That's a wrap!

Today, we thanked all the schools for their participation in Netsafe's Digital Citizenship Capability Review Tool pilot last term. We appreciated their involvement, and the feedback has been hugely encouraging.

Overall, 92 schools and kura representing all school types and regions took part in the pilot. 91% of respondents said that the review process with the tool had been a rewarding experience. 

"[This has been] very useful and thanks for allowing us to be part of the pilot. It came at exactly the right time for us and [was a] very positive experience overall."

All the comments we received will help us refine the tool and develop it as a resource for the education sector. We now move into phase two of development, and will let you know when the next version is available. If you wish to continue to use the draft version during Term 2, we still welcome your thoughts via the survey.

We wish you a great start to Term 2 and we’ll be in touch again soon.

Kia ora e hoa, Kathe. We have representation on the pilot across the sector, including Māori-medium, and it's still not too late to join now we are underway. We appreciate you spreading the word. 

Netsafe’s Education Team has started work on the first update to the Netsafe Kit for Schools in five years. The team are taking a ‘test and learn’ approach and will be piloting sections of the kit with schools and kura.

The first pilot involves a tool to help schools review the strategies, processes and resourcing they have in place to support digital citizenship and student wellbeing. 

Our Education Team has worked closely with CORE Education and a team of researchers to develop the draft tool.

There are over 50 schools participating in the pilot which runs in March/April. If your school would like to join them please email Karen Spencer, Director of Education, by Friday 3 March.

This update was published in Netsafe's February newsletter. To subscribe, visit our website https://www.netsafe.org.nz/ 

There has never been a greater need for schools to take a proactive approach towards a whole school community promotion of digital citizenship, including online safety and wellbeing, than there is now.

This is why Netsafe has created its revised position on digital citizenship in education in its new white paper:

• Download it today: From literacy to fluency to citizenship: Digital Citizenship in Education.

Digital citizenship is a powerful enabler of inclusion in social, cultural and civil society.  Becoming a digital citizen is ‘part of who we all are’ in school; it should be planned for, and addressed, through multiple contexts including structured activities and wherever there is a meaningful opportunity to talk and learn about being online.

It is time to seek a definitive statement for digital citizenship and its relationship to ‘digital literacy’ and ‘digital fluency’. Netsafe’s view is that the proliferation of terms and abstract concepts does not help schools. A consensus view of the values, aims and knowledge underpinning these terms is required.

This paper is Netsafe’s initial contribution to achieving this aim. In this paper, Netsafe presents a revised model of digital citizenship:

From 10-11 November, NetSafe is bringing the best local and international experts to Auckland to talk about the ways we can prevent and minimise online harm together. 

The experts will be speaking at Confronting Online Harm Together – New Zealand’s first conference focussed on harmful digital communications. 

YOUTH UNCONFERENCE

NetSafe is excited to announce a significant part of the Conference will be dedicated to young people. The Youth Unconference provides students with the chance to share their online experiences and contribute ideas that NetSafe can use to develop our approach to supporting young people. 

This is an exciting leadership opportunity for the students that attend as they will be helping shape cyber safety initiatives in New Zealand - but this is only the start! NetSafe expects this to provide the foundations for a more sustainable approach to youth engagement around these issues.

The Unconference will take place on Thursday 10 November, in Auckland, from 2pm – 4.30pm. It will be facilitated by the internationally acclaimed Project Rockit with support from Stick & Stones and Attitude. 

For more information go to: Youth Unconference - full details and registration

Is that the sound of tumbleweed?!

It's been a wee while since you've heard from Netsafe in this group — so if you are reading this, thanks for hanging in there!

There have been a few changes happening for the team in the last few months. Here's a rundown of the news and the new resources available.

Harmful Digital Communications Act

• NetSafe is now the Approved Agency for the Harmful Digital Communications Act: Read more about the new law and what it means for us all.

​

Resources for schools

We have just posted five (yes, five!) new pages of resources on our site too:

• NetSafe's service to schools and kura: A summary of how we are working with schools like yours to help you  get the right balance of protection and promotion for digital citizenship.
• Resources for primary and intermediate
• Resources for secondary
• Resources for school leaders
• Resources to help schools engage whānau and families

​

And finally, I'm delighted to be the new Director of Education at NetSafe. I'm looking forward to working with you all so do stay connected and share any questions or ponderings you may have.

NetSafe is still the first port of call when you, your family or your school need help or expertise related to online safety, online security or anything else you come across on the internet including scams, cyberbullying, privacy breaches or objectionable material.

You can get in touch with us on 0508 638 723 or check out www.netsafe.org.nz for useful information and how-to guides.

Ngā mihi

Karen

Thanks to everyone who came along to the session tonight with our guest author, Ewan McIntosh, and guest educator, Steve Mouldey from Hobsonville Point Secondary School. This session explored the opportunities and challenges of putting some of the book's ideas into practice, covering questions such as:

• how to find a focus that everyone shares?
• how does this align with 'inquiry'?
• how to keep the momentum going and make my ideas actually happen

We also had a great snapshot of how these ideas have influenced the planning and learning design at Hobsonville Point Secondary School.

• You can access all the notes via the shared doc, including the slides, and watch the session again below:

This thread will stay open for those of you who are keen to keep sharing thoughts and pursuing ideas in this space.

Now just get started (as Ewan would say!)

Thanks so much for your comments, Rebbecca. You pick up on a vital theme from the book, that of being inclusive and collaborative in the way we work with others to bring about change and innovation in schools/kura/ECE centres and beyond. 

There is a whole value set that sets behind this which is often espoused in the school vision - and I think the 'design thinking' approach offers a way to put that kind of high-level vision into action at a very pragmatic level.

It would be good to hear from schools that have tried using this method of idea identification and solution, driven by evidence and real voices from everyone involved.

In the introductory webinar, we touched on two other big questions:

1. What's your BHAG? - finding big hairy audacious goals, rather than staid five year strategies
2. Mapping the journey - how do you create a human-centered approach to prototyping, testing, altering ideas to make them work, rather than presuming you know the best solution from the outset?

What are the kinds of actions you might expect to see if we were to take a "human-centred" approach to strategic development, I wonder?

Got a questions about using a design-thinking, human-centred approach in school? Started the book and keen to unpick some thoughts?

Join Ewan McIntosh for a Q&A session on 18 November, 8pm NZ time, to wrap up this Book Group.

• Sign up in this form - and share a question for Ewan
• Access the Google Hangout on Air event

Kia nora koutou

Some incredibly rich reflections here - thanks again for all your participation over the month. I'm just popping the links to the recordings in here again in case anyone else want to review and I'll add them to the initial post on this thread as well:

• Opening webinar launch: http://connect.vln.school.nz/p4eg56sf3ho/
• Closing webinar sum-up: http://connect.vln.school.nz/p259w1knstx/

The closing session explored several of the questions that have come up in this thread, and we also heard from two guests, Danielle Myburgh (Hobsonville Point Secondary School) and Reid Walker (Henderson North School), who have been exploring some of the book's ideas with their learners and generously shared their journeys.

This thread will remain open beyond the end of Connected Educator Month for anyone else to drop into as they wish.

My thanks to Rachel, Rose, Sue and Sally for all their time and participation in this discussion so far - and to all of you who have been participating:) It seems to me that the book is a timely guide to reimagining learning design in ways that honour the 'front end' and intent of the NZ Curriculum.

Keep the comments, questions and stories coming;)