Passport to Digital Citizenship

In this post I will be analyzing Mike Ribble's article Passport to digital Citizenship. It is an article that suggests a method to teach the concept of digital citizenship in the classroom, using a four stage system.  His idea of digital citizenship includes nine categories that cover everything from accessing material; literacy; health; security and others. The first stage of the four stage system is to make the student's aware of these nine categories or elements. The second stage is to deliver guided practice on these categories. The third stage is to model and demonstrate them to give examples of how to use the elements. Finally to give the students feedback on how they executed the elements of digital citizenship.
So what about this model and the elements of citizenship? This model of teaching has been in use for years and is a good strategy for almost any topic that you are trying to teach. Execution of this model depends on the teacher and how well they can use differentiated instruction. One of the best ways for students to practice the elements of citizenship that Ribble is providing is to practice it themselves. There are many assignments that a teacher can assign and offer feedback as in any english class. The concept of digital citizenship is so large that it would be hard to make nine assignments to practice each element. you would have to grade multiple categories at once which will not be too hard.
While I agree with Ribble's plan there are some things that could be explained more in the article. His nine elements are vague in this article although it is also serving as advertisement for his book that cover these nine elements in detail. He also leaves it up to the teacher to use the four stage strategy without any real suggestions on how to execute it. He is giving teachers a model and leaving it up to teachers as to how to use it. I would like to know any other suggestions he has to make his four stage system work.

Ribble, M. (December-Janurary, 2008-09). Passport to digital citizenship: Journey toward appropriate technology use at school and at home. Learning and Leading With Technology. Retrieved fromhttp://www.iste.org/store/my-virtual-products.