California Assembly members are proposing a bill that would expand on the 2007 Chavez bill (AB 307) requirement for teaching Internet safety in California public schools. The Chavez bill originally addressed the need to teach students about copyright and fair use. The bill was later amended to include a section on Internet safety.

A new bill, AB 678 (Hall) Education Technology,  extends the Chavez bill to require California school districts’  3- to 5-year technology  plans to include Internet safety guidelines and criteria that educates students and teachers on the negative impacts of cyberbullying and the responsible use by students of mobile communication technology. The EGUSD 2009-2012 technology plan clearly delineates the district’s commitment to continue our outreach to teachers, students, and parents on the safe, effective, and ethical use of the Internet.

If you would like to track AB 678’s journey through the Legislature, bookmark this link: http://www.aroundthecapitol.com/Bills/AB_678/.

One of the goals of the 2WebWatchers blog is to keep our EGUSD community at large informed of changes in federal, state, and district guidelines pertinent to the teaching of Internet safety. Another goal is to provide you with resources that can be used in K-12 classrooms and at home.  We have a new addition to our collection of EGUSD student-produced, award-winning Internet safety videos: Blog Safely.  This PSA was produced by 4th grade filmmakers in Lesley McKillop’s classroom at Prairie Elementary and received Honorable Mention at the recent SEVA Awards Night.

As always, we invite your comments and feedback.

A visit to Toby Johnson Middle School’s Video Productions class is like stepping into a whirlwind of amazing media activities. Throughout the classroom, students are teamed up and collaborating to meet a variety of production deadlines. Student groups may be working on Public Service Announcements, commercials to promote school activities, movies to be used for instructional purposes by other teachers, news reports for the morning show, instructional videos, documentaries, music videos or digital story telling assignments.

All Toby Johnson students begin their day connecting through media through the live daily news show, First Things First on TJ TV, which, while only in its first year, has already become an integral part of TJMS’s school culture.

Video Productions teacher Dana La Chapelle started transforming her vision for a student-run school TV program into a reality over the summer. She remodeled what was originally an adjoining wood shop class into a state of the art – on a shoe-string budget – production studio. Thanks in part to funding from a Carl Perkins grant, obsolete equipment donated by CSUS, and a lot of help and technical guidance and equipment donations from Sacramento Educational Cable Consortium (SECC) production manager Doug Niva, La Chapelle’s students were able to go live with their first TJ-TV show on the first day of school. “Without SECC, we wouldn’t even have known what equipment we needed” said La Chapelle, “thanks to Doug Niva, we had a wish list to start with and set out to find a way to bring the needed items together. After we gathered the equipment, SECC stepped in again and helped us to put it all together. Doug spent two twelve-hour days helping me (and my family) put the studio together and many hours since offering technical support and guidance over the phone,” La Chapelle continued. “There is absolutely no way we could be doing any of what we’re doing today without the help and tremendous support of Doug Niva and SECC.”

In addition to the TJ TV shows, students are involved in creating a range of public service announcements (PSAs) that will go out to the TJMS community and beyond. The winning middle school entry for the Elk Grove Unified School District’s 1st Annual Internet Safety Video Contest, for instance, was produced by one of La Chapelle’s video teams. Much of their focus in recent months has been to create winning entries for the upcoming Student Educational Video Event (SEVAs) and to complete a video series about the changes that students experience during their middle school years to be broadcast as part of the school’s Advocacy Program lessons. Throughout all projects, LaChapelle weaves in lessons on ethical and legal use of the Internet, including copyright and fair use issues.

“My goal for the Video Productions class is to engage students in learning new technologies and production strategies that will prepare them for success both in school and in the future,” explains La Chapelle. “To be literate in the 21st century, students need a wide range of abilities and competencies, including the ability to create, analyze and evaluate multi-media texts – and to understand the safe and ethical use of new technologies. Most importantly, I want students to learn that what they think, feel and have to say is important. They have so much to contribute inside themselves. I love being able to show them how to share their voice in such a compelling format.”

As the video below illustrates, there is no “down time” in Video Productions. From a student perspective, the class provides a variety of experiences. As Jessica, a 7th grade video productions student explained, “Video Productions is a great way for us to get involved with student-made voices!” Seventh grader Enshika added, ” I really lie Video Productions. It gives me a chance to be creative and use my imagination. There are no boundaries or limitations.”

To learn more about the Video Productions class and TV program, please contact Dana la Chapelle at diachape@egusd.net.

If you know of other school programs that integrate Internet Safety into the curriculum, please contact 2WebWatchers at 2WebWatchers@egusd.net.

