Wrapping Up My Major Project

It’s finally here! Today I am wrapping up my major project for EC&I 832.

For my major project, I choose to do a Personal Journey Into Media (option #2). You can read about my original plan: Major Project Projections however, my plan changed slightly over the course of my exploration. My original plan included exploring 3 things:

1. Exploring Snapchat as a social media platform
2. Exploring Seesaw as an educational app
3. Integrating memes into literacy (in March – meme month! I am a big fan of alliterations).

Exploring Snapchat and Seesaw remained in place throughout the term. However, as I began the set up of Seesaw, I realized how much my students (and I) didn’t know about being digital citizens. Because I was just learning about being a digital citizen, I used our class sessions, readings and vlogs to learn about myself first! I couldn’t just hand my students a new app and expect them to know how to use it responsibly.

The apps we use in the classroom are mostly RAZ Kids and Mathletics, which unlike Seesaw, do not include social interactions or creating posts that others can see. We needed digital citizenship education! But I hadn’t taught this before. In fact, it wasn’t until this course that I found out about the Digital Citizenship Education in SK Schools document and even later when I discovered that teaching digital citizenship is part of our division’s policies. I am sure glad I know about this now! I plan to continue to use my Twitter account to share information about this because I know I am not the only person who wasn’t aware of this!

Through early February, I spent my time setting up the Seesaw app and preparing a digital citizenship unit. Which meant that I really did two of the major projects options combined into one (option #1 and option #2). I drew on a number of sources including Media Smarts, Common Sense Media, Google’s Be Internet Awesome curriculum and many more. I took online courses to be a Google Digital Citizen Educator and many courses about setting up and using Seesaw through their PD in Your PJs sessions.

The latter half of February was spent starting up our digital citizenship unit and before I knew it, March was almost here and I was supposed to be starting meme integration into our literacy unit. I have some really cool resources and tools to integrate memes into literacy (which I haven’t yet had a chance to use yet) but I had to make an executive decision. We had only just begun our digital citizenship education and still had much to learn alongside starting up with Seesaw. I didn’t want to switch things up  when we just got the ball rolling! So I decided to cut the meme integration for now and continued to work on creating my Digital Citizenship unit.

Thus, my major project changed to focus on exploring these 3 things:

1. Exploring Snapchat as a social media platform
2. Exploring Seesaw as an educational app
3. Creating and teaching a digital citizenship unit.

Meanwhile, I was using Snapchat as a personal social media app and having a blast!

Though I realized that I use Snapchat mainly for: having fun with filters, taking pictures of my dog and snapping about what we are up to (the last picture is us getting ready to hike to Horseshoe Bay Canyon – see my photo of the canyon in this post and then go visit it because it is A-MAZING!)

Here is look back at my app exploration and digital citizenship education journey:

1. The first week included setting up the Seesaw app and checking out all the great set up resources that Seesaw has to offer educators. Check out my process here!
2. Then I examined how Ribble’s 9 Elements relate to the Seesaw app and considered whether I would use Seesaw next year to replace Remind (which I currently use as well).
3. Next, I headed Back to the Basics with Snapchat to learn about the company, examine the app from the eyes of a newbie and get an insider view into some of the features.
4. Our first digital citizenship lesson looked at the Internet as a place you can visit (just like a field trip). We took an online field trip and came up with some rules for how to be safe online. Check out the lesson details here.
5. Up next was examining some of Snapchat’s core beliefs in the wake of the Kylie Jenner tweet about the new update which put Snapchat in the Spotlight for quite some time.
6. Our second digital citizenship lesson was about personal and private information. See lesson details here! This lesson included the kids creating safe usernames for each other — so much fun!
7. Then the fun really began! I explored Seesaw’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Service in my blog post.  Did you catch the sarcasm? To be honest, it wasn’t as boring as I thought it would be! I learned a lot about privacy during this class and am much more skeptical when a website or app asks me to agree to sharing information.
8. In our next digital citizenship lesson we learned about digital footprints. We transformed our classroom into the Internet, were hired by a detective agency and had to find clues by following the Digital Trail of two digital citizens from the animal kingdom.
9. If reading Seesaw’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Service agreement wasn’t interesting enough, I went ahead and read Snapchat’s too.
10. Next, I took some time to reflect on my learning in class and think about the importance and the why behind teaching digital citizenship. You can find those thoughts here.
11. Our fourth digital citizenship lesson focused on what it means to be a digital citizen.
12. Then I wrote a review about Seesaw, recommending it to other teachers! If you can’t tell from reading the review, I am pretty pumped about integrating this app into my classroom so far.
13. As I started to move up in the world of being a Snapchat user, I took some time to explore Bitmoji’s as they relate to Snapchat.
14. For the next three digital citizenship lessons, we spent a significant amount of time focusing on cyberbullying — what it was, how it differed from in-person bullying, how it was similar to in-person bullying, how being a responsible digital citizen means not being a cyberbully and what to do if you witness or are a victim of cyberbullying. Check out the lesson details here. We need to learn about being kind online before I would hand over the reins and let them start commenting on Seesaw.
15. My last look into Snapchat for the semester dealt with Digital Health and Wellness as it pertains to social media use and in particular through the use of Snapchat. You can find my thoughts here.
16. Now that we had some digital citizenship basics under our belt and had been using the Seesaw app to create posts for several weeks, it was time to open up the commenting feature on Seesaw. Learning to comment came in phases. The first phase of commenting instruction can be found here. Unfortunately, our next phase of commenting will happen after the Easter break but know that we are continuing to work on it beyond this course.

