SOME TIPS FOR USING INTERNET SAFELY
The web is open for anyone to post material on it and that means sometimes there are things that you’ll see, which you wish you hadn’t.
If you see something that you just don’t like, just close the screen on your laptop or turn off the monitor and go and an adult you trust. If there’s no one around, close the site using the cross at the top of the browser. If you think the content might be illegal, like racist hate sites or pictures of children being abused you can report it directly to an organisation called the internet watch foundation: www.iwf.org.uk. If the thing you don’t like is a person – so for example, someone exposing themselves on webcam or sending you indecent pictures – you can report that to CEOP and we will help. Use ‘CEOP report’
DEFENITIONS
Social networking services typically support the public display of networks, although they may offer privacy restrictions or facilitate closed communities. Permissions are a very important feature of most social networking services. They allow members and groups to control who can access their profiles, information, connections and spaces, as well as determining degrees of access. The level of granularity and control varies from service to service, but typically settings allow you to:
Managing relationships online and managing your online presence are key to having fun with and using social networks safely. However, the speed of the development of social networking services may mean that young people are more likely to have developed personal strategies or learnt from peers than from formal instruction and support from adults.
Social networking sites vary in the types of tools and functionality they provide (Boyd & Ellison define social networking sites as having three common elements: a member profile (in their definition this is always a web page), the ability to add other members to a contact list, and supported interaction between members of contact lists (interaction varies greatly, and there will typically be some degree of interaction facilitated between people who are not on each other's contacts lists).
Social networking sites are often perceived by their users as closed environments, where members talk to other members . This impression of social networking services as providing a private space is likely to account for behaviour, language and postings that do not translate well outside their intended closed context. While it is important that children and young people understand the public nature of much of their activity within social networking services (and can use permissions and privacy controls to manage personal information and communications), we also need to ensure that online activity is understood holistically – i.e. as the sum of activity of all the online sites and networks that an individual belongs to.
WHAT DO PEOPLE DO
ON SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICES?
The web is open for anyone to post material on it and that means sometimes there are things that you’ll see, which you wish you hadn’t.
If you see something that you just don’t like, just close the screen on your laptop or turn off the monitor and go and an adult you trust. If there’s no one around, close the site using the cross at the top of the browser. If you think the content might be illegal, like racist hate sites or pictures of children being abused you can report it directly to an organisation called the internet watch foundation: www.iwf.org.uk. If the thing you don’t like is a person – so for example, someone exposing themselves on webcam or sending you indecent pictures – you can report that to CEOP and we will help. Use ‘CEOP report’
Unfortunately, as well as great people, there are some really strange people who use the internet - people who aren’t friendly or who have bad intentions. If someone is being nasty to you online or on your mobile or if someone is being inappropriate; saying sexual things or asking you to do things that you feel are wrong, start by saving the conversation, blocking them and then report it to CEOP using ‘CEOP report’ Sometimes, people can seem really friendly and then do things which make you question the friendship and make you feel weird.
A CHANGING LANDSCAPE!!!
Social networking services are also developing rapidly as technology changes with new mobile dimensions and features. Children and young people within the UK, who have grown up taking the Internet and mobile technologies for granted, make up a significant segment of the “beta generation” – the first to exploit the positive opportunities and benefits of new and emerging services, but also the first to have to negotiate appropriate behaviours within the new communities, and to have to identify and manage risk.
Social networking services are on the rise globally, and this change is also evident in increased UK engagement with sites. Ofcom's recent International Communications Market 07 report found evidence that more adults use social networking sites in the UK than in any other of the European countries included in the survey. ComScore data from August 2007 suggest that UK Internet users clock up an average of 23 visits and 5.3 hours on social networking sites each month. Ofcom reported that 39% of all UK Internet users use social networking services, while the ComScore figures show 24.9 million individual social networking service visitors in August 2007.
According to recent Hitwise figures, the most popular dedicated social networking sites in the UK are MySpace, Facebook and Bebo . These types of social networking services are profile focused – activity centres around web pages that contain information about the activities, interests and likes (and dislikes) of each member.
