As education continues to see a growth of internet use and technology it is becoming increasing critical to educate teachers and students on cyber ethics. This is according to a new study by Dr Boris Handal from The University of Notre Dame which shows that there should be a greater focus on ethics in digital education programs to accompany the growth in online learning. “The Internet has brought great possibilities to advance society, but its power needs to be positively harnessed,” Handal said. “We already know a lot about what it is like being a good citizen, but we do not know enough about what it is like to be a good citizen online, and it is important that each generation is taught to use digital technology ethically.” Handal, an associate professor in digital technologies at Notre Dame, has visited more than 30 educational institutions and interviewed 100 leading educators in the United States, Canada and Australia over the past two years about best practices in implementing digital citizenship programs in schools. His findings will be published in an upcoming book Mobile Makes Learning Free. Handal said he had noticed a shift from ‘control and monitoring’ in schools to a more ‘responsible use of the Internet’ aimed at guiding students, but said there was still a long way to go. He said programs on the issue of cyberbullying could be taught using the language of friendship and respect while the message about cyber safety was about responsibility and trust, and the use of third party property was about honesty and truthfulness. Handal’s research showed that schools were reacting creatively to the issue of cyber security. He observed that some North American schools held a digital citizenship week where parents and the whole community was involved in discussing issues affecting the children when dealing with computers. On other occasions, the local municipality organised those events – effectively passing on the message that digital citizenship was everyone’s business. Some North American schools, he said, had also embedded digital citizenship across the curriculum in all subjects, and included digital citizenship in their orientation days. Others included it in their ‘character education programs’ or modified the school timetable once a month to dedicate one additional hour related to digital citizenship. “It is a vital part of the education of today’s students when you consider that young children can have unsupervised access to a world which was primarily created for adults who often themselves do not know the rules of working with third-party intellectual property,” Handal said. “There are also complaints from parents of Internet addictions and related ailments such as sleep deprivation, no-mobile-phone anxiety and eye-strain and posture problems resulting from long hours exposed to small screens. And research tells us that children under eight years of age are exposed to media an average of at least three hours a day.” Handal said it was therefore imperative that the growth in online learning be accompanied by good digital citizenship to ensure digital technology was used ethically and wisely. Do you have an idea for a story? Email rcox@intermedia.com.au