Okay, so I have given you a quick glimpse into my app exploration and creation of a digital citizenship unit. The strange part for me about this project is that it is more about the process and less about the product. All along I have been wanting to create a final product to hand in and had to accept that this project was more about blogging about my learning process. The semester is coming to a close and I have learned so much about Seesaw, Snapchat and teaching digital citizenship. But..it feels like my learning has just begun and the semester has flown by!

In my mind I have many future blog posts planned out such as how Snapchat can be used as a classroom tool, more about the activities and ways we are using Seesaw, how we are even deeper into learning about constructive commenting than before, other digital citizenship lessons that I have lined up for my students and so much more! I guess the best part is that all of this learning can continue on and it was a pleasure to engage in a major project that was relevant to me and that I felt I had some control over in regards to the process and the outcome.

Cheers

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That’s a Wrap! – Summary of Learning W18

What a whirlwind of a semester! I cannot believe how quickly it has gone by. On this page you will find my Summary of Learning for EC&I 832. Thank you to Alec and my fellow EC&I 832 classmates for helping me along this journey of digital citizenship and media literacy. I have learned so much and my pedagogical practices have changed for the better! Not only has my practice changed but I am also a more conscientious and informed digital citizen. I now have a stronger understanding of emerging literacies and contemporary issues as they relate to digital citizenship, media literacy, the fake news world and the variety of moral, ethical and legal issues surrounding these topics.

For my Summary of Learning I decided to try a new tool: Powtoon! I really enjoyed using this tool. It was very easy to create with and there are so many features I haven’t even explored yet. I am hoping I will get to try it out a bit more during the spring semester of EC&I 830. The only unfortunate thing about this tool is that the free version only allows for 5 minute clips which means that I had to break it into a part one and part two so please make sure to watch both!

Summary of Learning Part 1:

Summary of Learning cont’d (Part 2):

Thank you for watching!

I am happy that I can now say I am half way through completing my graduate degree!

Cheers!

Snapchat – Health and Wellness

You don’t need to look too far to find information about how social media is causing an increased or at least sustained momentum with regards to youth anxiety and other mental health concerns. There are several examples of tech guru’s working in the industry place limitations on themselves or their families. Despite much work being done on this topic, it is also contested (this article was published only two days ago!) by many who cite not enough research has been done to draw conclusions yet.

Many researchers are examining the effects of technology as they relate to distractedness and how app features are specifically designed to manipulate our brains. Tristan Harris talks about the extent in which tech companies “ethically steer people’s thoughts”. He discuss the business of technology and how all tech companies are competing for one thing: your attention.

In this Ted Talk, Harris discusses Snapstreaks and how the app is intentionally designed with your psychology in mind. Once again, the Internet is abound with articles and information about how Snapchat (the app I am engaging with for my major project) and Snapstreaks are addictive and relate to potential mental and socio-emotional concerns. (See also, My Bitmoji Gives Me Anxiety).

Harris founded the Center for Humane Tech and the Time Well Spent movement to encourage understanding of how the Internet is hijacking our society. In response, apps can choose to make more humane and ethical decisions about how to fight the attention addictions they create in the first place. Here is one example of how Snapchat is doing this.

