Okay, so let’s break it down. Digital Identities, this. Digital Natives, that. It’s all technical and connected, but how am I supposed to feel about it?

Well, to be honest, it’s kind of like hammering a nail that’s been hit so much on the head that it can hardly be called a nail any more.

Yeah. There’s that image.

Digital Identities are something that I live with every day. In the morning, I check my e-mail. During class, the use of technology forces me to think and re-think about every piece of technology I use. Sometimes I tweet it or post it onto Facebook, Twitter, or Google+. In the evening, I see what other people have said about their lives, or read up on security measures to make sure that you’re open to everyone, but only everyone you’ve approved of. Interspersed through that, I do homework, eat, sleep, and repeat the whole process.

I used to take time to relax. Digital Identities can be a pain for that, sometimes.

As for Digital Natives, it’s still an unknown factor for me. Yes, they exist. Yes, they can text anywhere from 200-2000 messages a day. Did You Know That?

But how many of these people actually are there? Yes, there’s probably a lot of them (WoW alone has over 10-12 million active users), but in the grand scheme of our 6 billion inhabitants on this tiny blue speck of spinning water and soil, how many of us can be considered true Digital Natives?

Yes, even if it’s in the seven to eight digit range of human units, it’s still significant enough to be constantly wondering if Google+ is the future Facebook killer? But I’m just wondering if we’re jumping the gun a bit early on labeling everyone with a Facebook account and a iPhone Digital Natives? Really, it’s the babies being born right now, after the mass explosion of smartphones and tablet computers that I’m more inclined to label Digital Natives. What will their lives be like with all of this massively complex technology at their fingertips? Or what will some of their lives be like living in households that refuse or are unable to afford such techno amenities? It’s always an inevitability: whether due to culture or economic stresses, someone’s always lagging behind, relying on hand-me-down Palm Pilots or avoiding anything with a screen like their life depended on it.

In education, things are heating up for Digital Natives/Identities: technology has never been more of a hot button topic than now. Well, unless you count the written word, the wheel, the bow & arrow, and the million other inventions created before the World Wide Web; they don’t count because they don’t make our lives as easy as current technology does.

…Oh, wait.

Anyways, moving on to a more serious note: education and Digital Identities is not an unfeasible step for integration. It requires a lot of thinking and preparation on the part of the teacher, but if the bonus is that students can inadvertently learn something while surfing the web beyond what internet meme is popular, then why not use it to teach?

Of course, similar questions have been posed that hasn’t fared so well in reaching mass appeal: why not use gaming in teaching something? Oh, Communism sounds great on paper (Which apparently it actually did), why not give that a try? Laser-disc, it’s unwieldy, but it’s better looking than cassette tape, let’s try investing in those?

Okay, so some of those questions aren’t that closely related, but I guess what I’m trying to say is, yes, I’m all for integrating teaching and Digital Identity-based technology. But what teachers shouldn’t do is immediately cheer for integration too quickly before taking the time to think about the real world implications of accepting to mesh the terms ‘education’ and ‘Facebook’ together.

Then, at least when they’ve thought about it and still accepted digital ID-education integration, they won’t be surprised when students start adding their teachers as friends on Facebook/Google+/Myspace.

Me? I’m just trying to find time to relax somewhere in all of this thinking.

Username: The Digital Native’s “Identity 2.0”

Cameron, Kim. (2005). The Laws of Identity. Identity Weblog. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://www.identityblog.com/?p=352

Cavazza, Fred. (2006). Digital Identity Mapping. Flickr. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/fredcavazza/278973402/

“Identity”. Dictionary.com. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Identity

Password: The Teacher’s Role in Unlocking Digital Identities

Brown, Danny. (2011). “Mobile is the New Digital Native”. Danny Brown - Social Media Marketing Blog. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://dannybrown.me/2011/04/06/mobile-is-the-new-digital-native/

Couric, Katie. (2011). “Notebook: Digital Identity”. Youtube. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZj3WMoBIkw

Lunsford, Angela. (2009). “Andrea Lunsford on the Myths of Digital Literacy”. Youtube. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIKu_hZT2BM&feature=player_embedded

Manitoba Education and Training. (1996). “Introduction”. Senior 1 English Language Arts: Manitoba Curriculum Framework of Outcomes and Senior 1 Standards. Pp. 01. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/cur/ela/docs/s1_framework/index.html

Manitoba Education, Citizenship, and Youth Cataloguing in Publication Data. (2006). Literacy with ICT: Across the Curriculum. University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB.

