Highly able children are often adept with today’s technology. They may not only be listening to iPods, working with iTouch and iPad, they may have a “smart” phone and most certainly will be using traditional computers as well.  Today’s student has no difficulty searching the Web for information, but they also utilize the interactive tools of Web 2.0 and social networking. They read and write blogs, they know to create new information to share and many create their own videos and post on YouTube.

Have you “Googled” yourself? Have you “Googled” your children? In our primary class students were working on a project and one of the requirements was to put a picture of yourself in your work. I intended to take a photo of each student for them to use, but before that happened, several students had “Googled” themselves and more than one of these eight-year-olds found pictures of themselves on their search results. One was a photo from the local paper of a sports event.

So what is a digital footprint? What difference does it make?

Everything you create digitally. E-mail, YouTube videos, social networking posts and pictures, web pages you create, and any other content that is placed on the web becomes a part of your digital footprint.

As our children establish their identity in a digital world, they are also creating their own digital footprints. It’s important that it be a positive one because in a few years they’ll be seeking college admission and jobs. Today’s college admissions office or employer has the Internet as a tool in collecting additional information about applicants. This information may be used to help them know more about the candidate.

It’s difficult to explain to our children that choices they make in elementary school may affect their future choices. They can always ‘delete’ those dumb things they posted, right? Recently, I googled myself. Web pages that I created many years ago and that have been inactive for years were accessible with a quick click of the mouse. Files that have been deleted don’t really go away, they’re just not as easy to find.

And yet, we don’t want to keep our children from playing and creating on the Internet because there are so many positive and wonderful opportunities waiting for them!  What we want for our children is to participate and create a positive digital footprint. The good things they create and share will reflect positively on them in the future – something to point out with pride.

Please talk with your children, whether you’re a parent or a teacher or both. Help them understand as they create and participate that the Internet is not just a plaything, but a snapshot of who they are. We shouldn’t fear it, but we should have a healthy dose of respect for its power.


Cindy Sheets, Vice President