Show Notes:

In this episode, I spoke with Dr. Marialice Curran (@mbfxc) and her son Curran Dee (@CurranCentral), otherwise known as Curran Central. This mother-son team from Connecticut is the brains behind the operations at DigCit Kids and are leading the way when it comes to educating students and teachers about digital citizenship, amplifying student voice, and global connections and collaboration. Even as a fifth-grader, Curran is already quite accomplished, with a TedX Youth talk and other speaking engagements around the world, being the “Chief Kid Officer” at DigCit Kids, and being an ambassador for companies such as Flipgrid and Hoonuit. These two are on a mission to improve education for all students around the world!

About Curran and DigCit Kids:

At the age of nine, Curran Dee founded DigCitKids, digital citizenship for kids by kids. As the & Chief Kid Officer (CKO), he is a fifth grader, a gamer and YouTuber, a hockey player and an international speaker (at DigCitSummitUK, Twitter Headquarters, DigCitSummitNG and DigCitSummitMX) and a student Ignite speaker at ISTE. He has presented at Minefaire and online at both EdChange Global and Global Maker Day. He is a student ambassador for Buncee, Flipgrid, Hoonuit, GoBubble and and Rosetta Stone. A regular student tweeter, he has moderated chats on digital citizenship and student choice and voice on Twitter and provides professional development for teachers and parents on digital citizenship and digital literacy.

Curran is also a TEDxYouth speaker and his talk has been used as part of professional development for educators as a way to encourage student voice, student choice, and students as leaders. “If you want us to learn about the world, we need to learn with the world.”

By the first grade, Curran started blogging at home as a way to complete traditional assignments in school. Unfortunately, he only has digital access at home and this has inspired him to advocate for connected learning opportunities in all classrooms around the world. His wish is for digital access for all students everywhere and DigCitKids is a way to amplify student voice in K-12 classrooms.