The Dangers of Sharing

This week in Educational Technology, I learned about digital citizenship. I had no idea what digital citizenship was until this week. To define digital citizenship, it is standards to hold yourself to including appropriate, responsible behavior. In other words, it is how you portray yourself and how others view you. You provide certain information on the internet in which others view you by. As Garth Holman explained in our featured video this week, our digital citizenship is our resume, online that is. 

As I have reiterated in previous blog posts, I am always careful in what I post on the internet, referring to social media. I am friends with some of my student's parents on Facebook. I think about what I post before I post things as inappropriate content can get me fired. I am not an avid Facebooker and I hardly use any other social media except for school purposes, so it is not difficult for me to sort through what is appropriate and what is not appropriate. Anything that you put on the internet, anyone can see. This video provides a good example of the consequences of what posting inappropriate can do to a person. Not only does it attract negative attention, but it can potentially put your life in danger. 

This picture is such a good depiction of the negative consequences of sharing too much information online. For anyone who is not familiar with location, the red pin points represent a location on a map. When people share their location on the internet, it is basically inviting intruders to their homes to rob them as everyone is aware that no one is home.

I have had my feelings hurt by someone sharing something online. Not to get too personal, but long story short, my mom and I do not get along and her family does not approve of the person I am engaged to. One of my family members posted something to my Facebook saying basically do what you want, we will see you in 3 months when he breaks your heart again. They began saying mean things to me, putting me down for not listening to them. I quickly deleted the post because it was attracting negative attention towards myself and I did not want anyone involved in my personal life like that. (I have been in a relationship with this man for 7 years and we are engaged to be married and my family now accepts him as an important person in my life). I like to think I have not hurt anybody's feelings, but I am sure that I have in the past when I was an immature teenager, but I have never posted anything online that would hurt anyone's feelings. I try and tend to be a genuinely nice person towards everyone. I do not post anything online that would potentially hurt someone. All I post on Facebook is pictures of my dogs and share posts that I believe are inspirational or ideas to use in the classroom.

Parents and teachers need to make their children aware of the dangers of online sharing. I love this picture and there are many more pictures found on Google under the dangers of sharing online from teachers exhibiting examples to show their students how quickly things are shared around the world. The online tools used in the classroom need to be completely evaluated before students are allowed to use them. Teachers will reiterate to parents that they are instructed fully on how to use the classroom tools and make the students aware of the dangers of the internet using primary examples like the pictures I provided. Also, teachers will make sure that the students are supervised the entire time they are on the internet using the required tools to enhance learning.