The concept of digital citizenship was one which I didn’t think much about before tackling this subject. I knew from the beginning of the subject that there would be language and concepts which I had not encountered before along with the creation of skills which I did not know if I was capable of (Marreiros, 2023d). I have come to understand that digital citizenship is far more than being safe online which did bring me to try to incorporate this understanding into my own school’s behaviour for learning program (Marreiros, 2023c). This website was created to be a living document which changes and adapts for the current needs of the school life, and I know a future adaptation will be looking at the highlights, ethics and pitfalls of using artificial intelligence (AI) so that the primary students have up-to-date understanding about plagiarism (Elgersma, 2023). In doing this not only will I, as a teacher librarian, be challenging student perceptions, but I too will be leading the way with colleagues and parents in their understanding of this component of a digital learning environment (DLE).

The opportunity to share this expertise is something which Cox & Korodaj (2019) discuss in their article about leadership, where they conducted their own environmental scan and reported on the importance of this reflective practice – something which hadn’t occurred to me around the environment of digital learning until beginning to tackle assessment two. In my position at the school, I believe that I can use my influence as a teacher of all students and collaborator in all school teams to offer my expertise and knowledge of the school DLE and personal DLEs, particularly since conducting the environmental scan of the school DLE. As was discussed in a forum post (Marreiros, 2023b), the conversation starters for staff about digital footprints is just one way to share, and with the information gathered in assessment two, I will be approaching school leadership to see how the recommended actions can be fulfilled.

The extension of my knowledge around an effective DLE has come through much self-reflection of my own digital interactions. I have become aware of my own DLE social, ethical and moral mistakes through using critical thinking skills (Marreiros, 2023a) and understand even more why Australian schools must teach the capabilities of creative and critical thinking, particularly in a DLE (Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2022). The nature of a DLE being available 24/7 does make it imperative that students are taught about the best ways to navigate this environment, which of course links back to being an active, safe and respectful digital citizen (Marreiros, 2023c).

One of the biggest takeaway moments I have had from this subject is that I have taken for granted what digital citizenship is. What I need to do now and instil in those I teach is that while citizenship has been granted, we need to make the most of this fabulous and dynamic environment.

References

Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority. (2022). General capabilities (version 9). https://v9.australiancurriculum.edu.au/f-10-curriculum/f-10-curriculum-overview/general-capabilities

Cox, E., & Korodaj, L. (2019). Leading from the sweet spot : Embedding the library and the teacher librarian in your school community. Access, 33(4), 14-25.

Elgersma, C. (2023, February 14). ChatGPT and beyond: How to handle AI in schools. Common Sense Education. https://www.commonsense.org/education/articles/chatgpt-and-beyond-how-to-handle-ai-in-schools

Marreiros, K. (2023a, May 9). 5.4 reponse [Forum Post]. ETL523, Interact 2. https://interact2.csu.edu.au/webapps/discussionboard/do/message?action=list_messages&course_id=_66276_1&nav=discussion_board_entry&conf_id=_136250_1&forum_id=_310070_1&message_id=_4446262_1

Marreiros, K. (2023b, March 10). Module 1.2 [Forum Post]. ETL523, Interact 2. https://interact2.csu.edu.au/webapps/discussionboard/do/message?action=list_messages&course_id=_66276_1&nav=discussion_board_entry&conf_id=_136250_1&forum_id=_310057_1&message_id=_4374392_1

Marreiros, K. (2023c). PBL in a digital world. https://sites.google.com/education.nsw.gov.au/pbl-in-a-digital-world/home

Marreiros, K. (2023d, February 21). So many questions! Stepping Bravely Into the Unknown – This Teacher’s Journey to becoming a Teacher Librarian. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/sbitu/2023/02/21/so-many-questions/

I was struck when reading the blog post by TeachThought Staff (2019) about the room for growth most digital citizenship programs have. The infographic below shows the aspirational way to go from a Digital Citizen to a Digital Leader. What it brings up in me is the challenge to live out the Digital Leader life in both my personal and professional spheres. The students I teach, being aged 12 and under, still have developing brains and are still working out how their actions affect those in the physical world, let alone a digital world. I am still teaching students that sometimes if you hide an item, it is still there in mathematical thinking, therefore the idea of something being permanent in the digital world is a far off concept.

Therefore, I need to lead by example and try to instil the importance of this to my colleagues and friends. This does not mean that I cannot showcase digital leadership to students. Like the Information Fluency Framework (NSW Department of Education, 2021), there is a continuum of learning and development and concepts such as the promotion of important causes can be taught in meaningful ways. The challenge is to do this with relevance. The learning journey of every individual is different and therefore the teaching methods need to be adaptive.

