Digital citizenship means being a proactive online learner while behaving ethically at all times.

Assessment 5: Persuasive Blog Post

What is digital citizenship you may ask? Digital citizenship refers to the usage of technology in a respectful and responsible way, this means preventing cyberbullying, knowing how to be safe online, and knowing how to participate in social activities responsibly. To be a proactive online learner you need to know and practice digital interaction and communication with others, management of your Digital identity and respect of others digital identity as well, to be able to solve problems by using technology, and to know how to look after yourself and others when online. Behaving ethically means behaving in a correct manner that is necessary to be able to use technology in the correct way and to be able to interact with others properly.  In this blog you are going to find how ethics influence online learners from knowing what is right and wrong in a digital environment, how to be ethical at all times while being an individual online learner and what that means, and how to communicate with others ethical as an online learner.

How ethics influence online learners from knowing what is right and wrong in a digital environment.

In Being ethical goes beyond just following the law, Kerns states that “Ethics are the standard of what is right and wrong, and they are based on our values. Being ethical requires making a moral judgment, and that’s not always easy.” (Kerns, 2011, para 4). Knowing what is right and wrong also means that we know what is real and fake, and what is true or false. One of the many things that people find hard to tell is if it is a real or fake news articles or something from a magazine, this can be because we want to know what is going on and we want to be able to believe. The thing that most people do is they share the article on social media without looking to see if the source of the article is one that they can trust, most people see the headline and thing I will read this and believe this without checking the source. Having ethics as an online learner can stop this from happening because we know that not everything that we read can be real and 100% true. We also know that sharing something that is not ours is wrong and we should not do it and that others should not either

How to be ethical at all times while being an individual online learner and what this means.

Being ethical at all times as an individual online learner can be hard because there are many things that have to be thought about such as; making sure that you are being safe online and that you are not exposing yourself or others around you, it making sure that you know what you are posting, that others can see it and knowing that people will be able to see it in the future, making that you are doing the right thing and not breaking any laws, and making sure that posting something does not lead to any copyright issues, that you know everything is your own. People have to be careful when online because we all know that our private information can be spread very easier and that people that we do not what seeing it end up seeing it, and it can be very hard at times to stop our information from getting spread around. On a website called Media Smarts they have an article called Ethics and Sharing Personal Information where is says “There’s no question that youth are aware of how easily their private information can be spread to unintended audiences, and many spend considerable time online managing who sees what about them.” (Ethics and Sharing Personal Inform, 2020, para 2), this tells us that people do know that their private information can be spread easier and that they are trying to stop it from spreading. We have to make sure that we are not the ones sharing other people’s private information because that would then mean that we are not being ethical as an individual. We all know that at times it can be hard to stay ethical, but it is important that we do.

How to communicate with others ethically as an online learner.

Communicating with others can be hard at times because not everyone has the same option, and this can be hard when online because we can often get frustrated and want to see something back which can then up hurt that other person. Being an ethical online learner, we know that it is wrong too cyberbully, and we do not condone it. When communicating with others we also known that we should us proper language and it should not include an explicit word in it, we also know that if we are communicating over messages that we should right full sentences. Everyone does make mistakes though and we must remember if we do say something bad to someone else that we should apologies.

In Conclusion, Digital citizenship is being a proactive online learner while behaving ethically at all times. Being a digital citizen is known what is right and wrong when on a digital environment and that you know how to behave in the correct way. It also means that as an individual learner that it does not matter if you are interacting with others or not that you still be ethical at all times. Remember to behave ethically when communicating with other because it might affect others around you. Please remember to always be safe when online, that you behave in a correct manner and that you make sure that you are respecting others that are also using technology.

