Archive for the ‘ethics’ Category:


Digital Citizenship for our Schools @alicebarr #cmtc10

These are my notes from Alice Barr’s breakout session, “Digital Citizenship for our Schools” at the the 2010 Christa McAuliffe Technology Conference in Manchester, NH on 30 Nov 2010. MY THOUGHTS AND COMMENTS ARE IN ALL CAPS. Track conference conversations using the Twitter hash tag #cmtc10. Alice is the Instructional Technology Integrator at Yarmouth High

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Podcast364: The ELL Bill of Rights – An Interview with Ruslana Westerlund @EllBillofRights

This podcast is an interview with Ruslana Westerlund, the creator of the ELL Bill of Rights (ellbillofrights.com) and the keynote speaker at the “Co-teaching and Collaboration Conference” in St Paul, Minnesota on 12 Nov 2010, at the School Community of Excellence. Ruslana is an educator originally from Ukraine, and has worked for years with English

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Take care of your laptop! (TPI: ThinkPad Investigation)

Do students at your school take care of their laptops, or the laptops they are able to use on carts kept at school? Lenovo sponsored the following ten minute CSI-spoof video to help students understand the critical need to take care of laptops, especially Thinkpad laptops featured in this video. This video was created by

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Privacy Implications of your Social Graph on Facebook #cwf2010

These comments were shared by Andrew Zolli at the Creativity World Forum in Oklahoma City on 17 November 2010. Andrew gave a FANTASTIC talk, and in these final minutes of the panel discussion addressed Facebook social graphs and some of the implications this has for privacy. See my post and text notes from this GREAT

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Controversial Anti-Abortion Education Campaign at UNT

It’s quite interesting to spend three days a week this semester teaching and writing on the campus of the University of North Texas, in Denton. Last week the organization, “Justice for All” sponsored a controversial anti-abortion campaign. These were the signs that greeted students, faculty, and others walking by the student union and the outdoor

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Firesheep should get your ATTENTION: Open Public Wifi Dangers are REAL

This may be the most important post you’ll read on my blog from a personal, digital security standpoint. If you use ANY website today which requires a login but does NOT use a “persistent https” secure connection thereafter, you’re at MAJOR risk of having your account(s) hacked if you use open, wifi hotspots in coffee

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Generational Differences and Parenting

These are my notes from Bill Roberts’ presentation on Parenting and Family Life at the “Family Matters” class on 27 October 2010 at First Presbyterian Church in Edmond, Oklahoma. MY THOUGHTS AND COMMENTS ARE IN ALL CAPS. Tonight we’re going to talk about parenting and generational differences, based on several books and some Internet resources

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China, Democracy, Charter 8 and Liu Xiaobo

Students in your class are likely to know at least a little bit about China and the concept of democracy, but do they know about Charter 8 and Liu Xiaobo? They should, and so should we as educators. Liu is this year’s winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, and his courage to publicly sign Charter

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First Proctored Quiz with Moodle

Today my undergraduate, pre-service education students in “Computers in the Classroom” at the University of North Texas took their first exam. This was the first time I’ve used Moodle in a proctored environment for an in-class quiz. In this post I’ll share a few of the settings I made in the quiz, and the classroom

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Emotional Intelligence by Phyllis Van Hemert

These are my notes from Phyllis Van Hemert’s presentation about “Emotional Intelligence” on 6 Oct 2010 at the “Family Matters” class at 1st Presbyterian Church in Edmond, Oklahoma. Phyllis was the counselor at our kids’ elementary school in Edmond and is now a family and kids counselor in private practice. Recommended Reading: The Optimistic Child

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Digital Grounding and loss of Facebook Privileges

The Washington Post article from September 5th, “Parents use ‘digital’ grounding as a 21st century disciplinary tool,” includes some good ideas for parents of digital age kids. Facebook is a privilege, not a right. Kids CAN survive without digital access to their peers for awhile, particularly if their device use is getting in the way

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Google UK Employees talk about Family Internet Safety

This evening I shared an hour long presentation at our church for parents about Internet safety and digital citizenship. Among other resources, I shared the Google Family Safety Center, Google’s Family Internet Safety YouTube channel, and the recently posted 2.5 minute video, “Parents at Google UK talking about child safety online.” I really like the

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Internet Safety and Digital Citizenship in Alva, Oklahoma (SlideShare Slidecast)

On Friday, September 10, 2010, I shared five presentations on “Internet Safety and Digital Citizenship” with all 900+ students in Alva Public Schools in Alva, Oklahoma. I started at the high school in the morning, and with the help of tech director Tony Ishmael made it to the junior high, grade 4-5 campus, grade 2-3

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News Literacy and the Basics of Journalism: Be Fair, Accurate and Clear

This summer for the second time, I had an opportunity to present and learn with other educators gathered for the week long “Oklahoma Multimedia Teachers” workshop at the Gaylord School of Journalism on the campus of OU in Norman. Tammy Parks, a broadcast journalism teacher in Howe, Oklahoma, has got me involved in this project.

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Free eBook: Henry Jenkins on Participatory Culture and Media Education

In the last few weeks at some point I read that Henry Jenkins has published a new book through the MacArthur Foundation titled, “Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century.” I noticed the book cost about $13. This evening, however, I discovered (rather serendipitously) that the eBook version of this

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Your unique, non-corporate voice MATTERS

Good thoughts from Kalle Lasn: If we, as a society, lose our voice completely, and corporations start doing all the talking, then we’ll be utterly lost. To some degree, this has already happened. Our ability to envision a future collectively has already been severely compromised. Yet another reason to become a storychaser. H/T to @creativetallis

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Remix Viral Media to Create Viral Media

Nick Pittsinger, a “20-year-old aspiring music producer in Florida” (according to Damon Brown writing for CNN) has used software to slow down Justin Bieber’s single “U SMILE” eight times and republished his remix on Soundcloud as “U SMILE 800% SLOWER.” Pittsinger’s song version was highlighted on Gawker last week, and to date the song has

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Internet Safety and Digital Citizenship Presentations for Students, Parents and Teachers

At the request of several school leaders in Oklahoma and Texas, I’m putting together a series of updated presentations this year for K-12 students as well as parents and teachers focusing on Internet safety, privacy, cyberbullying issues, digital footprints and digital citizenship. (Contact info is available on my “speaking” page.) photo credit: cotaro70s Using video

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Jessi Slaughter (Jessica Leonhardt) on YouTube: A Case Study on Digital Citizenship

The actions of Florida 11 year old “Jessi Slaughter” (Jessica Leonhardt) on YouTube as well as her father provide a case study on digital citizenship both sad and instructive to witness. The following seven minute segment from Good Morning America back in July 2010 provides a partial summary of the incident and situation. The YouTube

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Critical thinking is more important than ever amidst Internet-based denier propaganda

Critical thinking has ALWAYS been an important part of a high quality education. A case can be made in our information-awash society today, however, that critical faculties are needed NOW more than ever. The May 2010 issue of NewScientist magazine includes a special report section titled, “Age of Denial: Why so many people refuse to

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