Digital Citizens

I chose to critique my high school's website, which I haven't ever really looked at in depth.  When you open the page, it looks very clean and concise.  The name is large and captures attention, the school's contact information is readily accessible, and the tabs are clear as to where they will take you.  The site also shows news pertinent to students and parents of the high school.  It is not difficult to find what you are looking for or to navigate the site.  It utilizes graphics, images, a table for the calendar, and columns that make it more aesthetically pleasing.

If I were to teach a class, it would probably consist of younger children between nine and eleven.  Teaching or incorporating technology into the class would be very important, especially in this day and age.  I would use age appropriate programs and software such as Microsoft Word to create assignments, PowerPoints to give presentations and instruction, and email (most likely to parents) to keep the students updated on work and upcoming assignments.  Digital citizenship concepts that I would address are the idea of "netiquette" in web interactions and a complete understanding of copyright laws.  It is very important for young students to start learning these concepts soon so they are able to effectively use computers throughout the rest of their schooling.

From working on the newsletter assignment, I realized just how much work and effort goes into creating the newsletters that are sent home with students regularly.  I put into practice the skills necessary to make more than one set of columns and how to manage them.  Something I did not know how to do before class and this assignment was how to use page- and section-breaks.  I did not realize just how useful they are and I plan to use them with my future Word documents and work.  This assignment, while possibly time consuming (depending on the amount of work put into it and the desired outcome), was actually pretty fun to complete.  It is really easy to get super creative with a newsletter; it can go in any direction you're wanting to take it.