All students in grades TK-6 come to the computer lab at least once a week with their class. They learn computer basics, keyboarding, internet safety, Google Apps, navigating the internet, play educational games, and do research and projects for their class.

 

Students also have access to use their Chromebooks in their classroom. This allows our teachers to integrate technology in the classroom and expose our students to digital resources connected to their curriculum.

The Elk Grove Unified School District is committed to supporting 21st century teaching and learning. Given the pace at which new technology tools emerge, the District recognized the need to implement a comprehensive program to teach the safe, effective and ethical use of digital age technologies to staff, students and parents. As a first step, in 2008, Elk Grove Unified formed the Digital Citizenship Task Force (previously known as the Internet Safety Task Force) and began designing a district-wide program. The Task Force addressed new issues and opportunities and assessed program progress.

 

We feel it is important to note the difference between citizens and digital citizens. As upstanding “citizens,” we need to participate positively in our physical communities – our schools, neighborhoods, cities, states, countries and the world. Likewise, as exemplary “digital citizens,” students and staff must learn how to participate positively in a variety of digital/cyber/online communities. It is only by developing a clear sense of both our rights and our responsibilities that we can become fully engaged, contributing “citizens” of all the communities in which we find ourselves.

 

All EGUSD schools teach digital citizenship and are in compliance with current legal mandates, such as the federal E-Rate/CIPA requirements. More importantly, through a commitment that all EGUSD students are firmly grounded in what it means to be active, contributing (digital) citizens, the EGUSD community is providing students with the skills required in a global economy, such as creativity, collaboration, critical thinking and problem solving. These are all skills that can be seamlessly integrated into the main themes of digital citizenship.