When your students are "sexting" … what do you do?

That's the question Dr. Robin Bright and Dr. Mary Dyck, two University of Lethbridge Faculty of Education and Kinesiology researchers are going to ask of student teachers at a presentation Wednesday, Feb. 11, at 12 noon in the University Library's curriculum laboratory space, room 1170.

The talk is sponsored by the U of L Education Undergraduate Society and is entitled "Using Online Technology Responsibly: Practicing it and Teaching It." The target audience is primarily student teachers and will focus on topics such as online citizenship, Facebook, cyberbullying and safety/privacy, among other topics.

Generally, 'sexting' means sending sexually suggestive images to someone using a cellphone camera. The phenomenon may not be common in southern Alberta, but the technology to make it happen is everywhere, and the challenge to educators is how to handle it when it comes into the classroom or school environment.

Bright and Dyck, with colleague Pamela Adams (Education) are among the few experts in the area of cyberbullying and the use of technology among teenagers to fully study the differences between what parents think their kids are doing and what they actually are doing on-line.

As part of their extensive CYBER TALK survey, for example, they found that 20 per cent of the 1752 surveyed students (grade 5-8) have received unwanted sexual comments.