Techcast Episode 1: Teaching Online Safety

The first Techcast by Digital ATDN discusses the importance of teaching online safety and cybersecurity. It emphasizes the need to teach digital citizenship skills and integrate them into the curriculum. The risks of cyber attacks and information theft are high, and it's crucial to be aware of our online environment. Evaluating sources, analyzing intent, and teaching critical thinking skills are essential in all subject areas. Examples of incorporating digital citizenship into different subjects are provided, including English, social studies, science, and math. The website of Digital ATDN offers resources and trainings on teaching digital citizenship and cybersecurity. Welcome to Digital ATDN's first ever Techcast. My name is Brianna Patriarca. I have previous experience as an adult education teacher and program facilitator and currently am a technology specialist for ECON and Digital ATDN Connecticut. I'm joined today by... Hi, I'm Elise Novak and I'm a GED and ELL teacher at ECON. And today we are going to be talking about teaching online safety and cybersecurity. We're going to focus on the importance of teaching digital citizenship skills and how it can be easily integrated into your content curriculum. So I guess my first question for you, Brianna, is I understand that it's important, but we have limited teaching time. So why is it important enough to take up our precious teaching time? So that is a common concern with all teachers in adult education. And the thing to remember is that we work, learn, teach in a digital space. Our information from the dessert that we posted on social media that was so delicious last night to all of our financial accounts and information exists in this digital world and therefore could be at risk. Really important that we're aware of our online environment and the risks that are out there. You wouldn't go into a scary forest, right, and go down that scary dark path where there's no lights when there is a very nice, well-lit path. And if you did go down that scary path, you would want to be prepared. You would want to have, if you're in the middle of the woods in Colorado, some bear spray. You don't want to be that person in every scary movie that you're yelling at to not go. Don't go up there. To not go up there, to not go where there's no point of return and you know that that villain in the film is going to get them. Absolutely. We are taught at such a young age to be aware of our physical environment, but it's important that we teach our students how to safely navigate our digital environment as well. But Brianna, really, what are the odds of something bad really happening? About 48% of organizations experience info theft. In our jobs, if we think about the amount of people that work in our department and then how many people work in our agency and all of the people that we serve that come into our buildings and connect to our network, those are all potential entry points for a cyber attack. Our students can even potentially bring in that risk by allowing a cyber attacker in. So it's not just us we have to be concerned about, it's our students and those we serve. That means that there could be thousands upon thousands of opportunities for somebody to access our information. You mean our private information? Our personal identifying information as well as our students, such as our name, our date of birth, our social security number. If you have direct deposit, that financial information, even your email account can lead to them accessing that personal information. In 2021, half of American Internet users experienced an account breach. That is an entry point into your information. So I understand the importance now, but given limited time, how can this be connected to our core classes? One of the things with digital citizenship and cybersecurity is that a lot of educators just look at it as this isolated thing that needs to be taught separate. And it's not. Every class and every standard that we use in our curriculum development includes evaluating content for purpose, evaluating sources, right? We want to train our students on how to be able to look at something and evaluate its validity. Okay, so let's talk about down in the classroom. Can you give me an example for something that I might be able to use in my classroom? I previously taught C2P English, so for me that's probably the easiest. So when I'm teaching them to look at a piece of literature, we are looking at the tone, the purpose, the intent, diction, how that word choice can impact the meaning and interpretation. And that same type of analysis can be used when evaluating our digital environments and the different methods of communication that we are exposed to every single day. We need to evaluate our source. What is their intent? Is it genuine? Is it malicious? Are they trying to develop a sense of urgency in us so that we make a mistake and click and open that gateway for them? In terms of social studies, we have propaganda. With the election coming up, there's a lot of propaganda out there. You could look at that historical versus now in terms of the medium, right, how social media has an impact on our world. And it is a huge source of misinformation, and it's something that I'm on all the time. Our students and their children are, so it's a big concern for them. And it's important that they understand their responsibility to evaluate and research the information that they are exposed to on these platforms. And this skill applies across all subject areas. I mean, do you think there's anything that might not connect to the standards as a teacher? No, no. Your examples are terrific, but what about as an example for an English language learner or family literature or citizenship teacher? Not everyone teaches GEDs. Those concepts still apply. We still need to evaluate direction, to evaluate materials for their intent and their purpose and their accuracy, whether it's an email from your child's school that could potentially be a phishing email to apartment scams. There's been a lot of citizenship scams. Yes, yes, that's true. So let me give you a slightly harder example. I'm thinking of a science class. How would digital citizenship and cybersecurity connect to science? So once again, we're still kind of connecting back to those same standards, right? Evaluating the data for accuracy, for misinformation, looking at their intent. This data can be used to persuade and support just like in all other areas. If I get an email with a lot of statistics and numbers and things like that, I may think it's legitimate. That doesn't necessarily mean that it is. It's the same with the news and online information. There is a lot of misinformation that occurs with even reputable sources. And it's important that we teach our students to not trust information at face value and to evaluate all information critically. I think I'm starting to understand. Well, let me ask you this. What are some ways that you think you can connect it to math? You know what? I'm thinking about prime numbers and encryption. So one of the things that our students have to learn are prime numbers, but prime numbers are connected to how you create a strong password because that's part of encryption. Yes. And strong passwords are really one of the first defenses we have in cybersecurity and making sure that we're safe in our online space. In our Teaching Digital Citizenship and Cybersecurity training, which is available on our website, we dive into password best practices and how to create strong and secure passwords. There really are some easy ways you can integrate cybersecurity and that digital citizenship practice into your curriculum and instruction. It's as simple as integrating statistics, articles, and other digital citizenship topics when teaching skills within your content area. You can use articles around scams, misinformation in the news from credible and not so credible sources. For example, let's say you're having your students do a project on buying a car. So looking at what the best options are for them, what they can afford, and so on. Before you have them go do that initial research, have them read an article on online scams for buying a car. Talk about what they should be looking for. Talk about those financial ramifications that they could experience if they fall victim to a scam. It could impact their creditworthiness to get a loan. It can literally take money out of their pocket that they needed to purchase that vehicle. It's important that we know what to look for and those red flags. Okay. This all makes sense. If I wanted to learn more about incorporating these lessons into my classroom, what could I do? We recommend checking out our website, www.digital.atdnct.org, as we have a lot of resources posted on there, including a curated list of digital citizenship and cybersecurity lessons, and we also have two trainings available online. In teaching digital citizenship and cybersecurity in the classroom, we really focus in on the threats that you need to be aware of and how you can protect your account and prevent a cybersecurity attack. In empowering adult learners, teaching digital citizenship with impact, we're really going to focus on ways that you can integrate digital citizenship practices into your curriculum so you can better prepare students to safely navigate their online environment. Be sure to check out Digital ATDN's website for more resources and for where to access our monthly podcast episodes. And thank you, Elise. That was wonderful. See everybody again. Yes. Thank you for joining us. Bye.