On the Loose: a Guide to Life Online for Post-Secondary Students
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on the loose A GUIDE TO LIFE ONLINE FOR POST-SECONDARY STUDENTS CANADA’S CENTRE FOR DIGITASUPPORTEDL AND MEDIA LITER BYACY LE CENTRE CANADIEN D’ÉDUCATION AUX MEDIAS ET DE LITTÉRATIE NUMÉRIQUE Now that you are a post-secondary student, whether you’re still at home or off on your own for the first time, you have a lot more freedom than you used to and that affects your online life too. This guide will help you get off on the right foot with tips on how The guide is divided into four sections: to deal with the ways that your classes and relationships have changed and new SURVIVING SCHOOL Addressing new challenges when using the challenges like managing your money and Internet for research in college or university. taking care of yourself when there’s nobody looking over your shoulder. We’ll also help you spot potential problems with tips and LET’S TALK ABOUT MONEY Ways to be a smart shopper and how to solutions for staying on top of things before protect yourself and your computer. they get out of control. OTHER PEOPLE PROBLEMS Managing your online relationships – with friends and more-than-friends. TAKING CARE OF YOURSELF Ways to take care of yourself when you’re dealing with stress, harassment, and other issues that can come with being online. Additionally, controlling your online profile. © 2016 MEDIASMARTS WWW.MEDIASMARTS.CA ON THE LOOSE: A GUIDE TO LIFE ONLINE FOR POST-SECONDARY STUDENTS 3 SURVIVING SCHOOL You’re not in high school anymore – there’s nobody holding your hand, looking over your shoulder, and bugging you to get your work done. That’s great, but it can be tricky too. To do well in college and university you need to be an independent, critical thinker and understand academic ethics and honesty. Here’s how this looks when it comes to online stuff: PLAGIARISM Universities take plagiarism way more seriously than a lot of high schools do: even a minor case of plagiarism can make you fail a course, get you put on academic probation, or even expelled. You might have picked up some bad habits when you were researching high school papers that will get you in real trouble now. “The Plagiarism Spectrum” describes these different kinds of plagiarism. • Cloning: handing in work entirely • Remixing: rewriting someone copied from (or written by) else’s work in your own words and someone else stitching it together so it looks original • Find and Replace: copying work but changing some words or phrases • Mash-Up: mixing different unattributed sources and • Control-C: mixing your work with presenting them as your own work copied work, and not giving credit and proper citations • Recycling: re-using your own work and presenting it as new • Hybrid: mixing your work with copied work, only giving citations • 404 Error: making up quotes or for some of the copied work research and citing them to sources that don’t exist Some of these you might not recognize as cheating, but they can all get you in trouble. 4 © 2016 MEDIASMARTS WWW.MEDIASMARTS.CA CITATION You probably learned how to cite regular sources in high school or in an intro course. (If you haven’t, you’d better: find out if your profs want you to use MLA or APA style and look up a citation guide.) What you might not have learned is how to cite online sources. The blog Teachbites put together this great table that shows how to correctly cite different online sources in both formats: Source: Rao, Aditi. “How to Cite Social Media: MLA & APA Formats.” Teachbytes. April 9 2013. Web. Accessed July 8, 2016. MLA APA Lastname, Firstname. “Title of the Blog Lastname, Firstname. (Year, Month Post Entry.” Blog Title. Publisher. Date Date.) Title of the Blog Post Entry. posted. Web. Date accessed. [Web log post]. Retrieved from BLOG POST http://www.thewebsite.com Title of Video. Date of Publication Lastname, Firstinitial. (Year, Month of Video. Website Name. Web. Date Day). Title of Video [Video file]. Accessed. Retrieved from http://www.website. ONLINE VIDEO com/specificURL Lastname, Firstname (Username). Username. (Year, Month Day). Enter “Enter the tweet message here.” Date the tweet message here. [Twitter posted, time viewed. Tweet. post]. Retrieved from http://www. TWEET twitter.com Lastname, Firstname. “Enter Facebook Username. (Year, Month Day.) Enter post here.” Facebook. Date Posted. the Facebook post here. [Facebook [Date accessed. <web address>] update]. Retrieved from http://www. FACEBOOK POST facebook.com Lastname, Firstname. “Subject of In text citation only Message.” Message to Recipient’s (personal communication, Month EMAIL Name. Date of