Digital Citizenship -- Digital Security

This post builds on the ideas shared in the article "Nine Themes of Digital Citizenship".

The last of the nine themes is digital security -- our own. Just like we take steps to keep our homes and property safe (lock our doors, lock car doors, install a security system), it's important to keep our online lives secure as well. We do that by making sure we have anti-virus software on our computers (AND making sure it is up-to-date), backing up our data and files, using surge protectors, or password protecting our home networks.

Chances are, our students don;t think much about those things since they're not the ones in charge of that. At home, their parents take care of it. At school, the technology department does it. That's why it's important for kids to understand that their access to the internet, their information, their technology, and their files are relatively safe BECAUSE there are things in place to protect them. How can we reinforce this understanding to our students? Here are some ideas:

• At the start of the year, talk to kids about how their Chromebooks differ from a regular laptop and the difference between saving files and data to the cloud (like it happens in a Google account) or to a hard drive (like files saved on a computer).
• When students' access to a site is blocked here at school and they get frustrated, use it as a teachable moment, explaining to the kids how the firewall prevents things like viruses from entering our network as well as preventing students (and teachers) from accidentally clicking on something that could harm our files or our school network. The firewall is our friend :-)

Just like real-life safety can be a bit of a hassle (like if you've ever locked your keys in your car or locked yourself out of your house), online security can be a bit of a hassle, too (it takes time to run updates of anti-virus software or do a backup of data, it's a pain when you forget the password to your home network). But without those protective measures in place, we leave ourselves vulnerable to far greater inconveniences -- like losing all our files or having to buy a whole new computer!

Want to learn more about some of the worst viruses ever? Check out this fascinating video!