While the number of visitors to social networking sites is increasing, so too are the numbers of new services being launched, along with the number of longstanding (within the relatively brief lifespan of the Internet) websites that are adding, developing or refining social networking service features or tools.
The ways in which we connect to social networking services are expanding too. Games-based and mobile-phone-based social networking services that interact with existing web-based platforms or new mobile-focused communities are rapidly developing areas.
People who are looking to abuse young people online will often manipulate relationships and pressure you into doing things you feel uncomfortable with. Examples of this can include talking in a way that you don’t like, asking you to do things on webcam or with your camera that feel wrong or uncomfortable or making you feel anxious or trapped in a romantic or sexual relationship.
The first thing to realise about this kind of relationship is that it is wrong. Adults who pressure young people into doing anything that they don’t feel comfortable with should be reported using ‘CEOP report’ and blocked. They can be very clever and make you feel as though you have to do something because you owe them, or because otherwise they will get you in trouble.
This is wrong and you should report them.
You need to know that you won’t be in trouble, whatever you have done. These adults are sometimes very skilful at making those they abuse or try to build a relationship with, feel guilty about what has happened. They do this to try and make the young person keep quiet about what has happened. It can make you feel unsafe and dirty. If someone does this to you, the responsibility for what happened is theirs, not yours and you can talk it through with a number of different people.
Chatting, texting, online access, picture, video messaging, listening to music and sharing stuff for free through bluetooth are all really cool ways of using mobiles. You can even access your social networking site like BEBO or Myspace and watch television.
GPS tracking technology can now be used on your mobiles. So if you’re lost in town somewhere, you can use your phone to show you where you are on a map and give you directions to where you need to be. Social networking sites have teamed up with this technology and through some apps, you can now also see where your contacts are on a map too.
Although it’s great to have mobile access to most things we used to have to do on our PC at home, there are some risks that it’s worth considering to make sure you’re as safe as you can be.
It's a good idea to only give your number out to friends who you know in the real world. If your mobile number is given to people that you don’t know, they may hassle you. This is why it’s also best not to put your number on your profile of your social networking site (like Bebo, MySpace and Facebook).
Whilst having a camera phone is cool and really useful, be careful if you share your photos with others. Pictures can be changed or shared around, so think about what the image is and who you are sending it to, before you press send. Once it’s out there it’s out there forever!
Negative views of social networking services
Parents and educators alike are understandably concerned about illegal and anti-social behaviour online. Recent media coverage of social networking services has tended to focus on the negative aspects of services, for example the presence of predatory adults who want to use services to contact and groom young people . Illegal and inappropriate behaviour is an unfortunate fact of human societies, whether it takes place online or offline. However, over-emphasising these types of activity is not useful in supporting young people to recognise, manage and negotiate risk for themselves. Just as in the real world, we need to approach risk in an even-handed and realistic way in order to best manage it. Most responsible social networking services employ people to post-moderate anti-social activity, although it should be noted that the amount of information published means that services are reliant on users making reports.
This year the British monarchy launched its own YouTube channel, and the Queen broadcast her Christmas message online , which might suggest that social networking services are regarded by the establishment as a legitimate and effective way to reach a national and international audience, as television was when the Queen's speech was first broadcast in 1957.
Misunderstanding the nature of the environment
Many users believe that they are writing for a closed group of friends, unaware that the information they have posted may be publicly available and able to be searched for and read by a much wider audience. Acquisti & Gross (2006) characterise social networking services as “imagined communities” in recognition of the gap between users' perceptions of a private, closed network and the reality of who can access their information.
Additionally, it may not occur to young people that their public arguments or “flame wars”, their overly enthusiastic critiques of their teachers, or the risqué pictures of themselves that seemed quite funny at the time may still be around in a few years when they are applying for a job or trying to get into university, for example.
