At the beginning of the year I decided to set up a class wikispace that would let students interact in discussions about their recreational reading books. I worked with my librarian to set this up and she explained to me the security issues involved in setting up student accounts. Luckily, wikispaces.com was offering free educator sites and were willing to add student accounts without an email address attached. YAY! The wikispaces.com team is fantastic to work with and they have continued to support my class wiki throughout the year as new students have entered class.
The other day I was discussing this same issue with my tech coordinator as I'm slotted to teach a digital media class next year. I was interested in the availability of Flickr for classroom use. He explained about the E-rate funding issue.
I was so interested to find all of these issues addressed in chapter 7. I wasn't specifically familiar with the current laws and appreciated having them explained. From CIPA to COPPA to DOPA, there have been multiple laws put into place to help protect children. It is important to understand the background of an issue.
The copyright issue is another one that I have not fully understood. The new emergence of the Creative Commons license make so much sense. I am going to include a workshop on this before the end of this school year and be sure to address it early next year as my class begins to work with programs such as voicethread.
Nettrekker was introduced to me through a few different professional development tech classes. I haven't had a chance to use it yet, but my goal is to add that to my class tools for research. This will provide a safer way to search, especially images.
Pictures of students has been a question for me, as I have heard that school websites often can be a spot for predators to search for information about kids. For my digital storytelling and digital media class next year I would like to focus on images that do not include faces, unless it is a famous or historical figure. This will encourage students to focus on imagery and symbolism as they tell their stories and record events. I guess if the project will not be posted in a public site, then it is OK for pictures of students to be included.
Ultimately, I'd like for my digital media class to be able to add photos to one place that could then be accessed by my LA classes as well to use for projects. These images would not include faces, but artistic photos of landscapes and objects to enhance their projects. I plan to use the creative commons licensing idea so that the photographers get credit when the photos are used.
Even in our everyday lives people seem to freely borrow others work. I just got an email from a friend that included a mash-up that I created and sent out. He added it to his invitation. While it wasn't a big deal that I was not mentioned, I certainly understand the idea of giving credit to the creator. I'd like for students to get a good taste of this concept in class as they see others using their photos and such.
In conclusion, security and safety online is an ongoing important issue. It is imperative for teachers and administrators to stay informed and vigilant about security. The more we understand the issues surrounding internet safety, the better decisions we can make to keep our students safe.
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