A female elementary student wearing headphones smiles while working with her teacher on a classroom digital tablet.

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Lesson

My Values & Tech

What are my values, and how do media and tech impact them?

Grades

6–12

Time

45 mins.
Objectives:

  • Reflect on their personal values and what's most important to them.

  • Consider how different values are supported and/or compromised by tech.

  • Learn about connections between our values, behaviors, and well-being.

Vocabulary Show definitions
digital well-being · values
digital well-being – experiencing media and technology in ways that support one's mental, physical, social, and emotional health
values – principles or personal rules that are important to us and are informed by our experiences, identities, cultures, and much more
Lesson slides
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Part 1: My Values Sort — Preview Part 1 of the lesson and choose how you want to facilitate the activity (handout or values cards)

  • Optional: If time and resources permit, you can create a deck of the values cards for each student using Page 1 of the Values Posters. They can use the physical cards to complete the sorting activity.

Part 2: Tech's Impact on Values — Prep the class voting activity in advance:

  • Printable option: Print out the Values Posters and place them on a wall in the classroom. Have something students can use for voting, each with two different colors (e.g., sticky notes, stickers, or markers).
  • Digital option: Use the Virtual Values Voting slides and have students vote virtually.

Lesson Plan

45 mins.
© Common Sense Media. Lessons are shareable with attribution for noncommercial use only. No remixing permitted. View detailed license information at creativecommons.org. Lesson last updated: June 2023

What You'll Need

In Class

© Common Sense Media. Lessons are shareable with attribution for noncommercial use only. No remixing permitted. View detailed license information at creativecommons.org. Lesson last updated: June 2023

This lesson was co-created with the Center for Digital Thriving at Harvard Graduate School of Education.