinking around this question are:

1. Chapter 2 privacy why do youth share so publicly in It’s Complicated (starting on p. 56)

2. The Atlantic Monthly’s, Why Kids Sex article

3. This short clip from PBS News hour outlining a few specific examples of sexting and just how complicated this style of digital sharing is.

http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&isUI=1

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ABOUT the book

dana boyd (yes her name is in all lowercase) is one of the world’s experts on youth and social media. Her new book, is now out and certainly worth a read. There are several copies available for check out in hard copy, however the entire PDF of her work is available for free here.

Downloading Peer to Peer and Torrent Software on Your Yoga?

Downloading peer to peer (P2P)/torrent software is against the user agreement* you signed when you received your Yoga in June, and more importantly it can also be really harmful for your computer. PLEASE, never ask students to download torrent software, and model appropriate “responsible” use yourself. Although the laws in CH are slightly different than other parts of the world for file sharing it is not allowed on school owned machines primarily because it opens a direct line to your computer where harmful things can enter. Watch this funny and informative video made by a fellow ETC at SAS regarding this topic.

2. The user accepts responsibility for:

All software on the device. The user agrees not to alter the core configuration of the device or install torrent software.

PRESENT SHOCK!

Hats off to all of you for helping start the year purposefully and mindfully in the moment! As things ramp up, ask yourself, am I chasing the ever constant present, stressing about keeping up with online streams of content (email inbox, twitter feed, etc)?

Douglas Rushkoff, NYTimes columnist and futurist coined this term in his self titled book, Present Shock (available in the library) in 2012. According to Rushkoff (2012), present shock can be explained as, “the human response to living in a world where everything happens NOW. It’s a real time always on existence without any sense of beginning, middle, or end.” The video below is a great 7 min introduction to this concept.