Growing Up Online

Dear Fellow Bloggers,
I have recently watched a Frontline documentary for my educational technology class, that left me stock and stunned by the impact the internet has on our children. Growing Up Online showed how high school students would use these sites on the internet that would aid them in cheating themselves out of the experience of reading American history books. Instead these sites would give them a brief overview of the story with just enough substance to complete their school work with out it being look at as cheating. There were parts of this documentary that showed how parents were shut out of their teenagers lives as a result of the teens excessive use of the internet. In some instinces teenagers took their own lives as a result of being bullied on social media. Below you can find a break down of this assignment.

1. Why do you think the number of parents who reported the Internet being a good thing for their children has decreased? I think begin to see the effects of the internet. Social media become popular, and at the same time child sex crimes were very real in our society.
2.  In terms of student writing, what are some different types of "cheating"? What are the elements you would include in your definition of "cheating"? I did not realize as a college student, that there were so many writing cheat sites online. One could cheat by copy and pasating bits and pieces of scholoraly journals into your own writing. One could type in a subject area into a sereach engine and get hundreds of papers  written in that subject area, type your name on it and pass it off as your own. There are several elements that I would include in my definition of cheating; taking credit for work that is not your own. Sharing papers amongst friends and copy and pastteing someone elses thoughts and ideas into your own.
3.  Should students feel guilty for using “shortcuts” like this? Why or why not? Students should most certainly feel guilty about using shortcuts. It is not their work, creativity or ideas. 
4. What are the positive and negative consequences of blurring the line between being a celebrity and a regular person? The positive is the popularity that comes with being a celebrity. The negative is losing your own identiy in the celebrity role. 
5. What elements of this FRONTLINE program are likely to increase parents’ fears? What elements of the program might be reassuring? I think it would have to be the fear of not knowing what your child is doing when they are on the various social media sites. As well as the threat of your child feeling so bad about themselves because of bullying that they call themselves. I think parents would be reassured by knowing that most children will not give out their personal information on the internet.
6.  What are some of the short- and longer-term consequences of these types of behaviors for life online and in the real world?    There are many short and long term conquences to bullying and spreading rumors online and off line, the first would be that words hurt people and spreading rumors can cause an emotionally unstable teenager to kill them selves. Long term I imagine how the bully would be able to cope with knowing that they were the cause of the death of one of their peers.