I started this major assignment looking at connecting digital citizenship education to curriculum to establish a resource package for teaching. I started out with grade 6 Health curriculum from 2009, and began the process of making the connections. I realized very quickly that my role as an in-school administrator and limited role in the classroom setting made it difficult to continue working on this project.
As a result, I tweaked the major assignment to something that interested me even more, and that is building the framework to implement digital citizenship education in my school from K-12. Instead of finding a whole pile of resources for grade 6 Health, I began the search for a resource that provided some lessons for all grades K-12 in my school. My search led me to the Common Sense Education website. A great starting point for all of my teachers.
This resource gave me an idea and that was to use this resource to plant the seed of digital citizenship with my teachers, allow them to dabble with lessons and their students, then take the time to unpack the Digital Citizenship Education in Saskatchewan Schools document with them in our collaborative response groups that just so happen to align with the grade groupings for the Digital Citizenship Continuum. And the rest, as they say is history… I created a framework for my school to become fully immersed in digital citizenship education.
Link to document can be found here… Framework for Digital Citizenship Implementation
Darryl, this resource me happy! If I received it from my administrators, I would be so grateful for the holistic team approach to digital citizenship. Too often I feel frustrated by the disjointedness of our curriculum – or implementation of it. On my staff there are only 2/10 of us including digital citizenship in our lessons. As you show, the seed must be planted from an early age. The resources are there – and Common Sense Education is a great resource – but there has to be a consistent, cross-curricular approach so that by the time I get students in my Gr. 7 classroom and I say “Digital Citizenship,” they are fully equipped with the lingo and skills. This is how we change things for the better and I love that you are planting these seeds at your school. Congrats on being done!
Kimberly, I agree that Digital Citizenship will require a cross-curricular approach and my plan would be to be able to move to that point once we have navigated through some of the lighter stuff. I call it the “baby-steps” of learning. Start not by walking, allow teachers to crawl first, then support to stand, followed by support for the first few steps. Once these first supported steps have been taken we normally see steps on their own. At this point, things usually take off and cross-curricular teaching of Digital Citizenship can be achieved. I have learned over my years of administration that a full school movement or change can only be achieved when everybody believes that it was their choice to move or change in the first place!