Digital citizenship is a critical subject to teach middle school students. With the advent of the internet and influx of social media making it easier than ever for students to interact and exchange information online, it's essential that young learners know how to stay safe and be responsible when using digital platforms.
To meet this demand, new technology is driving change in educational standards for digital citizenship across the country. This means that middle school teachers need up-to-date and engaging digital citizenship activities to meet their course requirements.
While you could come up with your own activities, you want to make sure that you cover every aspect of digital citizenship so that you're students have the confidence they need to be safe in the digital age.
To help teachers like you meet your students' needs, we recommend these four tried-and-true digital citizenship activities:
- Introduction to digital citizenship
- Digital footprint
- Internet safety
- Digital communication
Pick and choose any of the activities below to fill your curriculum!
1. An Introduction to Digital Citizenship
This activity is the perfect way to break the ice by introducing your students to the concept of digital citizenship and making responsible choices when using technology. For this activity, you'll need:
- A list of scenarios that involve making decisions when using technology
- Notecards for students to write on
How to Prepare for the Introduction to Digital Citizenship Activity
For this activity, you’ll need to do a little bit of work up front.
Start with a list of scenarios that involve someone making decisions when using technology.
You can include examples of both good and bad digital citizenship choices. Make sure you have enough scenarios for each student in your classroom to have their own.
Some examples you could use include:
- Posting a rude social media update about a classmate (bad)
- Not opening a suspicious looking email (good)
- Doing online research without fact-checking (bad)
- Reporting cyberbullying to parents or teachers (good)
Once your list is compiled and you’ve noted whether each one is “good” or “bad,” write each scenario on a notecard — but don’t indicate which type of choice is it.
Now that you've prepared your class materials, it's time to introduce digital citizenship to your class.
How to Run the Introduction to Digital Citizenship Activity
To start the activity, pass out a note card to each student. Since each learner has a unique example, go around the class and have students read their scenario out loud. Instruct everyone to give a “thumbs up” if they think it is a good decision and a “thumbs down” if they believe it’s a bad decision.
After all scenarios have been reviewed, open the class up for a discussion and ask your students questions such as:
- Which scenario was the worst decision? Why do you think that?
- Do you do any of the “good” actions? Did you know that means you are being a good digital citizen?
Overall, you want your students to start thinking about what good digital citizenship is (and isn’t) in order to make your other digital citizenship lessons more effective!
A detailed conversation of the best and worst decisions will help your learners be more aware of these choices if they face them when working on their own.
2. Digital Footprint Activity: My Digital Footprint
Once you've considered basic examples of digital citizenship, you can expand your discussions to include your learners' individual digital footprints. Teaching this subject will help your class understand how their personal interactions online are traceable and how managing their digital footprint responsibly can help protect their privacy and ensure their safety.
To help illustrate the concept of a digital footprint, consider the following activity. To start, you'll need to gather these materials:
- A digital footprint handout for students
- Writing utensils
- Tape
How to Prepare for the Digital Footprint Activity
Before class, download the Digital Footprint handout and print enough pages for each student to have one.
If your students frequently forget a pen or pencil, make sure you have some spares. You'll also want to have a couple of roles of classroom tape handy so your learners can stick their worksheets to the wall.
How to Run the Digital Footprint Activity
Pass the digital footprint handouts to your students. While you hand them out, instruct them to write down websites, social media, and other applications they commonly use. They should especially be sure to include any website or application where they may have shared personal information.
Give your students a good amount of time to gather their thoughts and get everything on the page. This will allow them to realize how many sites they use that could be part of their digital footprints!
Once time is up, use the tape to hang the sheets on your classroom wall. Have students review the wall and note any common trends they see across the footprints.
Now that your students have a physical depiction of their own digital footprint, ask them these questions:
- What to you tell these websites and social networks about yourself?
- How long do you think that information stays visible?
From there, you can either go back to your main lesson or continue an open discussion -- whichever works best with your syllabus.