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Anya Kamenetz article “Your Kids Phone is Not like a Cigarette” argues that “when it came to tobacco, the solution was simple: Quit or don’t start smoking. That’s not the case here. Phones, tablets and other devices that have caused so much concern have more in common with cars than with cigarettes; unlike tobacco, they are essential tools that can be used in a healthy way”. So, we need to figure out how we use those tech tools in a healthy way.

I posted earlier this semester about how the Internet is Not the Problem. The Internet and it’s big business model which tracks and benefits from human psychology calls into question what we understand about society-technology dichotomy and brings many ethical concerns to the forefront. But to sit around and blame the Internet doesn’t help anyone. We need to continually be ultra-informed and aware about what is happening in the tech world. In this case, ignorance is not bliss. Ignorance can be potentially very harmful. Technology is transforming at lightning speeds and in order to care for our digital well-being, we need to stay caught up. Dr. Ribble’s 9 elements of digital citizenship includes the element of Digital Health & Wellness. Ribble makes the case that “Digital Citizenship includes a culture where technology users are taught how to protect themselves through education and training”.

Let’s work on maintaining our digital well-being together!

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Where will you start on your journey of digital well-being? If you’re not sure, try some of these suggestions.

The Evolution of Commenting Online – Part 1

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My students and I have been looking at this poster during all of our digital citizenship lessons. After exploring what it means to be a digital citizen, we have returned to this poster to guide and set a purpose for each new lesson. For example, when we talked about being kind online, we were focusing on the “heart” of a digital citizen. When we discussed personal and private information, we talked about “wearing our thinking caps” before we share information online. When we talked about rules for being safe online, we discussed listening to our gut feeling.

Today, when I opened the “commenting” feature on our Seesaw app (one of the apps I am exploring for my final project), I brought this poster up again for my students to see and asked which part of a digital citizen must we engage when we think about commenting on other people’s work. Of course, they responded with: respect themselves and others.

 

In order to guide our thinking about how to comment, we looked at this graphic and discussed what each element meant, along with examples. This included the discussion that random emojis, using for example 30 smiley faces or 28 exclamation marks would fall under the category of unnecessary. For our first go at commenting, we focused on the elements true, helpful, necessary and kind (we left out inspiring because we just aren’t there yet!) and the kids were excited to start commenting right away.

My students work on Seesaw during Daily 5 so they got started on this as soon as their group was at that station. They assignment for today was a short one (take a picture of their Ted Harrison art project) and write a caption explaining how they imitated his art style. This was a short assignment so that they had time to comment on the work of others and explore some of the comments that had been left for them by me. Their comments have to be approved by me before they are posted so they weren’t able to see comments from their peers right away.

After two days (when all groups had made it through this station and their first chance at commenting), I put all of the comments up on the screen for the kids to see. We filtered through each one deciding if it fit into our THNK (no I yet!) model. Some of the kids were surprised that I put their comment up for everyone to read (even though it is visible to everyone in the class through the app). This allowed us a teachable moment about the permanency and availability of their online actions. This also gave us an opportunity to talk about the “grandma rule” (they thought the name was hilarious!)

What we discovered as a class was that most of their posts were two things: true and kind. Here are some examples:

There were a few that went beyond the true and kind model to include helpful and necessary as well. Here are some of those examples:

This is just the beginning of my students and their learning how to comment. Next week we will be adding another layer of rules that comments must include in order to be approved! Stay tuned!

The Post-Truth Era – Part 2

Click to read The Post-Truth Era – Part 1.

This week, our professor Alec, asked us to write about an average day (for us) in terms of reading and making sense of information, media and the world around you by discussing personal strategies for analyzing and validating information? After all, if we are going to teach others (especially our students) about being media literate and about being able to spot fake news, we must first analyze our own practices. 

I am finding more and more that my parents are talking to me about “news” they read on Facebook or wanting to purchase something off of ads they have seen on Facebook.

Signe Wilkinson – Philly.com

Trust me, I have tried to explain filter bubbles to them. I have tried to explain fake news to them. My mom is constantly phoning me asking if I have heard of this make up or fancy lotion that she has seen in an ad on Facebook. When I tell her that I haven’t heard of it before, ask her if she has checked out their website or read reviews and inform her about why she is likely seeing the ad in the first place, she scoffs and rolls her eyes. However, her generation has not previously had to critically examine news in the way that people are required to today. I am constantly emailing articles to her so that she can better understand the algorithms that are controlling what she sees online. She is learning though!

