Navigating life in a digital society
About this resource
This video presentation guides parents, carers, and educators with modelling safe online behaviours to young children.
Age range for this resource
For parents, carers, and educators of children aged 2 to 5 years.
Goal of this resource
To foster young children’s sense of wellbeing and online safety.
To develop young children’s understanding about safe online search strategies.
How might educators use this resource?
Watch this video presentation then co-view the Play School episode Dinosaur Roar with children at your service. Invite children’s perspectives on how Maurice and Big Ted are using the internet: How did Big Ted know if he should open the message that came to his phone? How did Big Ted know which website to select to find about the dinosaur? What might have happened if Big Ted chose to go online shopping instead of looking at the website about dinosaurs? Watch the other two video presentations connected to this resource: Safe Messaging Online: Do you know who you’re talking to? and How do young children use and understand the internet? to further guide how you help children at your service navigate life in a digital society. Provide children with a range of materials to create their own pretend technologies for sending and receiving messages and searching for content online.
How might families use this resource?
Watch this video presentation then co-view the Play School episode Dinosaur Roar with your child. What does your child notice about how Maurice and Big Ted shared information? Invite your child to share what they know about searching for information online. Watch the other two video presentations connected to this resource: Safe Messaging Online: Do you know who you’re talking to? and How do young children use and understand the internet? to further guide how you help your child navigate life in a digital society.
How might organisations use this resource?
Share this video presentation, and the other two associated video presentations, Safe Messaging Online: Do you know who you’re talking to? and How do young children use and understand the internet?, with colleagues in your service. How can modelling safe searching with children become an embedded practice in your service when information searching with children? Highlight how learning about online safety is a requirement of Belonging, Being, and Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia V2.0 (Australian Government Department of Education, 2022).
What learning might we see?
Parents, carers, and educators modelling safe online safety behaviours with young children (e.g., only communicating with known others, searching for online information safely).
Young children becoming aware of the importance of communicating only with known others in online environments and conducting safe online searches.
Practices
Modelling
Children and adults participate in online activities together so that adults can model safe internet behaviours.
Knowing
Children and adults know about the people and data they are interacting with using internet-connected technologies.
Area
Citizenship
Citizenship in digital contexts recognises that young children are active participants in their communities now and into the future. As citizens, young children respect their own rights and those of other people, and develop an appreciation for cultural, racial, gender, and religious diversity. Digital rights, digital privacy, online safety, and cyber-safety education provide a foundation for early citizenship in digital contexts.
Connection to relevant standards
Belonging, Being, and Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia V2.0 (Australian Government Department of Education, 2022)
Outcome 1: Children have a strong sense of identity
Children develop their emerging autonomy, inter-dependence, resilience, and agency (e.g., Children show interest and curiosity through observing, listening, selecting, and making choices).
Children learn to interact in relation to others with care, empathy, and respect (e.g., Educators support children to learn about and recognise safe and unsafe situations).
Outcome 2: Children are connected with and contribute to their world
Children develop a sense of connectedness to groups and communities and an understanding of their reciprocal rights and responsibilities as active and informed citizens (e.g., Children broaden their understanding of the world in which they live; Educators provide opportunities for children to investigate ideas, complex concepts, and ethical issues that are relevant to their lives and their local communities).
Outcome 3: Children have a strong sense of wellbeing
Children become strong in their social, emotional, and mental wellbeing (e.g., Educators discuss and model appropriate use of digital technologies and discuss how to keep children safe online with children and families).
Children are aware of and develop strategies to support their own mental and physical health and personal safety (e.g., Educators learn about e-safety for children and embed and model safe digital practices).
Outcome 4: Children are confident and involved learners
Children develop a range of learning and thinking skills and processes such as problem solving, inquiry, experimentation, hypothesising, researching, and investigating (e.g., Educators model the use of digital technologies and media to assist children to investigate and document their findings).
Outcome 5: Children are effective communicators
Children engage with a range of texts and gain meaning from these texts (e.g., Children view and listen to printed, visual, and multimedia texts and respond with relevant gestures, actions, comments, and/or questions).
Children use digital technologies and media to access information, investigate ideas, and represent their thinking (e.g., Children incorporate real or imaginary technologies as features of their play; Educators teach children critical reflection skills and encourage them to evaluate the quality and trustworthiness of information sources; Educators assist children to have a basic understanding that the internet is a network that people use to connect and source information).
National Quality Standard (Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority, 2019)
Quality Area 1: Educational program and practice (e.g., Each child’s current knowledge, strengths, ideas, culture, abilities, and interests are the foundation of the program; Educators are deliberate, purposeful, and thoughtful in their decisions and actions; Educators respond to children’s ideas and play and extend children’s learning through open-ended questions, interactions, and feedback; Each child’s agency is promoted, enabling them to make choices and decisions that influence events and their world).
Quality Area 2: Children’s health and safety (e.g., At all times, reasonable precautions and adequate supervision ensure children are protected from harm and hazard).
Quality Area 3: Physical Environment (e.g., Resources, materials, and equipment allow for multiple uses, are sufficient in number, and enable every child to engage in play-based learning).
Quality Area 5: Relationships with children (e.g., Responsive and meaningful interactions build trusting relationships which engage and support each child to feel secure, confident, and included; Children are supported to collaborate, learn from, and help each other).
National Principles for Child Safe Organisations (Australian Human Rights Commission, 2018)
Principle 1: Child safety and wellbeing is embedded in organisational leadership, governance, and culture.
Principle 7: Staff and volunteers are equipped with the knowledge, skills, and awareness to keep children and young people safe through ongoing education and training.
Principle 8: Physical and online environments promote safety and wellbeing while minimising the opportunity for children and young people to be harmed.
Explore More
If these ideas are new to you, explore these related resources:
This article describes how the use of wooden pretend devices (e.g., phones, laptops, tablets, Wi-fi routers) in play-based learning can support children’s understanding of the internet and provide valuable opportunities for adults to model and discuss online safety with children.
Tinkering with unplugged technology
This video presentation explores how educators, parents, and carers can support children’s understanding of digital technologies through tinkering. Tinkering sees children taking apart unplugged technologies (e.g., old computer keyboards) then combining the loose parts with traditional play materials (e.g., playdough) to create their own imaginary technologies.
For more ideas, explore these related resources:
Staying active in the digital playground
This article invites parents, carers, and educators to promote children’s participation in physical activities using the PLAYback strategy. PLAYback sees trusted adults video recording children participating in physical activities then co-viewing the footage with children to reinforce, support, and build skill development.
When the dinosaurs came to kindy
This video presentation explores how early childhood educators can connect with children’s interests using digital technologies.
If you would like to read some research, explore these related resources:
Blum-Ross, A., Kumpulainen, K., & Marsh, J. (2020). Enhancing digital literacy and creativity: Makerspaces in the early years. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429243264
Edwards, S., Mantilla, A., Grieshaber, S., Nuttall, J., & Wood, E. (2020). Converged play characteristics for early childhood education: Multimodal, global-local, and traditional-digital. Oxford Review of Education, 46(5), 637–660. https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2020.1750358