National Cybersecurity Awareness Month

Hi All!

Did you know that October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month!  Often as we are exposing our students to all of these great tech tools, we neglect to talk about how to be safe online. Online privacy and security is an extremely important topic that should be discussed with students as we are teaching with and through technology.  Being unsafe online can impact us, our students and their children in many negative ways.  As many of our students are parents, it's important they know what to look for and are able to make sure their children are safe online as well.  

Why should I care?  Apathy is one of the biggest challenges facing data privacy and security online.  But our data is EVERYWHERE online and can easily be retrieved and used in a harmful way (Think access to bank accounts, addresses, credit card information, etc.)

But I have too many things to cover in my class.  I don't have time to cover digital safety.  This important, increasingly relevant topic can be fit into your class in easy micro-lessons.  Give students an online safety tip of the day, for example "Don't conduct banking or shopping activities over public WiFi" and have a 3 minute discussion about why this is important.  Or, as students are logging into a certain website, have a quick lesson about password safety and security.  Stay Safe Online is a great website with a lot of information and classroom resources ready to go!  You can find more info here: https://staysafeonline.org/ncsam/ 

If you already talk about online privacy and security in your class, it would be great if you could share how you approach the topic and any resources you have with us here.  

Happy National Cybersecurity Awareness Month!

Becky Shiring

eslbecky3@gmail.com 

Comments

Thank you, Becky, for bringing up this important topic. We definitely need to be talking with adults about this issue and integrating it into our technology-infused lessons. For some of the adult immigrants and refugees we work with, using the internet is a brand new experience. But --in fact-- all of us need to continue to expand our understanding of the potential dangers online.

What are your thoughts, folks? What are some good techniques for addressing cyber security in the classroom? I bet some of our members have developed some great materials addressing this issue. I would be especially interested in hearing what members think about helping adults understand the potential dangers for their children.

Cheers, Susan Finn Miller

Moderator, AELL CoP