We don't yet know the full consequences for a generation that has grown up online, or the future implications of new types of search, for example social searches, which aggregate information from across a range of social networking sites by your name or email address, or of the development of facial-recognition search software
The first thing to realise about this kind of relationship is that it is wrong. Adults who pressure young people into doing anything that they don’t feel comfortable with should be reported using ‘CEOP report’ and blocked. They can be very clever and make you feel as though you have to do something because you owe them, or because otherwise they will get you in trouble.
This is wrong and you should report them.
You need to know that you won’t be in trouble, whatever you have done. These adults are sometimes very skilful at making those they abuse or try to build a relationship with, feel guilty about what has happened. They do this to try and make the young person keep quiet about what has happened. It can make you feel unsafe and dirty. If someone does this to you, the responsibility for what happened is theirs, not yours and you can talk it through with a number of different people.
Mobiles:
Mobiles are a great way to stay in touch with family and friends, but phones have loads of other functions.Chatting, texting, online access, picture, video messaging, listening to music and sharing stuff for free through bluetooth are all really cool ways of using mobiles. You can even access your social networking site like BEBO or Myspace and watch television.
GPS tracking technology can now be used on your mobiles. So if you’re lost in town somewhere, you can use your phone to show you where you are on a map and give you directions to where you need to be. Social networking sites have teamed up with this technology and through some apps, you can now also see where your contacts are on a map too.
Although it’s great to have mobile access to most things we used to have to do on our PC at home, there are some risks that it’s worth considering to make sure you’re as safe as you can be.
It's a good idea to only give your number out to friends who you know in the real world. If your mobile number is given to people that you don’t know, they may hassle you. This is why it’s also best not to put your number on your profile of your social networking site (like Bebo, MySpace and Facebook).
Whilst having a camera phone is cool and really useful, be careful if you share your photos with others. Pictures can be changed or shared around, so think about what the image is and who you are sending it to, before you press send. Once it’s out there it’s out there forever!
Bluetoothing is a quick and easy way of sharing stuff like photos, files and music. It’s important to be aware that unless you lock your Bluetooth, anyone in the area can access things in your phone, like your contacts. If you don’t want to share this information with strangers (why would you?!), then make sure you lock your Bluetooth.
It’s also a good idea to change your password from the default setting of 0000 so people can’t guess it. Locking your Bluetooth can help reduce the risk of getting viruses or spam to your mobile.
If you are receiving unwanted or insulting texts, you can contact your service provider.
The worrying thing about the social networking using GPS technology, is that your contacts will be on a map, showing exactly where they are. If you can see them, your contacts can also see where you are too. Quite scary if you have contacts on your profile that you don’t know or don’t trust. If you do want to use these sort of apps, you need to remember to use your privacy settings and remove anyone you don’t know or don’t trust, from your contacts.
Sharing Files:
It’s also a good idea to change your password from the default setting of 0000 so people can’t guess it. Locking your Bluetooth can help reduce the risk of getting viruses or spam to your mobile.
If you are receiving unwanted or insulting texts, you can contact your service provider.
The worrying thing about the social networking using GPS technology, is that your contacts will be on a map, showing exactly where they are. If you can see them, your contacts can also see where you are too. Quite scary if you have contacts on your profile that you don’t know or don’t trust. If you do want to use these sort of apps, you need to remember to use your privacy settings and remove anyone you don’t know or don’t trust, from your contacts.
Sharing Files:
Sharing files can be a brilliant way to swap music, films and even homework. But be careful on peer to peer (P2P) sites, as you don't want to download more than you bargain for.
On some P2P sites, the files can be mislabelled, so you might think you’re downloading Lady Ga Ga’s latest video, but end up with a rubbish tune! Or even worse- a pornographic or violent film. You need to be especially careful since you could also be breaking the law.
A lot of files on unregulated file sharing sites aren’t good quality, so it’s worth paying for your music or videos, to ensure you can actually hear and see them properly.
Swapping files can also mean you end up swapping viruses or spy-ware, which can really damage your computer, and even lead to more pop-ups and SPAM. So it’s a good idea to pay for your downloads; this will help protect yourself and your computer from dodgy stuff or viruses.
