Addition to Reflection on Internet Safety

The following is additional information that I found while finishing this week's project. This goes with the Sunday night reflection.

There are many reasons that we should use the internet in education. The internet has many tools that are great for helping students to improve their learning skills. Some of the reasons to use the internet are because we have access to real time data which is information that is happening "right now". An example of this is to take a look at the Weather Channel to see what is happening in real time any where in the world. We could use this as a Social Studies lesson with the students. We can get original sources about famous people so that the children can hear and see what the people were all about. As educators, we have endless resources that will help aid our lesson plans as well as great activities that will go right along with the lessons we are teaching.

It is VERY important that we evaluate the websites we use for a number of reasons. The biggest reason is to make sure that the information that we are using is valid and legitimate. The internet has information that is opinion as well as information that is correct so it is important that we identify which it is before using it as a tool in our classroom. We can teach our students how to figure out whether a site is legitimate or not so that they can use it for reports and to learn. We had some great examples in this week's exercises of valid information and bogus information. We also have guidelines now from the exercises that tell us how to decipher the correct information. It is also important that we use sites that are safe for the students.

What questions would I use to evaluate the websites that I will use for the class?

1. Is it a credible website? Where does the info come from? What is the URL?

2. Do I believe what I am reading? Is it bogus info?

3. Who is the author and what additional information can I find on him? Look for his biography.

4. When was the site created and last updated? Is it old information?

5. What does the author say is the purpose of the site? Is it what you are looking for?

6. Is the site safe?

The ways that I can keep my students safe while they are searching the internet are by using the online tools for internet safety. There are many sites that teach children and adults internet safety. Some of the ones that I found are the following:

http://www.fbi.gov/kids/k5th/safety2.htm

http://www.netsmartz.org/index.aspx

http://www.kidscom.com/games/isg/isg.html