Supporting Parents in Digital Citizenship
On Mondays, I share a different ed tech quote on our Thompson Classroom social media pages for our staff to consider.
This week’s quote comes from the book, The Digital Citizenship Handbook for School Leaders, by Mike Ribble and Marty Pack. Within MVSD, our schools will spend this week hosting their “parent-teacher” conferences with families and supporting adults. In addition to communication on student learning and well-being, this is a fantastic opportunity to strengthen community understanding on a variety of topics; digital citizenship and technology use being one of them. Marty and Mike argue that before effective guidance from families can occur, they must first have an awareness of what technological resources their children are exposed to and the role they can play (p. 230). This is where I believe that this week’s interviews can help!
The following outlines some of the ways we work to support our schools and families with this goal:
Parent Tech Tip Display Boards
These boards were prepared for our schools to set up outside their main offices during the fall Parent-Teacher Conference meetings. They included information on:
- PowerSchool Parent Portal access (attendance, assessment, teacher contact information, etc)
- Microsoft Suite Download access (explained more further down in this post)
- the Digital Citizenship Guide for Parents
- links to the school’s online presence (website & any social media accounts)
- various tech tips selected based on school-specific concerns, age of the students, etc
Microsoft Suite Download Access
MVSD began its transition to an Office 365 environment in 2018 (prior to my arrival to this position). As part of our subscription to this platform all users, staff, and students, are eligible for up to 5 FREE downloads of the Microsoft Suite to their personal devices. This access means that all of our MVSD families can have the option of accessing and working with some of the main programs our students use while in our buildings.
Informational fliers were prepared for all families and shared out as an insert in fall report cards and tutorials were also shared online in both text and video formats.
Caregiver Resources Webpage
Added to the MVSD website in 2024, this page acknowledges that, “the caregivers of our MVSD students play a key role when it comes to the education and support surrounding digital tools. This includes cellphones, tablets, computers, gaming systems, cameras, and wearables (smart watches).”
This webpage outlines a variety of links that have been curated to assist caregivers in this role and help strengthen our student support in this area.
Social Media 4 Parents Session
These sessions were designed to inform parents/caregivers about social media and empower guardians to facilitate open conversations on how to use these tools safely & positively.
Event Goals
- What is social media?
- Who is using it?
- How can we use this safely?
- Are there legal restrictions?
- What are the benefits?
Topics of Discussion
- Summary of platforms
- Social media usage stats
- Privacy & security
- Terms of service
- Digital citizenship & literacy
Ed Tech in MVSD YouTube Series
This series was put together to provide insight for our MVSD families on what is happening behind the scenes with educational technology: why we make the decisions we do, what children can expect when they are in our programming, and general tech tips for families.
In response to continued restrictions on in-person gatherings in the spring of 2021, this series was extended to include 3 new videos requested through surveying our community.
Stay tuned on the blog as I will be sharing some further ideas on Tuesday about how we can introduce digital tools during Parent-Teacher interviews. Additionally, Wednesday’s post will highlight an awesome program we held last week on this topic!