When podcasting – be careful about what you watch or listen to. It can be easy to download something inappropriate, so always make sure that you go to reputable sites.
Benefits for Learners
What are the potential formal or informal educational benefits to individual users of using social networking services?- Young people as social participants and active citizens
Social networking services can provide an accessible and powerful toolkit for highlighting and acting on issues and causes that affect and interest young people. Social networking services can be used for organising activities, events, or groups to showcase issues and opinions and make a wider audience aware of them. information - Young people developing a voice and building trust
Social networking services could be used to hone debating and discussion skills in a local, national or international context. This helps users develop public ways of presenting themselves. Personal skills are very important in this context: to make, develop and keep friendships, and to be regarded as a trusted connection within a network.
Social networking services can provide young people with opportunities to learn how to function successfully in a community, navigating a public social space and developing social norms and skills as participants in peer groups.
- Young people as content creators, managers and distributors
Social networking services rely on active participation: users take part in activities and discussions on a site, and upload, modify or create content. This supports creativity and can support discussion about ownership of content and data management.
Young people who use social networking services to showcase content – music, film, photography or writing – need to know what permissions they are giving the host service, so that they can make informed decisions about how and what they place on the site.
Users might also want to explore additional licensing options that may be available to them within services – for example Creative Commons licensing – to allow them to share their work with other people in a range of ways.
- Young people as collaborators and team players
Young people as collaborators and team players Social networking services are designed to support users working, thinking and acting together. They also require listening and compromising skills. Young people may need to ask others for help and advice in using services, or understand how platforms work by observing others, particularly in complex gaming or virtual environments. Once users have developed confidence in a new environment, they will also have gained the experience to help others.
- Young people becoming independent and building resilience
Online spaces are social spaces, and social networking services offer similar opportunities to those of offline social spaces: places for young people to be with friends or to explore alone, building independence and developing the skills they need to recognise and manage risk, to learn to judge and evaluate situations, and to deal effectively with a world that can sometimes be dangerous or hostile. However, such skills can't be built in isolation, and are more likely to develop if supported. Going to a social networking service for the first time as a young person alone can be compared to a young person's first solo trip to a city centre, and thus is important for a young person to know how to stay safe in this new environment. - Young people developing key and real-world skills
Managing an online presence and being able to interact effectively online is becoming an increasingly important skill in the workplace. Being able to quickly adapt to new technologies, services and environments is already regarded as a highly valuable skill by employers, and can facilitate both formal and informal learning. Most services are text based, which encourages literacy skills, including interpretation, evaluation and contextualisation.
What are some of the potential uses of social networking services for schools and educators?
- Developing e-portfolios
E-portfolios are an online space where learners can record their achievements and collect examples of their work. E-portfolios don't have to be restricted to institutional provision. Learners can be encouraged to think about setting up “professional personal” sites for exploring and promoting their talents and interests. Or they might want to save or export social networking services activity as evidence of their skills; for example, a forum thread which demonstrates their negotiation skills, or a personal site or post which acts as a great example of their self-motivation and passion.
- Literacy and communication skills
Using sites to communicate, collaborate and create means learners use and can develop a wide range of literacy skills.
- Collaboration and group work
Young people already use a host of technologies – for instance, instant messaging programs such as MSN – to work together on an anytime, anywhere basis. By using social networking services' collaborative tools or setting up groups, young people can semi-formalise their efforts and document discussions and milestones as they go. - Learning about data protection and copyright issues
Data protection is an important issue for anyone who creates, uploads or downloads content online. Young people should consider who has permission to use online content. Considering the benefits of making it easier for others to use or reuse content, looking at the commercial implications of licensing, and understanding what kinds of permissions service providers request, is a compelling way to start investigating differences in licensing agreements (for example, Creative Commons licensing) and the terms of service agreements. Equipping young people to fully understand what permissions they can choose or agree to is an important digital literacy skill which can help develop creative, social or entrepreneurial skills.
