Digital Citizenship: Teaching Students About the Digital Footprint They Leave Behind

DIGITAL FOOTPRINTS LAST FOREVER.And that’s not an exaggeration.I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that one action online can impact you for a long time.  One comment on social media (good or bad) can go viral and become impossible to stop.Once the internet gets a hold of something, we can quickly lose control.  We’ve seen this in both positive and negative situations.  We’ve seen the hilarious cat videos go viral or a feel-good story spread from coast to coast.But - we’ve also seen situations where something gets out of hand, or something is taken out of context and then spreads far and wide online.  Maybe you’ve experienced this first-hand. It can be heartbreaking and devastating to the people involved.What we say and do online can have a lasting impact.  Once it’s out there in the world, it essentially lasts forever.However, our students don’t always think beyond the moment (Heck - many adults don’t think beyond the moment).  They don’t always consider that what they say and do online can leave behind a digital footprint.   And - this digital footprint can shape their identity and impact their online AND offline reputation.That’s why it’s so important to start young, teaching students the responsibilities they have as digital citizens.  The sooner we start to train kids to think about their actions online and the digital footprints that they leave behind, the better.FOR COMPLETE SHOW NOTES VISIT:  classroomnook.com/podcast/112LINKS & RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE EPISODEEPISODE 102: Digital Citizenship: Making Healthy Media Choices and Finding BalanceEPISODE 106: Digital Citizenship (Helping Elementary Students Understand Privacy & Security Online)Join the LINKtivity® Learning Membership and get access to my entire vault of LINKtivity Interactive Learning Guides - CLICK HERE to join.