Life+beyond+facebook

Life Beyond facebook: Alternative Global Social Networks
Donna Riehl’s article brought up for us many questions to explore and one of them is the role of social networking in our students’ development as responsible local and global citizens. We want our students to look beyond the mall and explore the world around them.

The article //Students’ Privacy Rights in School Libraries: Balancing Principles, Ethics and Practices// explores the dual nature of being both a teacher and a librarian so we do more then just supply students access to the Internet but teach them how this resource can be a conduit to “[|continued learning, social awareness, cognizance of a changing society, responsible citizenship and personal well-being] .”

Marlene Asselin and Keith McPherson at UBC are currently doing research on [|Adolescents' Internet Literacy] and the scope of their research is how adolescents' use the Internet "as do they homework, and examines parent, student and teacher views on internet use for learning the academic disciplines". The research presented in part at the workshop //Redefining Literacies For the Information Generation// at the [|2007 B.C. Teacher-Librarians Conference] finds that this generation is passionately tolerant, globally oriented, culturally diverse, and sensitive of corporate interest. Millenials are the demographic muscle force of social transformation but these findings are stark in comparison to a societal view that young adults are only obsessed with themselves and consumer “stuff”.

Since the Net Gen is used to solving their own problems and constructing their “personal landscapes” on the Internet, a traditional role of the teacher librarian as “expert” dispensing information will just not fly. The teacher librarian needs to become a facilitator/collaborator of information and an active partner in the teaching of the [|new literacies] with staff, students, and parents.

The Internet can help students to move beyond themselves and to challenge their perceptions of their rights and responsibilities. To do less would be a letting our students down. The following e-resources point to the possibilities.



[|CitizenShift] from nfb.ca: online media for social change
Students can view videos and contribute text, photos, audio and videos on a wide variety of social issues and it is Canadian!. It is also available [|en francais]

[|Taking IT Global] is a website community that links young people who want to make a difference in their local communities and internationally. Over 220,000 members contribute their ideas and art and the site is full of tools for managing projects. Youth can post their profile and dialogue directly with youth from around the world. Also, you can play the Global Kids’ Game [|Ayiti: The Cost of Living] to try to keep a family in rural Haiti alive. Have students explore the spotlight on [|Human Rights 60th Anniversary] Teachers can create closed classrooms as they collaborate with youth from around the world. Members create country profiles that give students a different take on that country than that of traditional media. Video: Taking It Global's goals media type="youtube" key="SGDy_isZ9aQ&hl=en&fs=1" height="344" width="425"

[|Check Your Head] (CYH) is a youth driven organization located in Vancouver. CYH educates young people on global issues, by looking at the connection between global events and issues and local realities.Check Your Head provides education, resources, training and support for youth, who then facilitate workshops, organize events and coordinate projects promoting education and action around issues of globalization and social justice. I (Lisa) have had them come and present in my school several times and they always challenge students perceptions and leave them wanting more!

[|Media Awareness Network] This bilingual site is dedicated to promoting critical thinking in young people about the media. They conduct media education, research and provide information literacy resources for teachers, parents, and students.

Featured site resource: These lessons, which were funded by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and are available free on MNet’s Web site, offer young people a better understanding of how media portrayals affect our view of global development issues. Developed in collaboration with educators from across Canada and designed to support social studies curricular outcomes, [|Beyond Media Messages: Media Portrayal of Global Development] includes four lessons in English and in French.** The lessons include the very topical //Celebrities and World Issues//, //Beyond Media Messages: Media Portrayal of Global Development//, F//inding and Authenticating Online Information on Global Development Issues//, and //Making Media for Democratic Citizenship//. These resources are designed for secondary but the website also includes other resources on media literacy for elementary. The [|educational games] on online hate, food marketing, privacy, cybersense, and critical thinking are amazing!
 * New educational resources on media and global issues

[|Adbusters] Adbusters magazine explores media, advertising, consumer protection, and they supply [|spoofs ads] about consumerism.



Human Rights Mashup: Google Earth Outreach Case Study
[|United States Holocaust Memorial Musuem: Crisis in Darfur] This ground breaking mashup lets students see a genocide in progress in Darfur as they track destroyed villages. This mashup could be used by history teachers as a counterpoint to the Holocaust or by English teachers as a visual call to action for students reading the novel //Night// by Elie Wiesel. Check out the inspiring //Google Lit Trip// for [|Night].



[|OpenNet Initiative]
Site blurb:
 * The OpenNet Initiative is a collaborative partnership of four leading academic institutions: the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto, Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School, the Advanced Network Research Group at the Cambridge Security Programme, University of Cambridge, and the Oxford Internet Institute, Oxford University. Our aim is to investigate, expose and analyze Internet filtering and surveillance practices in a credible and non-partisan fashion. We intend to uncover the potential pitfalls and unintended consequences of these practices, and thus help to inform better public policy and advocacy work in this area.**

How can students use the technology of the Internet without knowing about how they are mined for information and the threats to their privacy? Also, we need to be aware of many places in the world do not have open access to the internet. OpenNet Intiative introduces students to issues about censorship, [|filtering], and control of wireless networks.

Video about Citizen Lab and Censorship in China (Known as the Great Fire Wall of China) media type="youtube" key="tXe8oT9szp0&hl=en&fs=1" height="344" width="425"


 * CBC radio show Search Engine** did a special report from China. Click on [|Search Engine] and subscribe to the podcast. Listen to the episode SPECIAL EPISODE - Search Engine in China that includes in-depth interviews about Internet access in China, bloggers facing problems with the Chinese government for showing certain photos and content.



[|ChangeEverything.ca]
is a social networking site sponsored by [|VanCity Credit Union] for people in Vancouver, Victoria and Metro Vancouver who want to change themselves, their communities or their world. Students can register under an alias with their school wide email (First Class in the Surrey School District) and begin to change!

[|wearewhatwedo.ca] is an engaging website with resources for global change around consumer practices, environment, building community and social activism. The site promotes their book [|Change the World for 10 Bucks] that inspires people to make change in everyday actions. Over a million "small" actions have been posted to the site and students and staff can post their everyday actions to make change in their local and global communities. The art work and presentation of the book certainly appeals to the elementary audience but we recommend it for a secondary audience also.

[|Kiva.org] is a person to person micro-lending website. Students and/or staff lend funds to an entrepreneur in the developing world who is wishing to escape the circle of poverty. Students can track the business of the entrepreneur and when the loan gets paid back(they have a 99.7 % payback record!), students receive their funds back as credit that they can loan out again. The "father" of micro lending the economist Muhammad Yunus started this concept with his bank [|Grameen Bank] in Bangladesh which he won the [|Nobel Peace Prize] in 2006. The founders of kiva.org have taken this concept and run with in with web 2.0 technology. The students in the Global Issues Club in my school (Lisa) have donated 500 dollars to kiva.org and we are going to track our donation over the years to come. This site creates relationships between donor and business owner and in some cases where Internet service is available, students can send messages of encouragement to the business owner.

Satrical //Teenage Affluenz//a Video from Australia
This video illustrates how to use satire by contrasting the world of middle class youth in Australia to the reality of youth in developing worlds. (Our mothers' taught us to always leave 'em chuckling!) media type="youtube" key="KFZz6ICzpjI" width="425" height="350"