Respecting Yourself and Others Online Workshop Guide

Through a series of activities and presentations, participants will develop critical thinking skills and strategies, grounded in the best practices of digital citizenship and digital literacy, to minimize the risk of negative experiences and to maximize the positive opportunities of social media. The workshop also gives teens an opportunity to be leaders and provides them with the benefit of their insight and experience.

This workshop has two parts: a Peer Leader Training Session, in which 6-10 older youth, or youth identified as leaders, explore the issues in small groups; and the Respecting Yourself and Others Online workshop, in which the peer leaders and an adult facilitator engage youth ages 11 to 15 in an interactive discussion about the issues.

Role of the Adult Facilitator:

The adult facilitator chooses the youth who will be the peer leaders for the workshop; organizes the training session for them; and presents the program content in the Respecting Yourself and Others Online workshop.

Role of the Peer Leaders:

The peer leaders take part in the training session; prepare the activities for the workshop; and guide the discussion and put on a skit during the workshop with the youth participants.

Preparation and Materials

This workshop is designed to be presented in either a school or community setting. To prepare for it you will need:

• A workshop space for the Peer Leader Training Session, where the facilitator will work with 6-10 peer leaders to prepare content for the workshop
• A presentation space in which the facilitator and peer leaders will present the workshop to a youth audience. This space will need to have a screen, speakers, Internet access, a computer and a data projector to present the facilitator’s slides and videos.
• For the presentation, arrange access to a word cloud maker such as Wordle (http://www.wordle.net/create).

Print the following handouts which have been created by MediaSmarts to help young people better manage their online presence and think about what they share online. Have enough of these available for all of the peer leaders and youth in the audience, so that they can explore the issues raised in the workshop in more depth.