I faintly remember being taught about my digital footprint. I think it was one time in elementary school where it was brought up. I remember watching a video that definitely made me think. I believe it was a scare tactic that worked on me. I remember askfm was really big at the time. All of my friends were on it. It was an app where you can choose to ask someone a question anonymously and that person can choose to answer it or not depending on the question. I remember right after the video looking through my askfm trying to find any answer I gave that made me question if it was good for my digital footprint. I ended up deleting a bunch of posts and a month later deleting my account. The video definatley scared me into being very smart online. To this day, when I post something on social media, I think about what it makes me look like as a person, what it could look like to my future employer, and what it could like to my future students if they ever where to find access to my social media.

This approach proved is purpose back then, although when I get into teaching my own lessons on digital footprint, I think I would do it a little differently. When I teach this in my own classroom, I would want students to watch a video explaining their digital footprint and how it has an impact on their lives. I would then give the students a list of questions, asking their opinion on their relationship on social media with the nine elements of digital citizenship, focusing mainly on the elements 3-9. I would also have them look through their own social media accounts, and write a little paragraph on if they think they have a positive digital citizenship, and what they can start or stop doing in order to have a more positive social media outlook. Something I also liked in the article Character Education in the Digital Age was about putting technology into a broader social context. This article talked about a goal where Students will study the personal, social, and environmental impacts of every technology and media application they use in school. I think it would extremely beneficial for students now, because this would have been awesome for me to learn in elementary school and high school.

Technology has constantly changed throughout history, making major leaps and strides for every aspect of life. I remember when my elementary school got our first smartboard. Everyone was super excited about it, and made all the student super fascinated about what was happening on the board. New technology enters the classroom all the time, and it is always exciting for teachers and students to use this new technology.

In Wesch’s video, he talked about the power of YouTube as a platform and the different sites that support different videos. I found it extremely interesting how the majority of the videos posted onto YouTube are meant for less then 100 viewers, but often have the tendency to blow up with views and create trends. This made me think of all the videos I made as kid, whether it for class or for fun at home that I would make videos but post as private so that no one else could see. It makes me think, what kind of interest those videos could have gotten from the public if I had posted them for other people’s enjoyment.

Also, a question that we pondered in class was how people have built a relationship with technology and how that can be beneficial or negative. Technology is used for everything now-a-days and can make life al lot easier. It is easier to hold on to records of documents or look back on things that I have learned in classes in the past. It is easier for me to communicate with my friends and family and make plans. I also think that there is a lot of abuse to the advanced technology that we see today. I feel that it is because young individuals take this technology for granted, especially AI, and are not taught how to use it properly. I was placed in a class recently where students have been caught cheating by just simply copy and pasting essays out of chat gpt. Also, I feel students are starting to become anti-social. No one communicates face-to-face anymore. They are busy chatting through Roblox, or online through video games. I have also seen people sitting beside each other and texting one another instead of talking. I also noticed, that when you take the screens away form an individual in school, they do not know what to do. They cannot keep focus, some of them do not know how to have a conversation with another individual.

Looking into the future, technology is extremely beneficial when you have healthy boundaries around social media, and are taught how to properly use some of the advanced technologies that we are blessed to have today. Although, in today’s world, technology is often abused where people have more experience with their face in their screens compared to being face-to-face with another individual.

My daily tech habits are mainly based around entertainment. Most of my daily technology use happens during my free time, I can probably be spending my time in more productive ways instead of scrolling through TikTok and Instagram. TikTok I primarily use for entertainment purposes, as opposed to Instagram I use to learn more information on things I am interested in.  I scroll through recipes, some strength trainers who I enjoy listening to, and keeping up with what my friends are doing. These two sites that I spend the majority of time on is used for leisure and social interactions.

An app I use to help me stay organized is TimeTree. It is a calendar app that you can link multiple people to and share your schedule. You can also color coordinate your events. For example, I have a different color for class, work, coaching, and my football schedule. I also like how every morning it sends me a notification of what I have that day, and also gives me a reminder of my events a half hour before they start. Another organization app I use is Slack. This is an app my football team uses to send information or update players on important dates for school. You can also post links and spreadsheets that need to be viewed before events. The last app that I find extremely important is the Grades app. At the beginning of every term, I put my classes in for the semester into this app and input all of my assignments with the weighted grade that they hold in that course. I can then input the grade I hope to strive for. Once, I get my grades for each assignment, The app will tell me what I need to get on my other assignments to achieve that grade. This is an app I have recommended to a lot of my teammates, especially those who struggle with school and are always worried about what they need on their assignments to pass to stay eligible for the season. They have found this app super helpful. It helps them check what class they have a better academic standing in and what assignment they need to spend more time on or study for.

The biggest distraction for me when it comes to technology is TikTok. This is an app I turn to as a means of procrastination. Whenever it is time to cook, or do laundry I always find myself scrolling through TikTok. I feel I am usually pretty good on limiting my time on this app, and can usually get the things done that I need during the day. I feel I have a healthy relationship with technology. I manage my time well and I have apps that allow me to keep track of upcoming due dates and important meetings. The main boundary I have set for myself is not going on my phone a half hour before I go to bed. This allows me to get anything done that I didn’t finish throughout the day.

Hello, my name is Carson Sombach. I am in my third year of my Kinesiology and Education Joint Degree majoring in Physical Education and minoring in Mathematics. I am also a current athlete on the University of Regina Rams Football Team. I have four brothers, three of which also play on the Regina Rams which is extremely rare at the USports level. If you want to read and find out more about me I have attached an article that was done on my family. I have a passion for coaching football, and have coached at a fairly high level considering I am also still playing the sport.

This is me in the middle with the young football players on the South Saskatchewan Football Team after we won the Prairie Bowl

I have never blogged before, but I am excited to give it my best shot. I will be sharing my insights and reflections on educational technology. I have had some experience with educational technologies where I work. I work as an Educational Assistant in the Regina Catholic School System. The main technology we used was speek to text with those students who have dysgraphia.