Expanding digital citizenship education to address tough issues
By Nicole Mirra, Sarah McGrew, Joseph Kahne, Antero Garcia, and Brendesha Tynes
Even as educators wrestle with the ongoing challenges of pandemic-era teaching and learning, they’ve found themselves thrust into the middle of a civic crisis as well. For months now, fierce and hyperpartisan debates have raged at school board meetings and in district offices all over the country, focusing on everything from mask mandates to systemic racism and critical race theory, with those involved drawing on wildly divergent sources of information. No doubt, educators have a lot to contend with already, but these angry conflicts highlight the urgent need for our schools to provide civic and media education that prepares young people for responsible citizenship in a sharply divided and media-saturated society.
As members of the Educating for Civic Reasoning and Discourse Commission (sponsored by the National Academy of Education; Lee, White, & Dong, 2021), we recently reviewed the existing research into digital citizenship, focusing specifically on educators’ efforts to help students use digital tools for civic and political engagement. We found that such efforts primarily cluster around preparing youth in three important areas: civility, information analysis, and civic voice. Further, we found that this work shows much promise, especially in helping to diminish cyberbullying and to increase students’ capacities to decide what online sources to trust (Gaffney et al., 2019; Wineburg et al., 2019). However, we also concluded that if we want our schools to provide civic education that truly prepares young people to contend with current levels of political polarization, disinformation, and racism and other forms of prejudice, then these efforts will need to expand significantly.
Specifically, we urge educators to consider and apply three principles for innovative instructional design. All three can support effective teaching and learning for all age groups and across all subject areas. The strategies we outline are just initial steps, but we believe they can help educators at all levels chart a path through the storm that both youth and adults currently confront.