Encouraging Safe and Responsible Use of Internet – What Should a Teacher do?
Teachers need to differentiate between teaching search and teaching content.
If a teacher is teaching search, than one must teach about the consequences of what is on the web – which means teaching little Suzy that the web is one of the greatest “places” and can be a scary place. Kind of like New York City! I love NY, but there are places I don’t travel to – mostly out of ignorant fear – unfounded fear maybe.
If I was teaching search, I would use different search tools to protect the young students. I would customize my Firefox search toolbar and add the following search tools:
If a teacher in the 5 – 12 realm is teaching search it is important that teachers monitor the screens of the kids, even though their is a filter. This can be done the old fashioned way – walking around 
– or by using lab management software like synchroneyes or iTalc (a F/OSS app). The bottom line – teachers need to take responsibility for their students and not depend only on the filter.
If I was not teaching search, I would go find the web resources that I want my students to access. This has the following benefit:
Focus is on the content – not the searching for the content
It is that simple – teach search or teach with resources!
Technorati Tags: internet safety, btcactus, search
Powered by ScribeFire.
I am an Educational Computing Strategist (ECS). I figure out ways to IMPROVE education with technology. 
My Web site