References

Ethics and sharing personal information. (n.d). Media Smarts

https://mediasmarts.ca/digital-media-literacy/digital-issues/online-ethics/ethics-sharing-personal-information

Kerns, P. (2011). Being ethical goes beyond just following the law. NCSL.

https://www.ncsl.org/research/ethics/sorting-right-from-wrong.aspx

For assessment 4 we had to make a video, I decided to do my video about Harry Potter and the differences that are between the books and the movies. I called my video  Harry Potter! The differences between the books and the movies. To make my video I used iMovie because it is free to use for people that have apple devices. I had used iMovie before but it has changed a lot since I last used it and is now a lot easier to use. I was able to record, add music and photos all in iMovie which I thought I was not going to be able to do, which made the whole process easier. The images I used where from Pixabay, Unsplash, PhotoPin, and I also took photos of all the covers from the movies and books that I have at home. I got my background music from Free Music Archive which is called Illustrated Novel. I created my own Thumbnail using two image from the sites above and I then edited and added other stuff onto it, I did this by using PicMonkey.

Music: “Illustrated Novel”

Images: From Pixabay, Unsplash, PhotoPin and i also took some photos myself.

For my third Assessment I had to make a Podcast about my future career. I want to become a midwife so I did my Podcast on Midwifery and called my Podcast Abby’s Podcast On Midwifery. To record my Podcast I used Audacity which I had to download onto my computer. With this being a new app I had know idea what I was doing so I playing around with the app for a while, and when i finally understood what I was doing. I was able to record what I was saying in parts and add music in which I found on Free Music Archive, that I was then able to cut into smaller pieces to use in my Podcast. It was easy to edit everything since it was all on one app and I could cut and copy stuff if I needed too. I used Soundcloud to upload my Podcast and found it very easy to navigate since I had also never used that before, I added an image that I found on Pixabay, and then published my Podcast.

I had lots of fun with creating this assessment, once I had actually started. I learnt so much from it not just about online tools but also about myself since I never thought I would ever be comfortable with creating a Podcast.

Image: https://pixabay.com/illustrations/white-male-3d-man-isolated-3d-1871415/

Music: “The Spring (Instrument)”

https://www.freemusicarchive.org/search?adv=1&quicksearch=The%20Spring%20Instrumental&&

“Rising Bells”

https://www.freemusicarchive.org/search?adv=1&quicksearch=Rising%20Bells&&

The information that I got back from the profile outcome for digital online learner skills framework ‘connect’, was that I was mainly a bold beginner and an intrepid intermediate. This means to me that I have an understanding about how to connect to other and I know how to use different websites to connect with them. It also tells me that I have lots of room to grow and further develop my skills with using online platforms and using them to connect with others. I have used sites such as Padlet, LinkedIn and adobe connect, to connect with other peers. I have used Padlet during many classes to connect with other peers about what we are doing, we do this by all writing something and then we can read over what others have said and we can leave a comment or we can like what they have said. When creating my LinkedIn profile, I was able to follow and connect with my peers who were also doing the same thing. I was also able to join groups that connect to the career path that I would like to take in the near future, this also allows me to be able to interact with them and professionals that or in the group.

Connecting online is important because it always us to be able to interact with others and seek opportunities that we may not have been able to have if we didn’t have social media or other online sites. I now have a better understanding on how I can connect with others because I know about so many new and different websites that can be used to interact with others. I know I can still develop my understanding better throughout this year, on how to interact with other and that I will become more confident and comfortable doing so. I now have new knowledge about how I am able to protect myself will using social media and other websites, I also know how to present myself better online so that I have a good online profile for when someone is searching me up to find out more about me. Due to joining groups on LinkedIn I have been able to join in communities that have the same interest as I do, and I have been able to see what I will be doing and looking at in the future. Through LinkedIn I have found many other students that are doing the diploma of General Studies this year who are not only from my campus but from everywhere else, which has been pretty cool to see and know how many others are doing this course which I wouldn’t have known if I didn’t have an account.

So far while setting up my professional profile I have moments where I have thought that some things may be really useful and can help make a better profile, that if I hadn’t looking into them I probably would have thought that they would have no be useful for me. To move forward in the future with ‘connecting’ online, I will make sure that a regularly update my profiles and change anything that may need changing, so that my profiles can look the best that the possibly can. I will also continue to find new digital tools and explore all the different things that there is to do with them, like I have done with AutoDraw. By continuing to do this I will help able to help myself to become a better digital online learner over time and I will have been able to explore many different sites and I may find that some digital tools could potentially be very useful when studying and doing revision, which will then improve my studying and time.

https://www.autodraw.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/abby-martin-a5177b1a4/