Cross-posted from A Platform for Good.
I am the technology integration specialist in a Vermont school district with two school buildings about a mile apart from one another. One serves grades preK–2 and the other grades 3–8. I travel between both buildings on most days and have the pleasure of working with all of the adults and students in those schools. A few years ago, our district decided to become a PBIS district. PBIS stands for Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports. We’re focused on the positive, which in turn, reduces the negative behaviors.
Each of the schools has a catchphrase that all adults and students know. At our preK–2 school, students are “Safe, Kind and Responsible.” At our grades 3-8 school, students know the acronym “SMART = We will be Safe, Mindful, Accepting, Respectful, and Truthful.” There are signs, reminders, and images all over both buildings to help us remember these behavioral expectations.
In my work with students, these PBIS statements lend themselves naturally to topics under the umbrella of digital citizenship. The students know the phrases well and can easily transfer the ideas to their work with technology and the Internet. When asked what it means to be SMART online, they are able to share fabulous examples of how they are incorporating digital citizenship.
To help further these practices, we are utilizing many of the materials and lessons available from Common Sense Media. These lessons are a great way to connect what we’re learning to the PBIS words in each school. Teachers also integrate the language from PBIS into their technology-based activities. For example, here’s a blog post from one of our teachersexplaining how kindergarten students are Safe, Kind, and Responsible.
Another example of PBIS at work in my school district comes from a first and second grade teacher who worked with a group of students to create movie trailers on the iPad using iMovie. They each chose a different aspect of the school to describe in the movie.Being safe, kind, and responsible naturally evolved as one of the movies.
In our other school building, I observe teachers and students interacting with many digital citizenship topics. As part of a rotation with third and fourth graders, I also observe students making the connections between those topics and making SMART choices. By the end of our 6 weeks together, each student makes a short public service announcement to teach others about one aspect of digital citizenship. Here’s a recent example produced with Tellagami on the iPad.
We also have eight teachers currently engaged in various Flat Classroom Projects. Each of our grade spans is represented: K–2, 3–4, and grades 5–8. There is a lot of technology being integrated into the work they’re doing, which includes students communicating and collaborating with other students from around North America and a few in other countries as well. The middle school students are involved in the Digitween Project, which focuses specifically on digital citizenship. They are doing research and then will create and share a project to help educate others in our school community. Along the way, they are learning about being safe, mindful, accepting, truthful, and respectful when online. This project culminates near the end of 2013, so we’ll have more to share then.
Overall, there’s growing awareness about digital citizenship in our schools through the work we’re doing with PBIS. Digital citizenship is not a one-time focused activity or lesson. It must be repeatedly addressed with our students, our faculty, and our families. We all must work together to help our students learn what it means to be a responsible digital citizen.