Okay, wow! What a change is taking place, the more I work on my project! I think for the first time, I'm seeing how the various threads are all coming together.
When I first proposed this project, my main focus was on introducing the students to a virtual environment geared towards their age group. However, the more I have pulled various aspects together, the more my focus has shifted to the whole idea of scaffolding. First, it should be noted that I have 3 kids of my own, two of which are middle school-ish, so I also come at this from a personal perspective and from personal observation. Anyway, as I have quickly observed my 7th grader in particular suddenly move from simply emailing and interacting in worlds like Club Penguin to chatting, texting, and becoming obsessed with Wizard 101, I realized that at my school, I do little to prepare the tween for this new level of online interaction and socialization. I think we expect our kids to "understand" online safety but then restrict them entirely so that by the time they turn 12 or so, they have not transitioned or experienced "virtual puberty." I was mistakingly under the impression that not only did my 12 year old know how to properly behave himself online but that he would never partake in virtual chatting without my permission or that the option wasn't even available without my consent. I didn't realize that for pretty much every interactive adventure site he visits, there is open chat. This was shocking for me.
So, again, getting back to my project, what I really see myself doing now in the fall is providing that bridge for my 5th graders. I need to push my Internet safety discussions from simply avoiding strangers to using common sense tools to create their own safe environment online. This seems a switch in teaching from "don't do that and go there," to "build a strong defense and knowledge." Perhaps this is what teaching internet safety has always been about, but, again, I don't think enough has been done for those 5th and 6th graders.
Thus, I'm excited at not only teaching great lessons on safety but still using my virtual world as a "field study" where we can apply what we've learned to our educational experience.
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Kara!
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like your project is coming along great. I feel the same way, the last week things really started to come together for me as far as preparing materials and whatnot. I have to thank you because I was checking out your portfolio and I saw that you are using Netsmartz.org and I found some great materials on their website that I will be using. I hope you don't mind me stealing from you ;)
I know you've already posted your final blog but I wanted to jump in here and say - WOW! I can't wait to see a) your next blog and b) your project. So, how are you going to be sure that we can all steal this resource? ;)
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