A resource which was shared in Module 5.2 made me explore further into the blog of Anne Mirtschin (2021). Anne has been walking the world of meaningful digital citizenship long before a global pandemic caused many teachers to teach in a hybrid manner or solely online. The creativity reported in a 2021 blog post showed the influence which Anne has had in her school, something which I would love to emulate in my own sphere of influence.

References

Mirtschin, A. (2021, November 12). 2021Virtual year 12 graduation dinners. On an e-Journey with Generation Y. https://murcha.wordpress.com/2021/11/12/2021virtual-year-12-graduation-dinners/

NSW Department of Education. (2021). Information Fluency Framework. https://education.nsw.gov.au/content/dam/main-education/teaching-and-learning/curriculum/media/documents/Information_fluency_framework.pdf

TeachThought Staff. (2019, November 26). Moving students from digital citizenship to digital leadership. TeachThought. https://www.teachthought.com/the-future-of-learning/moving-students-from-digital-citizenship-to-digital-leadership/

One might ask, what have I learnt using a couple of entirely new platforms with an ambitious university assessment?

The initial enthusiasm of choosing to create an animation for my digital artefact, as I had never done that before, soon waned as the reality of my skill set started to dawn on me. My personal preference for dramatic arts over visual had me questioning my wisdom of format. However, as I am not one to shy away from a challenge, I persisted in doing something outside of my comfort zone. This is something I ask of the students I teach, so I needed to move beyond ideas of the perfect product to the process of learning. In essence, I took on the Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL) active attitude which I ask of students. Translating aspects of this task into the classroom is something I hope to do, by encouraging students to find some of their own videos or games to add to the website so they can help showcase digital citizenship to other students.

The video by Chipflake (2021) humorously lets me know that I am not alone in animation challenges. For me, the seconds of soccer skills in the digital artefact was a lot more time in the creation process. I have plenty of room for improvement in the breadth of the creative arts!

I worked out early on that certain platforms did not have the ease of use behind the scenes which I needed in creating a website, so settled on creating using Google Sites. As this task is one which I hope to use in the school environment, the platform choice with easy accessibility for students swayed my decision. However, it was also because of the choice of creating something which I wanted students to use behind a school’s security network that I encountered a hiccup. While trying to combat the lack of YouTube access on school sites I attempted to embed videos in a different way only to discover that doing this meant that public access to the site was restricted. Thankfully changes behind the scenes for later school access are easily remedied.

As for my future career, while animator is definitely not on the cards, an active and inquisitive learner is!

Reference

Chipflake. (2021, October 29). The truth about being an animator [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/06tkx5uvbJ0

As part of my initial dive into modules for this subject I was asked to view Steve Wheeler in his keynote presentation to INTED 2015 (IATED, 2015). I was struck by the report that schools are seduced by new technologies, but they don’t know what to do with them (IATED, 2015, 8:22). Have I been guilty of this? Absolutely! The challenge that I see is what can I do to make the use of new technologies authentic and meaningful, not just a flash in the pan, but something which will add purpose to students learning.

Going beyond this pondering I have been asked to define what a Digital Learning Environment (DLE) is. To me it is everything that you use when accessing digital content. For me this means, using a Dropbox account for personal documents, Microsoft 365 or Google Drive for school related documents, but that is just for document storage or creation. Recently, Canva and Lucid have also been used in this as well – something which was not around when my Dropbox account was first set up in the early 2000s. There are Teacher Librarian specific DLE, such as SCIS for cataloguing, Oliver as a library management system and other departmental opportunities such as Yammer conversations or PRC website management and use.

Beyond this, there are social media platforms, Facebook being one which my school community use frequently. As I live and work in the same community (and have had my child at the same school as where I teach) there is a blur of lines with where personal and professional end with some of my DLE, something I am acutely aware of. While I am cognisant of my digital footprint having lived in a time when the internet did not exist, I am hyperaware of the habits of primary aged students (and my own teenagers) and their inability to see the ramifications of ‘privacy’ online. This has led me to teach year 5 and 6 students about their online behaviour, particularly around privacy. Is there more I can do? Absolutely! Which I am keen to do.

References:

IATED. (2015, March 17). Steve Wheeler: Digital learning futures: Mind the gap! [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/t7EftCFQHVg

As I look at the subject outline for this subject, Digital Citizenship in Schools, I am struck with how much stretching and growing I will need to do in this subject. While the titles of the modules look really interesting (there is no access to the actual modules yet), the level of information which is covered in the 6 modules looks to be intense. Add to that, needing to create a digital artefact and I am already wondering what exactly this will involve and how can I set up something which is not a blog (something which I have done both during this course and in previous teaching roles). The phrase in the subject outline… ‘you are asked to be creative with this task’ referencing the first assessment creates both an excitement and trepidation in tackling this task.

Time will tell what I need to tackle next…