Ideally, digital citizenship would be integrated into content classes
As a math teacher, I agree with this. There are some incredible programs out there, free of charge, which I've tried to introduce to my students in the math classroom and I hope to continue to build upon this into the future. This has little to do with the ethical element of the definition of digital citizenship, but does link in with the using of technologies in a responsible and informed manner.
media mentors for their children
I like this term "media mentor." It's hard for me to wrap my head around the idea that most of my students don't remember life without smartphones. I think it's important to remind them that these tools are just that- tools. They are incredible when used in a purpose-driven way, but don't need to be in our hands and readily available every second of every day.
It turns out that students prefer a learning environment where they can choose to urinate any time their bladders are full, or eat whenever their stomachs are hungry. As my colleague Jal Mehta says, we have shown that there is very little relationship between the depth of a seat cushion and the depth of learning.
I find this an interesting take on distance learning. I wasn't here at St. George's for the 2020-2021 school year, but most of the students I taught last year did not seem to prefer distance learning to in-class learning. Many of them spoke of being at home all day, or in their dorm room, as an overall negative experience, not a positive one. I'd agree that whether or not a student wears a hooded sweatshirt or heads to the bathroom when needed, has little to do with their overall ability to learn, but also think that the ability for students to simply turn off their camera and disconnect during distance learning, shouldn't be underestimated.
Most notably, they found a positive correlation between connected learning andeducational engagement, and between connected learning and academic persistence andgrit.
How did they measure this? I know I love the notion of helping students develop persistence and grit, just am interested in how you go about actually measuring that.
Connected educators areincreasingly emphasizing the importance of brokering connections outside of their programsand building relationships that transcend a specific program.
This rings true for me with regards to the programming we will be running this fall and is a reminder to keep this in the forefront of my mind as we progress. Starting students along a path that can be built further upon later, without me, through the brokering of connections outside of St. George's, has implications well beyond my myopic view of what we are trying to do for the next few months.
learned how to ... be calm when everything, say,falls apart.”
A wonderful lesson to learn.
their engagement resides in a set of practices embraced, valued, and madeconsequential by a community of practice.
As the "adult in the room," I think it's important, when possible, to also be engaged in practice with the young people we work with. If I'm working with a group of young people who are tutoring, it's important that I help tutor as well if the situation allows. If I'm trying to emphasize the importance of sport in living a healthy life, it's important I play in that sport with the young people I work with. If I want to emphasize how important it is to work practice problems in calculus, I need to work practice problems myself and show my students that work. Etc... I find that when young people see me engaged in the practice myself, they are more likely to continue to engage with that practice.
In their study of adiverse range of families, Livingstone and Blum-Ross found that parents variously sought toembrace, balance, or resist their children's digital interests, often focusing on policing screentime rules rather than engaging deeply with their digital interests. Only a small number of“geekier” families saw digital interests as a space of shared enthusiasm.
I'm a bit on the fence with this one. I think it's important to encourage and foster student interest, whatever that interest might be. But also, being the luddite that I am, I can't help but say that many of the digital engagements I see young people involved in today don't seem all that positive and appear to me more like addiction than a pursuing of interest. As with most things, I don't think digital interests are in and of themselves either meaningful or not. It's the purpose they are used for which matters most.
scholarly activity and formal education werethe only or primary pathway to opportunity. W
I don't necessarily know exactly where I stand on this- I don't think I've thought through or talked enough about it with others- but I do think that scholarly activity and formal education are a major pathway to opportunity and shouldn't be undersold.
legitimizinginterests
I like this notion of a mentor or near-peer legitimizing interest and brokering connections to opportunities. Being the hyper-stressed, school-driven young person I was, I remember having worries about whether or not it was ok to spend too much time on outside interests that didn't fit into the mold of "this will help you get into college." The occasional calm reminder from an important adult in my life that it was totally legitimate to pursue and enjoy new things that didn't have a grade attached was massively important.
The experience of connected learning is defined as the integration of personal interests,supportive relationships, and opportunities to be recognized by communities andinstitutions.
I think this opportunity to be recognized is so important, especially for those students who aren't necessarily in four AP classes or on three varsity sports. Offering another outlet where students can do good work outside of the normal classroom day and be praised for doing so by adults in their lives means a lot.
While internal psychological andindividual processes are clearly critically important to learning, we emphasize the dynamicrelationship between learners and their social and cultural environment.
This is one aspect of the connected learning program here at St. George's that I'm excited about. With our program this fall where we will be taking our students off campus, we will be changing up the social and cultural environment they are so accustomed to. They will be working with young people they don't know, who aren't their age, and possibly have very different backgrounds than themselves. My own experiences have taught me that it's often this jump into the unknown that results in the most meaningful of experiences. I'm hoping it's the same for our students this fall.