WKBW News. (2011). “Bill Sponsored To Deter Cyber Bullying”. WKBW News 7: News, Sports, Weather. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://www.wkbw.com/news/local/Bill-Sponsored-To-Deter-Cyber-Bullying-131805638.html

So why should educators should care about Digital Identities or Digital Natives in the first place?

Beyond the fact that it’s their jobs to care about students, teaching is an overall complicated profession in Canada; on the one hand, it is steeped in tradition and established structure. For many provinces, guidelines are created for students and divided into both general and student/specific learning outcomes amongst each teachable subject and every grade level. Most of these structures are established for singular purposes. In the Senior 1 ELA Curriculum Framework of Outcomes and Standards for Manitoba, for example, the outcomes are stated as to “Integrate the four foundation skill areas of literacy and communication, problem solving, human relations, and technology…[providing] the basis for teaching, learning, and assessing in English language arts” (1996). Careful thought and planning is made for teachers to effectively guide students into attaining these established learning goals.

Yet, due to the ever-evolving nature of the 21st Century’s sociopolitical climate, economical stature, and individual costs/standards of living, education is also a profession that must constantly evolve to meets the demands of today’s students. With the dawning of the internet and its subsequent permeation into the popular culture, the effect of Digital Natives on the overall curriculum was inevitable. As the more recent Manitoban Literacy with ICT document comes to highlight, “21st-century students must develop multiple literacies that will allow them to respond to changing ideas, attitudes, and technologies as their communities and their world evolve” (2006).

So why care? Because students today are different. They may look generally the same as students who’ve come before the internet and social media boom, but they’ve arrived onto two interlocked worlds, the real world and the digital world; each one has its own special languages and literacies to learn. Students are pressed to constantly evolve with the current times of unending technological advancement and innovation, or fall victim of being labelled backwards and seen as an anomaly from the ‘norm’; it’d be hard-pressed to not find students in senior years that don’t already feel ostracized from society in general. As professionals, teachers should be expected to similarly evolve, but evolve with the knowledge that they are responsible for reminding the Digital Native generation of the great power that lies at their fingertips.

To quote the comic book writer Stan Lee, “With great power, comes great responsibility.” Both teachers and students must always remember the ethical implications of disregarding the power and by extension dangers of the Digital Identity.

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By the time Digital Native students arrive at the senior years, they will likely possess or at least are familiar with digital devices. Those that possess devices such as smartphones or tablets are even likelier to be constantly involved with their Digital Identities. Danny Brown, a Canadian social media consultant (and TEDx speaker), reveals on his blog that in the US alone, statistics show that communication through digital media devices are at an all-time high:

In the average school’s classroom, teachers are highly likely of coming across at least one student with a smartphone. It seems an inevitability.

But what educators can do with this knowledge? Well, as the earlier lesson plan examines, the potential use of these technological fingerprints in assisting student learning is up for review. Beyond the inherent use of videos, podcast, and online articles in classrooms, online username-required sites such as blogs, forums, or even social media sites can also be used to create environments for student learning. Creative writing amongst students, for example, is more prevalent than it’s ever been, according to Andrea Lunsford. As a tool, Digital Identities has the potential to be a very useful accessory for teachers to draw upon creativity from students.

And again, educators can also act as an ethical adviser to students that openly share their personal information with each new website, or are willing to abuse others under the belief that there are no repercussions with an online identity. Secure passwords and cyber-bullying are common issues that are being brought up amongst today’s youth, and teachers would be well positioned to inform or remind students of the issues that can affect them online.

It’s part of the vision for Manitoba, at least:

“The use of information technology will help enable all students to solve problems, improve their personal performance, and gain the critical and abstract thinking skills necessary to become lifelong learners and contributing members of their communities” (2006).

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In the English Language Arts department for Senior Year Education, technology is gradually being accepted as a potential outlet for students to creatively express themselves. For units on Shakespeare, online Cliff Notes were once treated as the bane of English teachers, as students would use these notes for references to Shakespeare instead of acquiring knowledge through careful readings of the text.

“Using Character-Oriented Tweets in Shakespeare’s ‘The Taming of the Shrew’”

Background: This quick Lesson Plan is offered as an alternative to individual or class readings of the text, allowing students to express their creativity while showing off their knowledge of the chosen text, rather than simply referencing online summaries. As a whole unit on Shakespeare, students will have been split into several ‘reading groups’, approximately 2-4 students per group. Each member of the group will be assigned a character to log their perspective and transition throughout the play, then read selected scenes in said groups. Each group will have an assigned Twitter account to which they will tweet their own character’s actions and perspective. As the class completes reading the play, the teacher will assess each student’s set of tweets, according to a predetermined rubric for assessment. Today’s particular lesson will delve into a particular in-class group reading.

