Playing It Safe with Student Digital Citizenship

By Kathryn Berger, iExplore Teacher at Riverview School

As parents, we teach our children many skills such as how to tie their shoes, ride a bike, and carefully cross a street as they walk to school or visit a friend in the neighborhood. Although these skills are automatic to us as adults, children need to learn and practice them step by step to be successful. Just as children need our support with these and many other skills as they progress throughout their childhood, they also require guidance in an area that many of us did not experience to the same level as this generation - the use of online resources and devices.

Digital citizenship is a term used to refer to an individual being a responsible, respectful, and safe “citizen” when they are using online resources on an electronic device such as a phone, tablet, laptop, or gaming system. As children navigate life face to face with other people, they learn to read and react appropriately to social cues in various situations, treat others kindly, and be cautious when interacting with people. Sometimes this is not as easy when done through a screen. Teaching children specific steps to follow to prevent online issues is as essential as learning to safely cross a busy street.

Being safe online is very similar in some ways as being safe in face to face situations. The advice of “don’t talk to strangers”, “trust your gut”, and “if you can’t say something nice, then don’t say anything at all” also hold true for interactions online. Going on websites that are appropriate for their age level, alerting parents about anything that pops up that is inappropriate or any online interactions that make them feel scared or uncomfortable, keeping information private such as their full name, birthdate, address, school, phone number, passwords, and photos by not sharing them online are all important steps in being a safe and responsible digital citizen.

We also need to teach children that not everything they see online is true and not everyone online is who they appear to be. People who do not have good intentions online often implement phishing techniques. Phishing refers to trying to lure people into giving access to their private information online through emails that look credible, from a trusted source such as a large retail company, bank, or person, but are actually fake. The email might include the company logo, contact information, and other content related to that company to make it look official. Sometimes these types of emails will be filtered to spam folders, but there are still many that unfortunately land in the email inbox. Some of the wording that might be included in the email might include something like “Your account has been compromised and will be deactivated. Please click on this link and enter your password to check on your account status.” The email might be more upbeat and state that the recipient has won a gift card which can be claimed by clicking on a link. Children concerned about their account or excited to win a prize might innocently click on the links. Those links may actually lead to a fake website which gives the sender access to the user’s password or other private information.

So how do we teach our children to be internet smart and avoid being lured by phishing emails? Here are some tips to follow:

• Scammers will often make the sender’s name look like a name or title that the company would actually use. If you are not sure if an email sender is legitimate, hover over the sender’s email address at the “from” section in the email message. If the email address looks like a mixture of letters and numbers and is very different from the company’s name, or if the address is similar to the company but is misspelled, and includes random spaces or hyphens, it was most likely created that way to trick you into thinking it was from the actual company.

• Look closely at the email message. Are there spelling and grammar errors? Most big companies have editors that check over their emails to avoid any mistakes in their message. If you notice several errors or if the wording doesn’t sound grammatically correct, chances are the email is fake.

• Instead of clicking on links or attachments in emails that appear suspicious and potentially revealing your password and other private information to scammers, type the official website address of the company in the address bar at the top of the screen to go directly to the company’s website. Once on the company’s website, you can check your account status safely. You might want to update your password while you are reviewing your account.

• Do not respond to the phishing emails! Mark them as Spam or delete them after showing them to a parent.

• Change your password often! Do not use the same password for every online account. Make sure your password does not include words that are easy for others to guess like your name, birthday, school, or city that you live in.

As we guide our children through their school years, we need to check in with them often about their use of online resources and continue to provide guidance to make sure they are being responsible, respectful, and safe while using digital resources and devices.

Just as we remind our children to safely cross the street while being aware of distractions to avoid potential accidents, we want to make sure they are safe while navigating the internet. Having strong digital citizenship skills will lead children on a safe and responsible path to enjoy the many positive benefits of using online resources throughout their lives.