I recently sent this video to her:

Fake News often uses seemingly shocking headlines to get readers to click. This video asks readers to stop, think and check before sharing. This video also lists the variety of items on a new site that you should be skeptical about. I think about many of these items as I scroll through news articles daily.

Like most people, I receive much of my news through social media sites, in particular through Twitter. My first line of defense is looking at the web address. If it is an opinion piece I am looking at, I am a little more lenient because many opinion pieces I read are from personal blogs. However, if it is news I am looking for, I want a web address that I am familiar with like CBC. I have friends on Facebook that post “news” articles from the most bizarre web addresses and I never click if it doesn’t look like a legitimate web address. I also roll my eyes at them for posting without being thorough. I’d say my thoughts coincide with my classmate Kelsie, as she talks about not knowing what to say when other post obvious misinformation on Facebook. I often end up just scrolling past.

With Ideas from the video I posted earlier in this blog combined with a list of critical questions in my mind (similar to the ones in my classmate, Luke’s blog post A Day in the Life of a Media Consumer), I set out to explore my daily intake of news.

If I read something that seems a bit fishy I often see if I can corroborate one news story with another. I also always check the date and the source of the information. I often (but not always) check the background of the author to see what else they have written and if they are writing for/working for a reliable source.

One new idea that I am now becoming cognizant of is circular reporting which makes it more difficult for people to corroborate their news stories with others. Check out this video to understand how circular reporting works and how it creates an fertile environment for the spread of false information.

Recently, I have also learned about websites like Snopes.com and FactChecker which I will be starting to use now that I am aware of them!

What personal strategies do you use for navigating the (mis)information you see online?

 

The Post-Truth Era – Part 1

Oxford Dictionary’s word of the year for 2016 was post-truth as defined as “an adjective defined as ‘relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less  influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief”.

This week’s class discussion focused on the new and emerging challenges of literacy in a fake news world or if you will, a post-truth world. Many of my classmate’s presentations this week discussed how fake news spreads rampantly compared to factual articles and that fake news stories tend to have some sort of flair or novelty, thus appealing to the emotions and personal beliefs of their readers.

Why is this such a big deal? Well, it isn’t just a big deal for journalism, fake news is attacking the foundations of democracy by hacking into the human psyche in a way that has not been done before. Fake news is eroding epistemological and ontological values and understandings in humanity’s worldviews. In his article How the Business of the Digital Age Threatens Democracy , Aiden White (2017) references the BBC’s Grand Challenges for the 21st Century where many experts “named the breakdown of trusted information sources as a primary threat” in the 21st century.

Aiden White (2017) writes about the business model of the digital age,

“Using sophisticated algorithms, bots and turbo-charged distribution systems and fed by limitless databanks providing personal access to millions of subscribers, this business model thrives on “viral information” that can deliver enough clicks to trigger digital advertising. It matters not whether information is true or honest or whether it has public purpose; what counts is that it is provocative and stimulating enough to attract attention. Digital robots are useful but they can’t be encoded with ethical and moral values. Clearly, the best people to handle ethical questions regarding online content are sentient human beings, however the digital business model eschews any significant role for journalists and editors to do this work. The development of business models driven by algorithms which put clicks before content has created a new culture of communications in which truth and honesty is obscured by fake news, bigotry and malicious lies; and it legitimises a political space that encourages ignorance, uncertainty and fear in the minds of voters. These realities raise bigger questions about fake news that not only concern the future of journalism but also the nature of democracy itself”.

It is a big job then, for parents and teachers to tackle the big business of the digital age. Anthony Golding (2007) in Fact or Fiction: Fake News and Its Impact on Education writes that “Students armed with a positive skepticism of fake news can become change agents rather than victims”. In The Grim Conclusions of the Largest-Ever Study of Fake News the author states “falsehood consistently dominates the truth on Twitter, the study finds: Fake news and false rumors reach more people, penetrate deeper into the social network, and spread much faster than accurate stories”. In all elementary classrooms, reading comprehension is a big deal. But in this “post-truth” world, simply understanding what we read is not enough. Young people must be taught the necessary skills for not just understanding what they read but being able to interpret the validity, quality and credibility of the sources they read. They must be able to analyze the difference between real and mis-information.

Adam Zyglis / The Buffalo News (CagleCartoons.com 2016)

So, where do we start?

In Jaimie and Jocelyn’s vlog, they discuss a video called The Problem with Fake News on the 5 Cs of Critical Consuming (context, credibility, construction, corroboration and compare).