Lesson Goals/Objectives:

1. To teach students how to analyze and dissect characters and scenes in Shakespearean texts.
2. To offer students a technological alternative to individual readings of the text.
3. To get students also thinking about technical aspects of plays, such as character blocking and expression.
4. To allow students to build their creative writing skills through the use of Twitter.

Suggested Grade Level: Senior 1-2

Time: 60 min.

Materials:

• Computer and internet access
• Twitter account
• The Taming of the Shrew - William Shakespeare

Introduction

• Students will be formed into their assigned groups as they enter class; they will have been asked to briefly skim Act II, Scene I with their groups the previous class. They will be given 15 minutes to go over the scene in their groups. One student will have been assigned any extraneous roles, but are not responsible for writing them into their tweets. (15 Min.)
• After reading the scene aloud, each group will be given 5 minutes to briefly discuss their opinions on the scene and what each member will touch upon in their tweets. (5 Min.)
• Total: 20 Min.

Development

• Transitioning over to the school’s computer lab, the student groups will be given 30 minutes to prepare and input their tweets into the group’s activated Twitter log.
• The first tweet will be written by the member assigned with the extraneous roles, indicating which act and scene the group will be writing on today. The teacher will be observing the students, offering assistance and feedback for students who are in need.
• Total: 30 Min.

Closing

• In the remaining ten minutes, the teacher will have a brief class discussion, determining where students are in the process, what issues that may have come up, and assign whatever tweets the groups have yet to finish as individual homework. The teacher will finally inform the students that the next class will involve a class discussion, examining the scene in depth.
• Total: 10 Min.

Before any exploration of the keywords ‘Digital Native’, ‘Digital Identity’, and ‘Education’ can be made, the term ‘Identity’ should be clearly defined first.

According to Dictionary.com, the all-knowing repository of definitions, Identity can mean all sorts of things: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Identity

There are roughly two of the five immediate definitions offered by the website that pertains to the topic at hand…

Identity:

• condition or character as to what a person is or what a thing is
• the condition of being oneself or itself, and not another

Note that this is the concept of an identity broken down into its most basic form. While these definitions are perfectly applicable to physical interpretations of people, the digital identity requires an addendum to account for the technological inclusion into one’s identity. Kim Cameron, former Identity and Access Architect for Microsoft, suggests that digital identities are in fact broken into two terms: ‘claims’ and ‘subjects’. Or, in more technical terms, he states the digital identity is “a set of claims made by one digital subject about itself or another digital subject”. (2005)

Now, to quickly break this down into one usable definition, we can take all of these keywords and definitions to arrive at:

Digital Identity:

• a condition of being one’s digital self or subject, defended by their claims of self-verification

Or, in layman’s terms, ‘being yourself online, and proving that it is, in fact, you’.

So, why did this definition matter in the first place? Well, in order to see what Digital Identities means to Digital Natives (a term coined by Marc Prensky in 2001, describing those generally born during or after the introduction of digital technology), and then explore why such things should matter for educators of Digital Natives, a set definition is key in understanding what this post means when it says Digital Identity.

For Digital Natives (and many, if not most of Digital Immigrants), it’s easy to boil the concept down to one term: social media. But, as self proclaimed tech evangelist Fred Cavazza outlines, the Digital Identity is much more expansive than this.

(You can find more of his work here, though it’s primarily in French: http://www.fredcavazza.net/blog/in-english/)

As it’s conveniently been laid out before you, the Digital Identity of the Digital Native is vast; these are only but a few of the potential websites that Digital Natives can and do use to represent themselves. Online shopping, social networking, online gaming, blogging, online creativity, and so much more new aspects and issues arise for the Digital Native, who is almost immediately surrounded by these digital opportunities from birth. The value of the ‘username’ is becoming just as important as a person’s birth name; to Digital Natives, it already is just as important. Perhaps even more so.

As educators of the Digital Native generation, what is important to realize as Digital Natives have entered their schools and sat in their classrooms, is that while the term ‘students’ are what physically defines teenagers or young adults in the classroom, there are 10-100 times as many websites that digitally define those same students to the world wide web. Even today, both old and new teachers are quickly coming to recognize the importance of teaching the concept of ‘Digital Citizenship’ to a new generation of students who are nearly born with a Digital Identity and ICT (Information and Communications Technology) literacy.

That is, Digital Natives may come into classrooms fully equipped with smartphones that hold their very lives in one convenient user interface, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they know how to navigate their online lives with an ethical compass. That is where the role of the educator comes in, and that is increasingly an issue that cannot and will not be ignored.

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