- Learning about self-representation and presentation – thinking about how you might be viewed across different contexts
An important part of digital literacy is understanding how distributed activity – the things that we do across a wide range of different websites – affects the impression we make on other people. Managing our web presence – understanding how to use permissions to keep information private or share it with specific individuals – is essential for getting the most out of communications platforms and for keeping control of any personal information that we choose to share. Thinking through personal rules for sharing or making information public is a useful strategy. - Learning about e-safety issues
E-safety covers a range of online issues but ties in firmly to the real world: staying safe, keeping personal information safe, protecting yourself and your belongings. Making sure that we don't participate in bullying or other anti-social behaviour, and helping out other people who might affected by these issues, is a key part of digital citizenship. - Producing public showcases for work, events or organisations
Social networking services can be a great way to quickly create websites to advertise or showcase events or groups, or to present work.
- Forming communities of practice
Educators have long recognised the value of using blogs as a way of creating, making visible and fostering networks around particular topics or interests. More recently, educators have been exploring the range of Web 2.0 tools: wikis, virtual worlds and social networking services, including video- and photo-management sites. Educators and other professionals are increasingly using social networking services to form communities and connect to others who share their interests. Ning in Education and Second Life Grid are examples of umbrella groups that support educators using or wanting to use Web 2.0 tools for education.
- Organising and scheduling work (time management)
Most social networking services have calendar tools that learners can use to schedule their personal and educational timetables. Some can export or import events from other web-based calendars, or third-party applications may exist that can help with this. Working publicly or in groups where others share your calendar or events can be a great motivator.
- Being where learners are
In addition to providing a whole community with useful information about a school, college, organisation or event, a profile on a social network sends a clear message to learners that you are aware of the types of spaces they enjoy online. This is a good reminder that these spaces are public and inhabited by people who may not necessarily be within their friendship networks, encouraging them to look at issues around permissions and sharing personal information. During Childnet's research into cyberbullying, children and young people said that one of the reasons they wouldn't tell their teachers about being bullied online was that they didn't think staff understood the types of services they used. Asserting a presence online sends a clear message that you know what services that are popular with your learners and understand the usefulness of these services to them, and that you would understand if they had a problem and wanted to come and talk to you about it.
Parents and educators alike are understandably concerned about illegal and anti-social behaviour online. Recent media coverage of social networking services has tended to focus on the negative aspects of services, for example the presence of predatory adults who want to use services to contact and groom young people . Illegal and inappropriate behaviour is an unfortunate fact of human societies, whether it takes place online or offline. However, over-emphasising these types of activity is not useful in supporting young people to recognise, manage and negotiate risk for themselves. Just as in the real world, we need to approach risk in an even-handed and realistic way in order to best manage it. Most responsible social networking services employ people to post-moderate anti-social activity, although it should be noted that the amount of information published means that services are reliant on users making reports.
This year the British monarchy launched its own YouTube channel, and the Queen broadcast her Christmas message online , which might suggest that social networking services are regarded by the establishment as a legitimate and effective way to reach a national and international audience, as television was when the Queen's speech was first broadcast in 1957.
Misunderstanding the nature of the environment
Many users believe that they are writing for a closed group of friends, unaware that the information they have posted may be publicly available and able to be searched for and read by a much wider audience. Acquisti & Gross (2006) characterise social networking services as “imagined communities” in recognition of the gap between users' perceptions of a private, closed network and the reality of who can access their information.
Additionally, it may not occur to young people that their public arguments or “flame wars”, their overly enthusiastic critiques of their teachers, or the risqué pictures of themselves that seemed quite funny at the time may still be around in a few years when they are applying for a job or trying to get into university, for example.
We don't yet know the full consequences for a generation that has grown up online, or the future implications of new types of search, for example social searches, which aggregate information from across a range of social networking sites by your name or email address, or of the development of facial-recognition search software
A CHANGING LANDSCAPE!!!