The video argues (and I agree) that critical thinking citizens are good for democracy and democracy is good for everyone. Jaimie and Jocelyn also included this infographic to help teachers, parents and students begin to spot fake news:

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Last week on Twitter and in our EC&I832 Google+ Community, I posed this question:

What resources or tools do you use to teach primary students about fake news or the hidden purposes behind media messages? #eci832 #medialiteracy #digcit

— Brooke Alexander (@balexander31) March 21, 2018

My students are too young to analyze most news articles because it is above their current reading ability but I would like the opportunity to incorporate this topic into our discussions at school.

My friends and classmates came back with the following ideas/resources:

• The House Hippo commercial (shout out to Amy Bladyko)
• National Geographic – How to Spot Fake News (offers 5 kid friendly news articles and “Real or Fake?” videos for viewing) (shout out to Deni M.)
• Real or Fake – Youtube channel (suggested by Amy Snider)

Other ideas welcome!

Is Bitmoji the New Face of Your Digital Identity?

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As described by Bitmoji.com, “Bitmoji is your own personal emoji. Create an expressive cartoon avatar, choose from a growing library of moods and stickers – featuring YOU! Put them into any text message, chat or status update”. There are over 1.9 septillion different combinations to make your bitmoji look just like you. Sometimes, I am kind of creeped out by how much my friend’s bitmoji’s really do look just like them.

So, how do you make one?

Bitmojis are are fun way to respond to messages in a variety of apps. I have been using Bitmoji for a few weeks now and really enjoy the creativity it allows me in conversations via text and Snapchat especially. Snapchat has recently introduced Friendmojis. To check out how to use Friendmojis, click here.

Bitmoji (owned by the software company Bitstrips) is a Toronto based company that was started by high school friends Jacob Blackstock and Jesse Brown in 2008 with the original intent of providing a web-based service for people to create their own comics without having to be good artists. In 2016, Snap Inc. (the company that owns Snapchat), bought Bitmoji. As I have discussed in earlier posts, Snapchat is one of the apps I am exploring for my major project.

Source  – Bitmoji now allows you to take a picture so that you can make your real image to your avatar.

Common Sense Education provides a good review of how this tool can be used in the classroom including as a safer profile picture for students to use at school. The review offers it’s own bottom line: that Bitmoji wasn’t necessarily made with education in mind but that they are many cool users for the app in the classroom. One interesting suggestion this review gives is for students to use Bitmoji as a way of representing characters in books or other texts. I know this simple idea opens up many possibilities in my mind for uses in the classroom. Remember, you must be 13 to sign up for the app though so best reserve this for high school students.

So, why do people love Bitmoji so much? Several sources that I have scoured for this blog post suggest that it provides the kind of face-to-face (if you can call it that) interaction that text message bubbles do not. Young people aren’t the only ones using it either. Most of my 25-30 year old friends are using Bitmojis. My youngest teenage cousin is using a Bitmoji and so are people I know that are similar in age to my parents.

What do you think of this reason for loving Bitmojis presented in the Forbes Magazine article The Inside Story of Bitmojis: Why We Love Them, How They Make Money, Why They are Here to Stay?

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So, EC&I832 classmates, do you think Bitmoji fits into the emerging definition of digital identity?

Check out how the new selfie feature makes it even easier to create a Bitmoji in the image of your IRL self using the selfie option:

If you don’t have a Bitmoji already, here is how you can get one and then download it onto Snapchat:

 

How do you think I did?

Before you download Bitmoji or Snapchat to your phone, make sure to check out their Privacy Policy and Terms of Service. Lucky for you, Bitmoji and Snapchat operate under the same Privacy Policy under their company, Snap Inc. You can check out my review of Snap Inc.’s Privacy Policy here.

As for the Terms of Service, by creating a Bitmoji, you grant them the following rights:

“Rights You Grant Us: Some of our Services let you create, upload, post, send, receive, and store content. When you do that, you retain whatever ownership rights in that content you had to begin with. But you grant us and our affiliates a worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable, and transferable license to host, store, use, display, reproduce, modify, adapt, edit, publish, and distribute that content including in connection with marketing and promotions for as long as you use the Services…You alone though remain responsible for the content you create, upload, post, send, or store through our Services…just know that we can use your ideas without compensating you”.

So, please be informed before you engage with this app and any new app for that matter!

Have you used Bitmoji? Do you like it? What apps have you used it with? What do you think of it as making text messages or chats appear like a more face-to-face human interaction? Do you see it as a way to create your digital identity online?