Dinemis KİP

2014110195

Cet 360.05

Digital Citizenship

Technology has an irrefutable impact on people’s lives. All of us are witness of this huge

change. For example, in 2002, my family had a laptop and our relatives thought that it is an

unnecessary think what we do with that? or people needed to collect coupons to get a cell

phone whereas in today’s world, people have change their cell phones or laptops frequently

according to their changing demands. No doubt, technology age has brought with not only

new devices but also new concept to our lives; digital citizenship is one of the most popular

terms. Therefore, my concerning article is namely “Digital Citizenship” that is related to

appropriate technology usage at schools and at homes.

Digital citizenship can be explained briefly being aware of ethical conducts while online. In

other words, digital citizenship is defined as “Students understand human, cultural, and

societal issues related to technology and practice legal and ethical behavior” (Ribble, 2008).

According to Ribble (2008), being a full electronic participate in society, buying electronic

goods, exchanging information, the capability to use digital technology, legal rights governing

technology usage, digital health and wellness in terms of both physical and psychological and

taking to guarantee people own personal safety are elements of digital citizenship. Also, this

article claims that not only children but also teachers and parents should be informed about

technology users of technology need to be informed about what they will do with this

opportunity. To provide this information clearly there is a cycle that includes four parts;

awareness, guided practice, modeling and demonstration, feedback and analysis. Moreover,

there are two crucial point about digital citizenship; first of all, all K-12 educators should be

share same ground to provide children’s physical and psychological well-being in the digital
world and also parents members and community members should be added in teacher-student

relationship about digital citizenship. In other words, it is really important that having

common language in schools and in homes is a significant problem because students’

technological usage both in and out of school became easier with growing level of internet

access. (Hollandworth, Dowdy, & Donovan, 2011).

Now I want to mention the possible the pros & cons and questions about digital citizenship.

First of all, being a digital citizenship means removing borders among countries in the world.

So, the next generation can easily ignore racial, religious or any kind of discrimination that

are human-made. Secondly, digital society is a big village that everyone can visit the another.

To make it clearer, when a person posts a video on YouTube, another person who is from

another part of the country or world can be watch and comment it. It might be considered as a

different version of socialization.

On the other hand, being a digital citizen also has some disadvantages. As I mentioned

before, one of the elements of digital citizenship is digital commerce. There are many

researches about online shopping addiction. Because it more accessible, good prices, saving

on time or entertainment are attractive factors for consumers, people have a tendency to lose

the control. Another point is that, in a long term being a digital citizenship might create big

real distinct between people. This idea makes me to think that an episode from Black Mirror.

The episode is about an app that all people have account on that and people give points to

others. Wherever you go, your points appear above your head; sometimes people do not look

at each other’s’ face they just care their phones and points. Actually, this is not a utopic case,

in 2020 Chinese Government restrict will enforce their citizens to monitor their daily lives

and evaluated, and according to results low scoring participants will be punished with slower

network connection, limited access to restaurant and removal of the right to travel (Botsman,
2017). This is, in the simplest words, the unconditional occupation of private life. Therefore,

is it really necessary to promote technology usage in that level?

Moreover, there are also significant questions about being a digital citizen. How the human

especially child rights will be protected in digital society? because they will become more

open to cyber bullying or other dangers such as hackers or fake people. No doubt, the right of

children to play might be also ignored owing to digital society. Also, digital citizenship is a

relatively new topic in Turkey. Should we trust teachers and parent about being a good role

model to their children? And lastly should adults be allowed to see everything that the child

post? Is it really necessary or if it is, is it a protection or limitation? if it is not, how an adult

can protect the child from the cyber bulling?

To conclude, digital life is an unavoidable part of our lives and people need to learn live

with it. In schools, teachers provide students with a comprehensive and beneficial guideline to

participate in digital world in an appropriate way. At least for me, digital citizenship is a new

and interesting topic, I will continue to do research about it.

References

Botsman, R. (2017). Big data meets big brothers as China moves to rate its citizens.

Retrieved from http://www.wired.co.uk/article/chinese-government-social-credit-score-

privacy-invasion

Hollandsworth, R., Dowdy, L., & Donovan, J. (2011). Digital citizenship in K-12: It takes a

village. TechTrends, 55(4), 37-47.

Ribble, M. (2008). Passport to digital citizenship. Learning & Leading with Technology,

38(10), 14-15.
Retrieved from http://www.learningandleading-

digital.com/learning_leading/200812?search_term=digital%20citizenship&doc_id=-

1&search_term=digital%20citizenship&pg=16#pg16