“...technology has not only mediated communication in countless ways, but ... the very ways we communicate – and even the ways we talk and think about communication – are changing as a result.”Social networking services are changing the ways in which people use and engage with the Internet and with each other. Young people, particularly, are quick to use the new technology in ways that increasingly blur the boundaries between online and offline activities.
Social networking services are also developing rapidly as technology changes with new mobile dimensions and features. Children and young people within the UK, who have grown up taking the Internet and mobile technologies for granted, make up a significant segment of the “beta generation” – the first to exploit the positive opportunities and benefits of new and emerging services, but also the first to have to negotiate appropriate behaviours within the new communities, and to have to identify and manage risk.
Social networking services are on the rise globally, and this change is also evident in increased UK engagement with sites. Ofcom's recent International Communications Market 07 report found evidence that more adults use social networking sites in the UK than in any other of the European countries included in the survey. ComScore data from August 2007 suggest that UK Internet users clock up an average of 23 visits and 5.3 hours on social networking sites each month. Ofcom reported that 39% of all UK Internet users use social networking services, while the ComScore figures show 24.9 million individual social networking service visitors in August 2007.
According to recent Hitwise figures, the most popular dedicated social networking sites in the UK are MySpace, Facebook and Bebo . These types of social networking services are profile focused – activity centres around web pages that contain information about the activities, interests and likes (and dislikes) of each member.
While the number of visitors to social networking sites is increasing, so too are the numbers of new services being launched, along with the number of longstanding (within the relatively brief lifespan of the Internet) websites that are adding, developing or refining social networking service features or tools.
The ways in which we connect to social networking services are expanding too. Games-based and mobile-phone-based social networking services that interact with existing web-based platforms or new mobile-focused communities are rapidly developing areas.
DEFENITIONS
“Social networking services” refers here to a wide-range of rapidly developing services tools and practices. Social networking services can be broadly defined as Internet- or mobile-device-based social spaces designed to facilitate communication, collaboration and content sharing across networks of contacts.Social networking services allow users to manage, build and represent their social networks online. Services usually (but not always) include other individuals; they might also include the profiles of events, companies, even political parties. They may let you add anyone in the network as your friend or contact, or they might ask both parties to agree all connections.
Social networking services typically support the public display of networks, although they may offer privacy restrictions or facilitate closed communities. Permissions are a very important feature of most social networking services. They allow members and groups to control who can access their profiles, information, connections and spaces, as well as determining degrees of access. The level of granularity and control varies from service to service, but typically settings allow you to:
- keep your information private (i.e. be seen by only those to whom you give permission) or
- restrict the visibility of your information to:
- signed-in service members only
- people on your contacts list
- particular groups of service users
- make your information public so that even people who are not members or are not signed in as members of the service can see it.
Managing relationships online and managing your online presence are key to having fun with and using social networks safely. However, the speed of the development of social networking services may mean that young people are more likely to have developed personal strategies or learnt from peers than from formal instruction and support from adults.
Social networking sites vary in the types of tools and functionality they provide (Boyd & Ellison define social networking sites as having three common elements: a member profile (in their definition this is always a web page), the ability to add other members to a contact list, and supported interaction between members of contact lists (interaction varies greatly, and there will typically be some degree of interaction facilitated between people who are not on each other's contacts lists).
Social networking sites are often perceived by their users as closed environments, where members talk to other members . This impression of social networking services as providing a private space is likely to account for behaviour, language and postings that do not translate well outside their intended closed context. While it is important that children and young people understand the public nature of much of their activity within social networking services (and can use permissions and privacy controls to manage personal information and communications), we also need to ensure that online activity is understood holistically – i.e. as the sum of activity of all the online sites and networks that an individual belongs to.
WHAT DO PEOPLE DO
ON SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICES?
