Who are the digital natives? Mark Prensky (2001) first introduced the terms of digital natives and digital immigrants to characterize the difference between students and teachers with technology. Many teachers are digital immigrants, "not born into the digital world but have, at some later point in [their] lives, become fascinated by and adopted many or most of the new technology." In contrast, "students today are all 'native speakers' of the digital language of computers, video games, and the Internet." They spend hours on social media and sending text messages, but few students realize how powerful their words are.
It may be intimidating to teach using technology when our students are proficient users. But it is our responsibility to create a safe, online community that practices authentic and meaningful communication. It starts with us, the teachers, to create a clear set of guidelines for student interactions online, model appropriate behavior, and monitor the missteps that occur along the way. Here are some questions to reflect upon when creating the norms in your virtual classroom:
- What habits do you want to instill in your students in order to be successful learners?
- How should they interact with you and others in order to maintain learning conditions?
- What should students do with their learning?
As you create your virtual classroom norms with the reflected answers above, keep these tips in mind:
- A fewer number of norms, rather than more, work better. The recommendation is about three to five. You can have a bold sentence to highlight the overarching norm and then write a few sentences afterward to clarify the norm (such as this here).
- Co-construct them with students. Have students take ownership of their class and behaviors. Students have a good sense of what is right and wrong, even the young ones.
- State them positively. Beware of norms that start with the word 'No' because these do not tell them what students should do.
- Post the norms. Just as we would have posters of our norms in a physical classroom, it is important to post them in a virtual space so that students are always aware of them.
- Teach and rehearse the expectations. The norms should be taught during the first weeks of school and revisited occasionally throughout the remainder of the year, especially after a school break. You should model each rule so that students can learn what they look and sound like.
Stay tuned for my next blog post of ice-breakers ideas so that students can practice these norms!
