( Puzzle Krypt by Schlucher from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Puzzle_Krypt-2.jpg)
What have I learned by examining the concept of digital citizenship and its applications in preparing a school digital environment?
Learning about digital citizenship and the digital learning environment has been like putting together a jigsaw. Prior to undertaking this subject I thought that digital citizenship (DC) would not be interesting and that it pertained to keeping safe online. As the time came closer to the beginning of the semester, I came to look forward to learning about DC. This is reflective of my maturing attitude to my studies and to my work as a teacher librarian. Learning about DC has taught me that it is not just cyber safety and that it is actually highly interesting and relevant to my school digital learning environment. I have learned, among many other things, that it has Nine Elements not one. The lectures have started me thinking about and experimenting with, embedding it in my teaching and learning across K-6 (Ramrakha, 2014). I understand that to be a good digital citizen one must not just consume but contribute. In a small way, I have started doing this by blogging on my school library website (21clibrary ) and by expanding my personalized learning network (PLN). I feel my understanding of this is in its infancy but I am starting to put the pieces together of the jigsaw.
How has this subject extended my knowledge and understanding of the role of digital learning environments?
Although, DLE, is at times, organic in nature, this subject has shown me that this doesn’t necessarily have to be the case in its entirety. At school, so far, the DLE, has been managed by the DEC, however, in recent times the staff have been thinking about how we can manage it more ourselves, within the DEC firewall. This subject has given me some tools to structure this intervention around. For example, I found the lecture on Designing the Digital Learning Environment opened my mind to the possibilities when I read the Digital Learning Environment for Scottish Schools. What I mean is that it made me see what could be possible and to what extent the DEC is failing to support schooling in the digital age. Such as when website filtering controls what images and what websites the students have access to. This is a double edged sword as the children need to be protected but when they are home the digital divide comes in to play as their internet access is unfiltered when they leave school. So, at school by limiting their access we are not teaching them how to cope with the real digital world as it is an artificial one.
The role of the library and the Teacher Librarian
Since beginning my Master of Education I have been pondering this question. I always thought it was my job to support teaching and learning by resourcing the curriculum, encourage the enjoyment of reading, teaching information literacy and so forth. I know am beginning to see that I can use my knowledge to inform practice at my school. Now, I understand that I can stretch my professional wings, so to speak. For example, I have talked to the leadership team about making time in our already scheduled planning week at the end of term, to write a vision statement and strategic plan for this shift to a twenty-century school that they are excited about making. I will be helping write this document, as well as, a scope and sequence document for ICT. The latter will incorporate DC so that it can be taught to every Stage at school. Through this subject I am developing a PLN. It is my ambition to use this PLN to share with the staff at my school where we should be headed and why we should be going there through differentiated professional development Most of all, however, I want to use my new knowledge and enthusiasm for DC and how it interacts with the DLE to enhance the twenty first century learning outcomes of my students. I want my knowledge of DC to inform not only policy but practice at school, not only of myself or in the library but to have it transfer throughout the staff at school and across the boundaries of my school to the outside world. I want to use my knowledge to expand my classes’ horizons. I want to use it so that when the students leave school they have DC embedded in their thinking and their actions.
References Ramrakha, S. (2014, May 9). Module 5.3: Creating a digital citizenship program [Online forum comment}. Retrieved from http://digital.csu.edu.au/groups/etl523-digital-citizenship-in-schools/forum/topic/module-5-3-creating-a-digital-citizenship-program/
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