For the past year, we (2WebWatchers) have taken our Internet Safety workshop on the road in an effort to make it accessible to parents as well as teachers. These regional face-to-face workshops serve as an open invitation to parents to join in the conversation of best ways to help their children learn to use the Internet safely, effectively, and ethically.

As part of the presentation, we showcase how teachers are harnessing the power of Web 2.0 to take learning beyond the walls of the classroom – while teaching students the protocols to keep them safe from others, from each other, and from themselves. A concern voiced by some parents is that their elementary student may have little access to the Internet during the school day due to lack of computers in the classroom and/or limited access to computer lab time. Therefore social networking is not woven into their child’s school day. They ask for recommendations of safe social networking sites their child might use at home.

Our question to parents is “Is there a specific interest or goal for bringing your child into the world of social networking? For instance, do you wish to:

• create an online communication tool for your child, family and friends that can be accessed, expanded, archived over the years?” If the answer is “yes,” then we recommend creating a blog, using an ad-free program such as Google’s Blogger. An excellent example is All About Amy. We first learned about Amy’s blog via a post from her father. In the years to come, we suspect Amy will value being able to look back at conversations with her immediate family, relatives, friends, and all those who helped her on her journey to becoming a reflective writer. All About Amy is a great model for parents as co-pilots!

• provide your child, age 5-8, with access to a safe, international audience and a window into other cultures? If the answer is “yes,” then we recommend Panwapa – Where Kids Shape the World. This site is an excellent introduction to social networking! For a starter, the only “personal information” required to create a profile is your child’s country. Sponsored by Sesame Street, Panwapa allows children to visit other members around the world, thus learning about other cultures and languages as well as world geography. Members are walked through steps to create an avatar. With pre-scripted messages and a built in voice-over directions, Panwapa is accessible to pre-readers. The Care Giver and Teacher Guides are also helpful. A safe FREE site with educational value and no ads (other than funders’ logos). Appropriate for ages 5+

For parents who are curious about several of the better-known social networking sites for elementary students and ‘tweens, here is some background information:

• Club Penguin – Brought to you by Disney, and, although it’s possible to join and play for free, more options are available to paying members. Site is heavy on consumerism, but does offer levels of parental control. A recent parent review published to Good Housekeeping Magazine, Undercover in a Kids Online World, is an interesting insight into the “good” vs. “bad” of this site. Parents should definitely be co-pilots on this site and provide guidance and explanations about how to deal with unfriendly messages. Appropriate for ages 8+

• Webkinz – Requires purchase of a Webkinz pet in order to get “pet code” required for becoming a member. This site is all about consumerism, which could possibly teach children lessons in saving. Definitely needs a parent co-pilot to monitor unfriendly messages. Appropriate for 8+

• Imbee – “Sorry to announce that this site is down indefinitely.” Too bad because this site offered a parent-monitored introduction to blogging. Appropriate for ages 11+

For parents wondering where to go in order to find reviews of kid-friendly social network sites, we recommend Common Sense Media.

Any insights from readers would be most welcome!

Note: Webkinz image copied from http://sydemkate.com/Images/webkinz3.gif

An Internet Safety Night for Sunrise Elementary parents is scheduled for Thursday, April 2, 2009. This workshop is part of our continued effort to teach parents how to best guide their children in the safe, effective and ethical use of the Internet.

Our presentation is an interactive, highly participatory conversation with the community at large. As always, we will share topics that have emerged from this training session here on 2WebWatchers. 

Sunrise Elementary will be the 5th and final Internet Safety training sponsored by an elementary school for the current school year.

2WebWatchers will be scheduling future regional trainings through Adult Education. We will advertise these trainings here on the blog, in school newsletters and on School Loop.

The first annual Pleasant Grove Region Parent Forum will be held today – Saturday, January 31, 2009, from 8:00 A.M. to 12:00 P.M., at Pleasant Grove High School. Internet Safety for Parents is one of the many workshops offered by EGUSD, PGHS and Katherine Albiani Middle School. 

This workshop includes background information about Web 2.0 technologies, such as blogs, wikis and social networking – including tours through MySpace and Facebook. The workshop also addresses cyberspeak and cyberbullying.

2WebWatchers thought this would be another excellent opportunity to invite workshop parents to go live with their questions and comments.

Here are some questions we have for you:

• What brought you to the Internet Safety for Parents workshop?
• What are your current Internet Safety concerns at home and at school?
• What future topics would you like to see posted on 2WebWatchers?

We welcome all feedback and look forward to continued discussions on helping EGUSD parents assist their children on traveling the Internet safely, effectively and ethically.

As mentioned in previous posts, all comments on 2WebWatchers are moderated and will appear once they have been approved.