Digital citizenship (DC) is a concept integral to acting as a functional member of society in the 21st century and is it therefore imperative that it occupies focus in education with clarity and understanding. In general, DC refers to the responsibility and etiquette of one who uses digital technology (computers, the internet, etc.) to interact and engage with any aspect of society. Because there are differing views in academia as to what DC is and includes, formal definitions are variable. In an educational context, some authors have defined DC as “…a transversal dimension that involves the values, skills, attitudes, knowledge and critical understanding which citizens require in the digital era” (Frau-Meigs et al., 2017). Furthermore, a general but clear aspect of DC is to “…make safe, responsible, respectful choices online” (Common Sense Media, 2011).

In the traditional sense, citizenship is often viewed as a legal membership bounded within a nation-state which provides civil, social, political, and economic rights and responsibilities to legal citizens (Choi, 2016).  As a citizen of the digital world, such boundaries and societal norms are eliminated or disjointed because DC includes concepts like globalization and multiculturalism that emerge from a global network of information sharing like the internet. It includes self-representation and interaction through one’s digital identity on a platform that is lousy with misinformation, nefarious intention, permanent records, unrelatable contexts, and unregulated volumes of opinion (this is a “with great power comes great responsibility” moment from Spiderman’s Uncle Ben). Unlike the 20th century, where those who wanted no part in the technological movement had the ability to stay out of it, global citizens of the 21st century have no say over being integrated into a digital world—you can ignore the internet, but the internet will not ignore you. The dichotomy of the digital world is that is simultaneously a source of greatness and horror. It has given power to the people through the democratization of information and performed functions such as having broken down ancient systems of belief used to suppress and control marginalized groups while, at the same time, formed whole new factions of misinformation and rebirthed dormant ideology without context. The problem with a digital world, without digital citizenship, is that the rules for this new age are not yet discovered because they are rewritten daily; therefore, in order to use such a tool while protecting oneself and others, one needs to understand how to be an appropriate digital citizen.

I have tried to provide some indication to a spectrum of good and evil potentiated by the digital world, but why is digital citizenship important to a classroom? The internet and social media can be wonderful tools for connection, information sharing, learning, community building and more, but it is also a place of sexual harassment, catfishing, cyberbullying, psychological torment, and physical threat—particularly in school settings (Brailovskaia et al., 2018; John et al., 2018). DC is an antidote to many of these issues through understanding the risks, applying positive mental health to digital use, gaining experience in safe, informed settings, practicing self-regulation, and more.

Although digital literacy can be incorporated into any curricula with an educator worth their salt with digital technology, there are developed curricula in use. As of 2018, an organization named Common Sense Media has been a leader in the DC field providing curricula to 76% of all public schools in the US (Gleason & von Gillern, 2018). On the Common Sense Media website, educators, students, and parents can find resources that can be applied to K-12 education where it “[a]ddresses topics of concern for schools…, [p]repares students with critical 21st century skills…, [s]upports educators with training and recognition…[, and e]ngages the whole community through family outreach.” Personally, I would make a concerted effort to explore digital citizenship by integrating it into all classes I teach. I hope to teach in the sciences, and as part of the science curriculum, the scientific method is taught and maintained throughout scientific education. For those unfamiliar with the general basis of the scientific method, it is a set of principles (ie. Replicability, falsifiability, correlation vs causation, ruling out rival hypothesis, extraordinary claims, occam’s razor, etc..) that exposes why and how we are wrong with our hypotheses (informed and educated guesses)—a result could be positive, but that means that your hypothesis was not proven wrong, not that it was fact. Just as the scientific method is capable of putting our biases in check, it is a method for detecting misinformation and navigating the chaos and negativity on the internet. In this sense, the negative aspect of the internet is in fact a tool to use the scientific method against for learning! Other ways to engage DC is to build positive health in the classroom to provide students with the confidence and ability to handle misguided and ill-intended content on the internet; furthermore, to make good choices and gain awareness towards what is personally exposed on the internet and devices…and what that means.

 

References:

Brailovskaia, J., Teismann, T., & Margraf, J. (2018). Cyberbullying, positive mental health and suicide ideation/behavior. Psychiatry Research, 267, 240–242.

Choi, M. (2016). A Concept Analysis of Digital Citizenship for Democratic Citizenship Education in the Internet Age. Theory and Research in Social Education, 44(4), 565–607.

Common Sense Media. (2011). Digital Literacy and Citizenship in the 21st Century: Educating, Empowering, and Protecting America’s Kids A Common Sense Media White Paper. In Media (Issue March, pp. 1–16). Common Sense Media.

Frau-Meigs, D., O’Neill, B., Soriani, A., & Vitor Tomé. (2017). Digital Citizenship Education. Overview and New Perspectives (Vol. 1).

Gleason, B., & von Gillern, S. (2018). Digital citizenship with social media: Participatory practices of teaching and learning in secondary education. Educational Technology and Society, 21(1), 200–212.

John, A., Glendenning, A. C., Marchant, A., Montgomery, P., Stewart, A., Wood, S., Lloyd, K., & Hawton, K. (2018). Self-harm, suicidal behaviours, and cyberbullying in children and young people: Systematic review. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 20(4).