Chapter 10 Reflection

Preventing Cyberbullying

This chapter extensively covers how to raise awareness for cyberbullying.  It begins by explaining that it is a school’s responsibility to be aware of cyberbullying in its community, and to make steps against it.  I completely agree that teachers need to be aware of cyberbullying and in the forefront of combating it.  To me, it is a simple conversation that occurs throughout a school year, but it does need to be more explicit and directed than that to begin with.  There must be clear guidelines and rules when students are accessing the internet and other technology, and as I discussed in my last blog, it must be a collaborative effort between administrators, teachers, students and parents. The chapter also discusses peer mentoring, which I also think is a great idea.  I think students should collaborate on creating a PSA, or a short presentation describing what cyberbullying is, what not to do, and what to do if a student is bullied.  I think having the students do research and create this to present to other students, maybe a younger grade, or even a whole school or small district would be awesome.  Not only would these students be doing a service, but they would be educating themselves as well.  Bullying in general is also combated by having a safe learning environment.  Of course all bullying won’t stop if a school is safe, but creating a culture where students voices are heard and respected and students feel safe, is a good starting point to prevent bullying.  Formal education about bullying and cyberbullying should occur.  Also, firewalls and tracking software are good tools to use to deter misusing technology, although they are not foolproof.  

A large section of this chapter discusses the parent involvement to prevent students from unwanted online behavior.  From giving parents information on cyberbullying to tips on how to use the internet with your child.  Hinduja and Patchin continually discuss how communication between parents and teachers, but more importantly parents and children is essential to fostering a good online identity for kids.  They also discuss how important it is to have the conversation start earlier, since students will be on the computer not only in school, but they are often always connected with mobile devices. The authors reinforce the ‘basics’ of cyber safety like not revealing personal information, or communicating with people you don’t really know.

I definitely believe that netiquette needs to be addressed in schools.  I think that with the internet being so readily available people forget that it is powerful and dangerous. Also, as smart as we know kids are, oftentimes they do things online that they wouldn’t do in person because it is ‘safer’ for their ego and they are able to hide behind a computer or screen name.  My first year teaching Myspace.com was on it’s way down, but still fairly popular.  I had a Myspace account that I rarely used, and one of my students contacted me on it for homework help. Everything was private, plus I didn’t put anything on it that was bad, but it freaked me out.  I kept it though, because I used it to look up my students.  To my surprise, most of them had everything open and very inappropriate things on it.  I took that as a great opportunity to have some discussions with my students.  In the years that I taught there, I hadn’t heard anything official come from the school about cyberbullying, or online etiquette.  I’m hoping that happened in a computer class, but it should have happened more often.  Teenagers don’t think beyond this moment, and that is why the internet is so scary.  They don’t realize that posting pictures of them at a party could potentially be bad.  They need to hear that multiple times, and they need to see where someone suffered consequences based on those things.  Telling kids to do something is not nearly effective as showing them why they need to do something.