Mrs. Schroeder's Website
204 Pleasant Street
DePue, IL 61322
ph: 815-447-2121
dixiesch
Cyber Smart: Savvy Talk
Please read the information below. Print out the assignment worksheets. They will be due tommorrow.
Chat rooms are places on the Internet where you can have live, real-time conversations with many people at the same time. Think of it as a telephone party line — except you type rather than talk. Everyone in the chat room can see what everyone else writes, but you can still be as anonymous as you want.
While chat rooms can be dynamic meeting places for people with similar interests, they can also be cruising grounds for predators trying to make contact with young people. For this reason, young children shouldn’t be in chat rooms — period. Just as we teach young children not to talk to strangers in the street, they shouldn’t be talking with strangers online. When they become older (10-13) they should only participate in monitored kids’ chat rooms, and even then under the close supervision of an adult.
Chat rooms are monitored in several ways. Some sites run software that automatically shuts people out for using inappropriate language, while others use real live monitors. Even in monitored chat rooms, however, there is nothing to stop an adult from joining in and pretending to be a child.
INTERNET 101-INSTANT MESSAGING For today’s Net generation, instant messaging (IM) has replaced the telephone as the most popular way of talking with friends. Kids rush home from school, log on and continue schoolyard conversations, often staying online for hours. To use instant messaging, you need to download software from the Internet and register with an instant messaging service. Because the most popular IM service is MSN Messenger, many kids refer to instant messaging as ‘MSNing.’ Instant messaging is a great cost-free tool for kids for talking to friends, keeping in touch with people in faraway places and for coordinating school projects. Many parents confuse instant messaging with chat rooms when their kids say they are ‘chatting’ online. While both technologies involve communicating in ‘real time,’ there are important differences that have safety implications.
A chat room is a place on the Internet where you can talk to anyone in the world. Imagine opening up an international phone book, picking out random strangers and calling them. Instant messaging is a safer environment because it permits users to select the people they want to talk with. Users create contact lists of friends to chat with and can block people they don’t know or don’t want to communicate with. While kids have some control over who they talk to, it’s still possible to talk with strangers using IM. The prestige associated with a large instant messaging contact list means some kids have over 100 IM ‘friends,’ many of whom they’ve never met. Most IM programs encourage users to fill out a ‘personal profile’ which includes detailed personal information. Once completed, this profile is available to anyone on the Internet. Kids should be taught to never fill out these kinds of profiles online. Another issue with IM is that kids feel freer to say things online that they would never say face-to-face, so instant messaging can be used to spread rumours and gossip. For many kids, this means the peer pressures of school can continue long after they have left the school yard. |
ONLINE TALK-DOS AND DON'TS
*Do stick to monitored chat rooms for kids
*Don't use screen names that tell your name, age, or whether you're a boy or girl
*Don't go into private, unmonitored chat rooms.
*Since instant messaging is like private chat, do use it only with family and friends.
*Don't relax so much that you accidentally give out private identity information.
*Don't flirt with strangers
*Don't answer questions that make you uncomfortable.
*Don't respond to questions like: "Are you alone?"
*Do tell your parent or guardian if someone bothers you...especially if they may have part of your private information
*Never plan to meet on a face to face basis!
ASSIGNMENTS:
Print out the assignment worksheets below. This assignment is due tommorrow.
204 Pleasant Street
DePue, IL 61322
ph: 815-447-2121
dixiesch
