Being a twenty year old in today's society I am fully engrossed in the digital age. Personally I have all the accounts. I have since I was in middle school. Professionally I am a student therefore I use the internet all the time. Right now as we speak actually. I use it for research, papers, assignments, Springboard, or blogging! I make sure to monitor everything that is posted of me and what I post. However, I wasn't always this way. In middle school and even early in high school, unfortunately what was posted of me wasn't always a huge priority to me. This is because I was young and uneducated. This doesn't mean anything bad was posted by any means, I wasn't stupid about it. However, I definitely wasn't educated. Luckily, now I know what should and should not be posted.
I have definitely had my feelings hurt online, yes. On multiple occasions actually. This was a common occurrence in middle school mainly. Due to the fact that children are vicious in middle school. I'm sure I hurt a few peoples feelings as well. Whether it be intentional or not. However, unfortunately, it's a lot easier to pick on someone behind a computer screen than it is to face them in person. If I could do anything differently..? hmmm. I probably wouldn't have signed up for any of the accounts I was on until high school. Without being educated, having any sort of an account in middle school isn't a very good idea. Mainly because kids are vulnerable at the time and don't see the consequence in a lot of their actions.
When parents think of Dateline and online predators they worry about their children online. Especially parents of young girls. Not to say that boys couldn't be in danger as well, however, girls are a bit more prone to the danger of online predators. I feel like when I was younger TV shows would always throw in a few episodes about someone being stalked online or something. To inform us of the danger and make it a little more relate-able with our favorite TV show. However, now a days I don't see this happening. I think TV shows now sugar coat things for their younger audience. Which in turn is both good and bad. Parents are always going to assume the worst could happen to their child. In any situation, it comes with worrying and being a parent. Therefore, this might cause parents to see digital citizenship as more of a negative than good. They see the precautions to be not enough. I'm well aware there are a lot of dangers when it comes to the online world. However, as long as students are educated and are aware that they have a place to turn if something were to go wrong then we can avoid the horrible possibilities of online. It's not just the children that need to be educated about online safety, as well as, what to post and what not to post. It's also their parents so they can do what is best for their child and keeping them safe, while also allowing them to explore the many options that the internet has to offer.
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