Safety and Security Online: Your Online Image

Download Student Sheet(s) for printout in PDF format.

Read a Letter to Educators about Internet safety and security from CyberSmart!

Overview

Students explore the consequences of unintended audiences viewing their social network profiles. They consider four key characteristics of social network sites and how they might affect teens as they try out new identities. Then students collaborate to write a letter to parents demonstrating their understanding of issues related to unintended online audiences.

Objectives

Analyze situations in which teens' social networking profiles are viewed by authority figures.
Describe four characteristics of social networking sites that cause them to be very public spaces.
Use creative thinking to find ways to deal with unintended online audiences.

Materials

Student Sheets 1 and 2 (one of each for the class)
Student Sheet 3 (one per student)
Drawing paper

Introduce

• Have each student think of three face-to-face places they can be found during a week:
  • at school,
  • hanging out with friends,
  • in a house of worship,
  • or at a family gathering.
• Then have them draw three large intersecting circles (Venn Diagram) and write the name of each place in a circle.
• Using pencil, because they will want to make adjustments, have students write words that describe the image of themselves that they present in each place. Suggest that they list the kinds of clothes they might wear, their language style, the topics they talk about, and so on. Demonstrate how to write a trait common to two audiences in the areas where the circles intersect.
• Discuss how each circle represents a different identity.
  
  Use Web 2.0 tools that will enable students to create three-circle Venn diagrams online.

Teach 1: Analyze the Problem

• Cut apart the scenario “cards” on Student Sheet 1 and give one card to each group of three or four students.
• Have each group read and discuss their scenario and questions.

Teach 2: Think About It

• Next, cut apart and distribute the matching cards on Student Sheet 2.
• Have each group read and discuss the information and questions under Think About It.
• Then have each group create a presentation that will inform the other groups about the problem they explored. They may wish to present in the form of a skit, improvisation, debate, news article, or a concept map.
• Distribute and discuss Student Sheet 3. Make sure students understand the concept of their audience: the group of people who view them at school, at a house of worship, at a park, or online.
• Explain to students that there are several ways in which information on the Internet is preserved after it is deleted by the creator.
  • Many social networking site companies keep a copy of a profile to make it easy for you to rejoin the network in the future.
  • Search engines archive, or keep copies of, old Web pages as well as current ones.
  • A nonprofit organization called Internet Archive is dedicated to preserving historic Internet records in an electronic library and has its own search tool, called the Wayback Machine, that allows users to find and view old versions of Web pages, software, videos, and audio files.

Teach 3: Find Solutions

• Ask: How does it make you feel to know that parents, employers, school administrators, and even younger sisters and brothers, may be looking at what you say online? Students may express anger.
• Explain that it is natural for teens to want to share and communicate with their peers unwatched by adults. Students may agree that the situation is somewhat unfair, especially when they have little unsupervised time away from teachers, coaches, and parents.
• Ask: What are some solutions to the problem of dealing with unintended audiences online? Some students may say that teens should find some other means to socialize online. Others may say that the solution is for employers and school administrators and parents to leave teens alone and give them their space.

Teach 4: Take Action

• Have students write a letter to their parents explaining their understanding of unintended audiences online and their feelings about how it affects their use of social networking sites. Whatever else they say in their letter, guide students to reassure their parents that they “get” what it means to manage the identity they present to others online.
  
  Use Web 2.0 tools such as a wiki to have students collaborate in writing a class letter to parents. Then publish the letter on a class wiki or a blog, where parents can post comments.

Close

• Ask: What audiences other than teens might be interested in viewing teens' social networking profiles? Why?
  Ask:What characteristics make social networking sites very public spaces?
  Ask: What are some solutions for dealing with unintended online audiences?

Extend

Students will benefit by revisiting this lesson each year. For students who completed this lesson in a previous grade, have them create a comparison chart like the one below and fill it in. Some possible responses are shown in italics