Ultimately, this activity will help to give your students a better context and personal relation to the importance of being aware of digital footprints and knowing what information they are sharing.
3. Internet Safety Activity: Using Strong Passwords
Now that you've considered students' digital footprints, it's also important to share with them the importance of internet safety and securing their information whenever they interact with a website or computer or mobile application.
This activity is a great introduction on the importance of creating strong passwords. Before starting this exercise, you'll need:
- Notecards for students to write on
- Writing utensils
How to Prepare for the Internet Safety Activity on Passwords
For this activity, you will write down examples of good and bad passwords on notecards. You’ll want to have enough notecards so that each student in your class has one.
For examples of bad passwords, write phrases like “your birthday” or “your pet’s name” -- ideas that students should never include in a password.
To come up with good password examples, write random phrases such as “greentreeswithleaves” or fully random combinations like “Auh89Dnl!”
It may seem obvious, but make sure you and your students do not use any real passwords in your examples! Emphasize the importance of keeping this information secret and secure.
How to Run the Internet Safety Activity in Your Class
Start your class by asking students to raise their hand if they think they use strong passwords for online accounts such as email and social media. This will give them something to think about as you pass out the note cards face down.
Once all students have been given a notecard, instruct them to flip over the cards and decide whether what is written would make up a good or bad password.
Go around the class and have some students share what is written and then if they think it is a good or bad password. Then ask them to explain their point of view.
With that simple question, your students will start to share their own knowledge about creating strong passwords, which might surprise you!
After you’ve had ten or so students share, ask the class again if they think they use strong passwords. At this point, students who raised their hand before may not raise them this time. If this occurs, encourage those students to think of a new password and change their accounts once they get home.
Overall, this activity is a great way to give your students actionable knowledge they can use right away to protect themselves online!
4. Digital Communication Activity: How to Know What to Share
Lastly, you can help your students become responsible communicators by showing them how to best converse in an online platform.
This instructor-led activity is a good way to start a lesson on digital communication. It will get your students thinking about how to make wise decisions when using technology to communicate.
For this activity, you'll need just one item: a handout on Being a Good Digital Citizen.
How to Prepare for this Digital Citizenship Activity
This activity takes the least amount of prep work of any of these four exercises.
Simply download the Being a Good Digital Citizen handout, and print enough copies for each student in your class!
How to Run the Digital Communication Activity
At the start of your class, ask students to share how they communicate with technology. As they raise their hands with answers, write them on the board at the front of your classroom.
Most likely, you’ll write down types of personal communication like social media and texting.
Once you’ve written down a sizeable list of answers, ask them how they think they will use technology to communicate in their future careers. Add these new responses to the board and underline any repeats from before.
Then ask the class which types of communication could negatively impact their future if used irresponsibly. When students respond, circle their answers and ask them two follow up questions:
- How could this be used irresponsibly?
- How do you decide what is okay to share?
The second question is what will really get to the heart of your discussion. After a few students have given answers, pass out the digital citizenship handout.
Then you can transition from the activity into a discussion about each question on the handout, highlighting ones your students mentioned before being given the sheet.
From this point, you can open the class up for a larger discussion or transition to your regular lesson on digital communication. Either way, this introduction activity prepares your students to learn more about digital communication and how to make smart decisions online!
Discover How to Teach Digital Citizenship with iCEV
Digital citizenship is a fundamental topic for teaching middle school students. When young learners are aware of the importance of using technology responsibly, they'll be more prepared to be safe and respectful when engaging in online environments.
Each of the four activities in this article will help your students understand a different aspect of digital citizenship. But what if you want to go beyond a basic understanding of these topics to ensure your students are confident with digital literacy and citizenship?
If you're looking to do more to ensure the success of your middle school students, consider iCEV's Digital Literacy and Career Exploration Curriculum.
This comprehensive curriculum includes multimedia lessons and interactive projects and activities that will help them develop as digital citizens and be prepared for the future!
