Objectives:
Students will evaluate privacy policies.
Students will utilize critical thinking skills.
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Students will work collaboratively and individually.
The purpose of this lesson is to make students aware of privacy policies, how they should evaluate a policy as well as improving their reading, writing, and critical thinking skills.
Teaching students evaluation skill for online activities where there are no regulatory standards is a major component of computer literacy. The students must be challenged to think and to express themselves.
Explain what privacy policies are to your students. Hand out a privacy policy and explain the content areas.
Provide students with a glossary of Internet terms that pertain to privacy policies. For example--informed consent, opt out, secondary use, aggregate, access, disclosure, cookie, third party, server, encryption, usage data, sponsors, and TRUSTe.
Prepare a worksheet for students to use as a guide so they will know what should be included in a privacy policy.
Sample Worksheet Questions
Is there a link for the Privacy Policy on the site’s home page?
Does it tell you why the data is being collected?
Does it tell you how the data is being collected?
Does it tell you how the date will be used?
Does it tell you what information is supplied to third parties?
Does it tell you how your information is protected?
Does it tell you how to change or delete your personal information?
Is the site a member of TRUSTe?
Is the content of this page appropriate for you to make an informed decision?
Is there information that contradicts something you found somewhere else in the policy?
Is there a date of last update?
Does up-to-date information matter to you?
Is there any information on the page that you disagree with?
Do they use absolute words (like “always” or “never”)?
Would you do business with this Web site?
Have the students form groups of three or more depending on the size of your class. Give each group a privacy policy from one of the top Internet service providers (i.e. AOL, Microsoft).
I think students should work in small groups to evaluate their first privacy policy. It makes it easier, and it also gives them the opportunity to work collaboratively to solve a problem. This is being done many times in real-life situations.
Once the students have completed the worksheet, have them formulate and justify their ideas by writing a narrative evaluation.
Example of narrative evaluation
After answering all of the questions on the worksheet about this privacy policy, explain why you think this is or is not a good privacy policy.
Letter
You can also have the students write a letter to the company. Have them tell the company what they think the company should include in their privacy policy and why it should be included.
For the last phase of this lesson, have students work individually. Have them pick a privacy policy from a Web site of their choice. Follow the same procedures that were used above.