10 Tiny Ways You Can Make the World a Better Place Today
Today is Pink Shirt Day, a national initiative to end bullying both offline and online. Since 2007, Canadians have been donning pink shirts to show their commitment to ending bullying in all forms.
What starts as a joke can end up hurting someone
Lots of times kids will say they’re not bullying, they’re ‘just joking’ – in fact, it’s the number one reason for being mean online. Other times, people will play down how serious the situation really is.
Some reactions hurt more than you think
Before you react, ask yourself:
- Am I letting things go because I'm worried about making things worse for the person being targeted? Some things we do when we witness cyberbullying – even when we're trying to help – can make things worse, so it’s always a good idea to step back and think about the situation before jumping in.
- Am I letting things go because I don't like the target? It can be hard to feel bad for someone we don't like.
Not reacting to cyberbullying can hurt as much as cyberbullying
How witnesses react can make a BIG difference in stopping cyberbullying and making it hurt less.
It can be hard speaking out when cyberbullying happens for a whole pile of reasons, but what you say and do is really important.
From Ethics and Empathy to Making and Remixing: Extending Digital Literacy to the Secondary Grades
For more than a decade, MediaSmarts has been a leader in defining digital literacy in Canada. This is reflected in the elementary digital literacy framework we launched in 2015. The Use, Understand & Create framework is based on a holistic approach which recognizes that the different skills that make up digital literacy cannot be fully separated.