Introduction
Equity and Citizenship Advocate: Leaders use technology to increase equity, inclusion, and digital citizenship practices.
Every individual who has access to digital products smoothly fits in the role of a digital citizen. However, a digital citizen must indeed have a certain level of digital literacy, nevertheless misunderstanding, particularly in the field of education. As educators involved in digital teaching and learning in the 21st century, we firmly believe that there must be a standard or protocol for us to follow as qualified digital citizens. Meanwhile, educators have to help the candidates to get prepared as well.
People can produce technology and tools, define their meaning, and make the right decision to implement. Before, through the above process, we must ensure the safety of technology and user privacy to protect the digital citizens at the first step. Now we want to make a change, turning passive into positive. Therefore, new requirements for digital citizens introduce us to five new elements to our practice.
Inclusive:
To be an inclusive digital citizen means to be multicultural and diverse in many ways of judging online information from different resources. Especially for educators, if they could be as inclusive as possible, they could positively affect their students, leading them to be inclusive people. In my opinion, being inclusive is crucial in the digital world and one of the key features of a successful and respectful human being.
Informed:
A digital citizen who stays informed often gets the opportunity to evaluate and identify the accuracy and validity of those online resources. But, as educators, we could do more than that. After assessing and analyzing the information from the internet, we should transfer them into content that fits the pedagogical requirements. Digital citizens could cultivate their critical thinking and decision-making ability, and critical thinking is essential to help digital citizens identify the proper online recourses that they could retrieve.
Engaged, Balanced and Alert:
Those three elements are crucial and somewhat connected in the learning and teaching environment of the digital teaching age. First, educators should engage students in their learning process by using all kinds of digital tools. A well-designed digital project could raise the awareness of students to use technology for the greater good. Second, students and teachers need to know the importance of being positive and problem solvers in the digital learning environment. Meanwhile, mental health is even more critical for some students because online bullying and attacks occur more frequently. Educators and school faculties should stay alert and provide proper guidance to the students who become victims.
Since the pandemic, everything relied on digital tools more than ever. As future instructional specialists, we must stay alert, align to the standards, and set an excellent digital citizenship model.
Reference
Figure 1, Retrieved from https://hrexecutive.com/how-technology-is-disrupting-the-way-we-develop-leaders/