In November of 2008, Durham Academy registered with Common Sense Media as a resource for our parents and teachers. This is the text of an article Mr. Schaefer wrote for The News and Notes.

A little Common Sense goes a long way
By Karl Schaefer
Computer, Middle School and Chair, Computer Department

The other day I sat in the audience as seventh grade students listened to Katie Koestner discuss cyber safety. I have heard her presentation before, so most of the information was familiar. What has changed is the number of hands being raised by the students in response to Katie’s questions. More hands went up with students admitting to owning cell phones, mp3 players and even Facebook accounts, where users must be 13 years old, which means most are using false information.
The increase in hands is not surprising, but is worrisome as our students rapidly adopt these new technologies without understanding all of the implications. Here at the Middle School, I work with students in fifth grade through language arts classes on topics related to cyber safety and digital citizenship. Students in other grades are exposed via integrated projects in various classes. This approach is a start, but not comprehensive enough with the advancing tools that our students use in their daily life. In the media-drenched world of today, we all need access to more resources to help our students learn how to protect and shape their digital legacy.

In order to help Durham Academy parents, we are happy to let you know of a new resource, Common Sense Media, to support parents in managing their kids’ 24/7 media lives. The resource is free and covers a wide range of topics including movies, television, books, music, games and the Internet. We believe Common Sense Media will help inform you about what your kids are seeing and doing, how they communicate and the impact media has on their development. Most importantly, you will find simple tips and tools about what you can do to raise your children to be safe, smart and responsible media users and creators.

Common Sense Media is the leading non-partisan, non-profit organization dedicated to helping families find the media that is right for them. By providing parents with the information they need to make informed choices about the entire media landscape, Common Sense Media has become a powerful ally to help parents remain the primary influence in their kids’ lives.

For more tips and information on media and your kids, we encourage you to visit
http://www.commonsensemedia.org/advice-for-parents.

The tools continue to change and student adoption is fast to these tools. Three years ago most people had never heard of the technologies of IM (Instant Messaging) iChat, Blogging Wikis, Atom, RSS, (Really Simple Syndication), Podcasts, Videocasts, Tags and Social Networking. Today, however, these tools are an important part of how we communicate on the web. These changes have caused some to "rename" the web, referring to it as "Web 2.0" Will Richardson calls it the Read/Write Web because readers can interact with authors allowing for conversations leading to the building of communities online. Whatever you call it, our lives and institutions are changing as never before. Marc Prensky put forth the idea that our students are "Digital Natives" because they have grown up with technology as part of their lives. Adults however, are the "Digital Immigrants" due to their lack of such exposure early in life. This is a very fitting description in how we adults interact with technology as compared to our students. Suffice it to say, technology is more than a tool today. It is a part of our students daily lives in more ways then a simple machine or calculator ever has been. We can discuss the merits of this change, but at the end of the day, the technology will still be here and our students will still be using it. Therefore, we immigrants need to be more aware of what the natives are doing with and using for technology.

The growth of the Social Networking sites like Myspace, Facebook and others are great examples of what digital natives do when they grow up never having experienced life without the Internet or being "plugged into" some sort of device that connects them to other people. Unfortunately, many digital natives do not always understand the difference between public discourse and private discourse. Most schools have not adequately addressed these issues, as they are recent and not completely understood by schools. Many noted educators, however, have written that schools should confront student use of these technologies, which allow them to post information about themselves with a false feeling of anonymity. They say students must be taught what is appropriate information to share and what needs to be kept private. They need to know there are unethical users of the Internet that will use personal details of a student’s life to their advantage. They need to understand that once they put information about themselves on the web, it could remain there for years due to the caching of sites. Finally, education also needs to take place for those students who still believe every word on the Internet. There are still some out there!

What immigrants need to understand is that the natives see the Internet for the connected community it is today. It is their "social playground," and just like a real playground, adult supervision is advised. The challenge as educators and parents is to help our students learn how to work and live responsibly in this new world. As David Thornburg has said, "Teach your students for their future, and not your past". We must address this issue by educating students, not by simply blocking or banning web sites.

Consider the following by Robin Raskin, taken from a National Academy of Sciences study, "Inappropriate Uses of Technology -- A Study of Children."

"You can protect children from swimming pools by: putting up fences deploying pool alarms, or legislating laws holding pool owners' responsible But the best strategy is ... to teach kids to swim."