Message. Email. Day, Year) RESEARCH AND AUTHENTICATION Doing research in university or college can feel a lot like getting dropped into the Did you know? deep end of the pool. If you’re lucky, you learned in high school how to do effective searches online and recognize unreliable sources. (If you didn’t, check out our guide Employers say they want new hires to know how and where to find Your Connected Life to get started.) Now you’re in a whole new world of searching information online (without much databases, not just Google, and learning to read between the lines to spot things guidance) and how to use a search like bias. strategy that goes beyond Google and finding an answer on the first Research skills aren’t only important for getting through university: employers page of search results. who’ve hired recent graduates rank being able to obtain and process information as the number four top skill they’re looking for, ahead of job-specific technical knowledge, skill with software, and writing ability. © 2016 MEDIASMARTS WWW.MEDIASMARTS.CA ON THE LOOSE: A GUIDE TO LIFE ONLINE FOR POST-SECONDARY STUDENTS 5 TIPS FOR RESEARCH Get started early. Don’t assume that Make a point of identifying your you know everything you need to! A own bias. We all tend to give more study found that for first-year university weight to things that confirm what we students, not putting things off was one already believe. This can be even worse of the keys to having a good experience because of the online “filter effect,” doing research. which makes it possible to only ever see sources that we agree with. Always Go beyond Google. Tools like Google seek out opposing arguments and Scholar may be misleading because evidence. they can make you think that anything you find using them is “scholarly”. Get Find out who’s paying for the site. to know the specific databases for your Check the “About” page or do a WHOIS subject and learn how to use them search to see who has registered the instead. site. Ask a librarian for guidance. Librarians don’t just re-shelve books: they’re there to help you get better at doing research and know exactly what your profs are looking for. It’s okay to start with Wikipedia (but don’t stop there). Wikipedia articles aren’t generally a legitimate source for university-level research. Also, while many Wikipedia articles link to more reliable sources, you can’t Research the writer or assume that the list of sources is a good organization. See what other people overview of the field or don’t reflect a are saying about them. You can also do particular point of view. a citation search in a database that covers that subject to see if anyone else Learn to recognize bias. Most is citing them as a source. academic work isn’t trying to be neutral or objective: at the very least it’s testing Look for “loaded” arguments. a theory that the writer hopes is true, While it’s normal for academic writing and is often making an argument that to have a point of view, watch out for the writer wants you to believe. Usually, pieces that use emotionally loaded it’s not too hard to recognize a writer’s language or powerful images rather than point of view. What’s more challenging a logical argument. Watch particularly is if sources present themselves for writing that tries to scare you or to as scholarly – but may actually be dehumanize a particular group. representing corporations, crackpots, or even hate groups. 6 © 2016 MEDIASMARTS WWW.MEDIASMARTS.CA LET’S TALK ABOUT MONEY For a lot of people, college or university is the first time they really have to handle money on their own. Even if you’re living in residence and don’t have to worry about paying rent or buying your food, you might have just gotten your first credit card. Either way, you need to start thinking about money – how to control how much you spend, how to avoid getting ripped off by scams, and how what you’re doing now will help you make money after you’ve finished school. SCAMMERS AND HACKERS You may think you’re not interesting or important enough to be a target of online crime – but scammers spread their nets wide: there are no fish too small to be worth catching! One of the most common ways people get hooked by scams is through email or texts. Watch out for messages asking for money or personal information; offering you money, a prize, or anything else that seems “too good to be true”, from a company you haven’t done business with; or asking you to click a link in the message. Another thing to watch out for is identity theft. This can range from someone pretending to be you on social networks to using your credit card, bank account, or Did you know? social insurance number.