People use social networking services for countless activities. Among the most common uses, however, are:
YOUNG PEOPLE AND SOCIAL NETWORKING SERVICES? - Connecting with existing networks, making and developing friendships/contacts
Social networking services provide purpose-built spaces for members to create and present an online representation of themselves, either within friendship or wider networks - Represent themselves online and create and develop an online presence
Young people tend to use social networking services to communicate and socialise with their contacts and consolidate their existing friendship networks. However, in the same way that some children and young people collect trading cards or kinds of toy, some young people use social networks to collect contacts to display their popularity. - Viewing content and/or finding information
As well as keeping up to date with what other people are doing, you can use social networking services to generate recommendations based on likes and activities. Social networking services are awash with content – pictures, music, video, as well as event, organisation and topic information. - Creating and customising profiles
There are many different kinds of profiles, although they typically consist of a web page supported by a range of tools. Profile pages are not just lists of information – they allow members to develop and present an image of themselves to the world, and to establish and project their online identities. Displays of preferences (favourite music, books and films, for example) allow members to share information about themselves.
Most social networking sites also allow members to customise the look and feel of their pages to a greater or lesser extent, through page templates or content, including video, widgets, music and images. - Authoring and uploading your own content
Content might be in the form of messages or blog posts – it might also be photos, video or music. - Adding and sharing third-party content
Third-party content might be in the form of links or embedded content hosted somewhere else – for example, a video hosted at YouTube or another video-hosting service, but playable on a member's profile page.
Content may be added in widget form – widgets can be simple badges (pictures with links back to other sites) or dynamic content, for example, a slide show or the last songs catalogued by a last.fm account. This type of dynamic content makes it easy to move information, content and links from one social networking service to another.
Quizzes and polls are also very popular. Some services allow you to create quizzes or compare yourself with other people on your contacts list who have also answered questions or added a particular application. - Posting messages – public and private
Many services support public and private messaging through message boards or in-service email. MySpace and Facebook offer members an instant messaging system. - Collaborating with other people
By using service tools to create groups, users can, for example, collectively create profiles, hold discussions, and store, share and comment on objects. In-service messaging can be a rich source of informal collaboration. - Young people and social networking services
By using service tools to create groups, users can, for example, collectively create profiles, hold discussions, and store, share and comment on objects. In-service messaging can be a rich source of informal collaboration.
Many mainstream social networking services are aimed at teenagers and young adults. Most services have a minimum membership age of 13 or 14, and many explicitly state that they are designed for over-18s. There may be safety restrictions on the accounts of 14- to 17-year-olds; for example, regarding whether their profiles appear in public or off-site searches.
Some sites are specifically designed for young people; for example, both Teen Second Life and Habbo Hotel are aimed at teens. Imbee.com is primarily a blogging service for tweens (children aged 9–13), requiring a parent's permission to sign up. Both Disney and Nick.Com have dedicated services for children – Disney acquired ClubPenguin, a virtual world social networking service aimed at 6- to14-year-olds, in August 2007. Children and tweens can create penguin avatars, for which they can “buy” (with virtual money earned in in-world games) clothes, accessories, pets, homes, furniture, etc.
Services aimed at younger children typically have stricter privacy settings, greater levels of moderation and more limited user interactions. Some require parental permissions – for example, sign up, usually with a credit card – and set preferences, such as the level of in-world communication allowed. As opportunities for contact are limited by safety settings, such child-focused sites may be less suitable for collaborative educational practices and projects than mainstream sites, which make collaboration and contact far easier – factors which bring their own challenges.
The National School Boards Association (in the USA) recently released research findings of an exploration into the online behaviours of 9- to 17-year-olds in the USA . The sample included 2,300 children, young people and parents. Nine- to 17-year-olds reported spending almost as much time on social networking sites and other websites as they do watching television – around nine hours online, compared with 10 hours of TV. Ninety-six per cent of the young people surveyed reported using some form of social networking technology; the findings indicate that education-related topics are the most commonly discussed, with 60% talking about education-related topics and 50% discussing their school work.
It is clear that young people regard social networking services as just another part of their social and often school-related activities.
