Live on the Web, I was just listening to Sec. of State Hillary Clinton’s call for 21st-century statecraft (as well as the need to protect free expression online) and couldn’t help but think about how much we need to respect, teach, and model good citizenship at home and school (here and in every country) – using the media kids use and love – in order to realize Secretary Clinton’s vision for Internet freedom. She spoke of the need to “create norms of behavior among states.” Absolutely, but we need to start here at home, promoting and modeling norms of good behavior online and in homes and classrooms using the social (behavioral) media and technologies where so much kid behavior occurs now. I just reviewed a major study, the Kaiser Family Foundation’s, about how much youth are using media, and while some are appalled at the time spent with media, are they thinking about how so much of that usage is outside of school, because we block social media and cellphones from school – leaving young people completely on their own to work out social norms? What a missed opportunity! Secretary Clinton also called on us to focus on the needs of youth. Doing so must include understanding how they use media, not just how much. Let’s begin now consciously to model and teach the good digital as well as real-world citizenship and “statecraft” that will be protections to free speech, our countries, and most especially our children – at school, in virtual worlds, and all the other places where they spend time. [See also “Digital risk, digital citizenship” and “From users to citizens.”]
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[…] “21st-century statecraft at home and school” // Share| Permalink Post a comment — Trackback URI RSS 2.0 feed for these comments This entry (permalink) was posted on Wednesday, January 19, 2011, at 5:01 pm by Anne. Filed in social media and tagged civic engagement, clicktivism, Deb Socia, Ellen Helsper, Magdalena Bober, Matt Levinson, Pew Internet, public service, social activism, social media, Sonia Livingston, volunteer work. […]
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sbalkam says
And so we need to connect the push for 21st-century skills with 21st-century statecraft by fostering 21st-century citizenship: translating the rights of free speech, assembly and religion, as Sec. Clinton emphasized today, with the responsibilities of civil and respectful behavior online. Schools will be critical in encouraging this, but only after they (and us older generation) get over our unrealistic fears of the new technologies.
Stephen Balkam
Family Online Safety Institute