Month: November 2021

Understanding the Impact of Technology and the Digital Footprint we Leave Behind

My Week 2 Reflection

This week’s lesson was very informative.  I feel that I learned a lot about my digital footprint and about net neutrality.  After reading this week’s articles and watching the videos, I can honestly say that I have learned a lot and I think it has shed some light on a few things for me.  For example, the concept called filter bubbles by Eli Pariser, is something I could see happening with my own digital experiences.  I would notice the more I would search items on the internet, those items would appear as ads on my feed in Facebook.  I also noticed that when I would be talking about certain things, all of a sudden it would also appear in my Facebook feed.  This is crazy to even think about, and a little scary.

I also learned the concept of net neutrality, which is creating a neutral internet.  I can see the importance of having net neutrality and why the bigger corporations want control and not have the regulations that are in place.  The corporations such as Comcast and AT&T want control over what consumers see and they also want the option to charge more for faster internet.  This is not good for us, schools or the smaller corporations. 

For us, it means that they would have control over what appears in our searches, or it would mean that if we were to search something that the providers were not for, they could simply block it from us.

For smaller corporations it means that they do not even get a chance to grow.  There would be no way that the smaller corporations could keep up financially with the bigger corporations.  I could see how this would be walking a fine line of becoming a monopoly in our society. 

Schools want an even playing field and our students deserve this.  Net neutrality helps our schools accomplish this.  Without net neutrality our students would suffer greatly.  Long (2015) states in her article, What Net Neutrality means for our Students and Educators, that without net neutrality, service providers can charge higher prices for larger bandwidths, which would mean schools that are already struggling with finances would not be able to afford the higher cost which means internet speeds would be way slower than the average schools.  It also means that the providers have the option to sensor material from students.  If a student was wanting to research a topic that the providers did not necessarily agree with, the provider could either make the response time a lot slower or they could block the material and only provide the student with more of a one sided perspective.  As Long (2015) put it, this is an infringement on our First Amendment, Freedom of Speech.  Most of the time, to the untrained eye, people do not even realize that certain content is being blocked, since this happens behind the scenes.  No one should have the power over us to control what information we receive.

One of the most interesting, but also scary, thing I discovered is that net neutrality has different rules for mobile devices.  It is almost like rules do not apply to mobile devices, which honestly I do not understand why.  This part left me with more questions than answers.  I invite you to read the article, An Introduction to Net Neutrality to learn more about this topic.

What is Digital Citizenship? A reflection of my week one learning.

This is my first week in 5316 Digital Citizenship.  Before reading through the syllabus, I honestly did not know what to expect.  I mean I knew it was going to cover how to appropriately represent yourself online, but I did not realize there was so much to it. 

We were asked if citizenship and digital citizenship were the same.  It was then I realized that digital citizenship had a lot more to it than just representing yourself in a positive way.  When looking through all of our resources, I found out that there is not one set definition for digital citizenship; there are several and each of them has its own twist on the definition.  Ribble (2015) deconstructs digital citizenship into nine essential constituent elements. 

The nine elements that Ribble describes are:

  1. Digital access – Citizens have different levels of access.  Full access should be a goal of citizenship.
  2. Digital commerce – Buying and selling online is increasing exponentially, and consumers need to be aware of what to purchase and the legality of their purchases.
  3. Digital communication – There are numerous ways to communicate online, and citizens need to make wise decisions in what and how they communicate.
  4. Digital literacy – Technological literacy requires citizens keep up with digital changes.
  5. Digital etiquette – Citizenship comes with a responsibility to follow etiquette when communicating with others.
  6. Digital law – Citizens have a responsibility to behave ethically and be aware of laws governing them.
  7. Digital rights and responsibilities – The rights of users are shared equally.  These rights come with responsibilities.
  8. Digital health and wellness – Physical and psychological issues can occur when ergonomics and other problems are not addressed.
  9. Digital security – Citizens must take action to protect their information online.

The three categories that Ribble created based on how they directly related to the students.  The first category were the elements that directly affected student learning and academic performance, and the elements were access, literacy, and communication.  The second category were the elements that affected the overall school environment and student behavior, and these elements included etiquette, rights and responsibilities, and security.  The third category was the affect student life outside the school environment, and this included the elements of commerce, health and wellness, and law.

The three principles that branched from this was the principle to respect yourself and others, and these included the elements of etiquette, access and law.  The second principle is to educate yourself/connect with others, and the elements included are communication, literacy, and commerce.  The third principle is protection yourself/protect others and the three elements included are rights and responsibility, safety, and health and welfare.

The element that is probably the most important to me is digital health and wellness.  During the first part of the pandemic we were all at home with little to nothing to do but be on our devices.  I often found myself at times getting depressed because of all of the negativity that I was reading.  My husband gave me some of the best advice, to step away.  He told me that we need a break from things like this or it will suck us in and turn out bad for us.  He was right, I could feel myself being depressed with all of the world issues that I needed a break, so I stepped away and was able to turn my focus back to the most important issues in my life, my family.

I have learned a vast amount of information this week in regards to digital citizenship and saw that it is so much more than acting right online.  I believe that Darren Kuropatwa (2015) said it correctly, it takes more than just not doing bad things to be a good citizen, it also takes someone making positive contributions to be a good digital citizen.

References

Kuropatwa, D. (2015, July 16). Digital Ethics and digital citizenship. YouTube. Retrieved November 18, 2021, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbMsbxYvr4E. 

Ribble, M. (2015). In Digital citizenship in schools: Nine elements all students should know. essay, International Society for Technology in Education.