Month: December 2013

In the last week of school I had an opportunity to discuss with students from Years 7 through to 11 the importance of thinking about their use of Social Media while they are on their holiday break. There was a consistent resounding cheer when I mentioned they were about to immerse themselves in their various social networks when they finished school for the year and were in the enviable position of determining what it was they wanted to do with their day. For many of the students I teach, that means communicating with their friends over Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr.

Sometimes I feel a bit like a broken record reiterating the ‘think before you post’ message, important as it is. I’m always on the lookout for articles, posts or videos that can help me tell the story that needs telling. I find video a really effective way of getting a point across, but it can be hard to find new material. Having a son who trawls YouTube for a living (or so it seems!) proved fortuitous on the weekend before my sessions. He had come across a Social Media Experiment conducted by YouTuber Jack Vale. It was perfect for the message I wanted to convey about making sure your privacy settings are set to friends only and turning off location settings on apps that don’t necessarily require them. Take a look yourself.

Before watching, I did preface with the students that the people in the video were expressing surprise and some of their reactions were bleeped out. It was fascinating watching their reactions during the short few minutes. Many of their faces echoed the expressions of the people on the screen as they realised that all of this information was shared publicly and these people could be found easily because of the location data embedded in photos shared in spaces like Instagram. It was effective across all Year levels, with many of the younger students coming to me at the end of the session to get help finding where location services was located on their phones so that they could turn it off in Apps not requiring it for functionality.

Sometimes we assume our students are savvy users of technology, but my experience tells me they often need direction. Finding opportunities to share and discuss information in our often crowded curriculums is difficult, but we need to make time. Parents are often not in command of knowledge like this and can’t provide necessary guidance. My message to my students at the end of the session was that there is a need for them to be informed users of technology, not ignorant users who can make serious errors by sharing information unknowingly. This means understanding dashboard settings of programs they use on their computers and general settings of devices such as phones that are a part of their everyday lives.

It was time well spent!