Educators, parents and carers increasingly recognise the importance of understanding the appeal and use of social networking services among young people. This may be to prevent or respond to a negative incident: cyberbullying or inappropriate content or activities. However, adults should also recognise the benefits of young people's use of technology to support their media literacy skills and social participation, and explore the potential educational benefits of social networking services.
SOCIAL NETWORKING EVALUATION CHART
The following guide is designed to accompany the social networking services evaluation chart, which can be downloaded from Childnet's Digizen website
There are many social networking services. New sites appear daily and existing sites update their services all the time in what is still a rapidly developing area. Most services are profile or content focused, and although they may seem to offer similar services, there are significant differences between sites, tools and services.
This checklist is designed to help you review sites to see whether they meet your needs as an educator (perhaps with a specific learning and teaching aim or project in mind), parent, or even as a potential site member. Currently, most UK school networks block access to many social networking services. However, there are many reasons why educators may explore social networking sites.
http://www.digizen.org/socialnetworking/evaluating-sns.aspx
The comparison chart looks at several existing services: Bebo, EducatorCentral, Facebook, Flickr, MySpace, Ning, TakingITGlobal and YouTube. These services were chosen to illustrate a reasonable range of the different types of service available.
Bebo, Facebook and MySpace are among the most popular social networking sites in the UK.
Some sites are specifically designed for young people; for example, both Teen Second Life and Habbo Hotel are aimed at teens. Imbee.com is primarily a blogging service for tweens (children aged 9–13), requiring a parent's permission to sign up. Both Disney and Nick.Com have dedicated services for children – Disney acquired ClubPenguin, a virtual world social networking service aimed at 6- to14-year-olds, in August 2007. Children and tweens can create penguin avatars, for which they can “buy” (with virtual money earned in in-world games) clothes, accessories, pets, homes, furniture, etc.
Services aimed at younger children typically have stricter privacy settings, greater levels of moderation and more limited user interactions. Some require parental permissions – for example, sign up, usually with a credit card – and set preferences, such as the level of in-world communication allowed. As opportunities for contact are limited by safety settings, such child-focused sites may be less suitable for collaborative educational practices and projects than mainstream sites, which make collaboration and contact far easier – factors which bring their own challenges.
The National School Boards Association (in the USA) recently released research findings of an exploration into the online behaviours of 9- to 17-year-olds in the USA . The sample included 2,300 children, young people and parents. Nine- to 17-year-olds reported spending almost as much time on social networking sites and other websites as they do watching television – around nine hours online, compared with 10 hours of TV. Ninety-six per cent of the young people surveyed reported using some form of social networking technology; the findings indicate that education-related topics are the most commonly discussed, with 60% talking about education-related topics and 50% discussing their school work.
It is clear that young people regard social networking services as just another part of their social and often school-related activities.
Educators, parents and carers increasingly recognise the importance of understanding the appeal and use of social networking services among young people. This may be to prevent or respond to a negative incident: cyberbullying or inappropriate content or activities. However, adults should also recognise the benefits of young people's use of technology to support their media literacy skills and social participation, and explore the potential educational benefits of social networking services.
SOCIAL NETWORKING EVALUATION CHART
The following guide is designed to accompany the social networking services evaluation chart, which can be downloaded from Childnet's Digizen website
There are many social networking services. New sites appear daily and existing sites update their services all the time in what is still a rapidly developing area. Most services are profile or content focused, and although they may seem to offer similar services, there are significant differences between sites, tools and services.
This checklist is designed to help you review sites to see whether they meet your needs as an educator (perhaps with a specific learning and teaching aim or project in mind), parent, or even as a potential site member. Currently, most UK school networks block access to many social networking services. However, there are many reasons why educators may explore social networking sites.
http://www.digizen.org/socialnetworking/evaluating-sns.aspx
The comparison chart looks at several existing services: Bebo, EducatorCentral, Facebook, Flickr, MySpace, Ning, TakingITGlobal and YouTube. These services were chosen to illustrate a reasonable range of the different types of service available.
Bebo, Facebook and MySpace are among the most popular social networking sites in the UK.
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