Addressing schools‘ needs to understand and convey the benefits and dangers of social media
This two-year project, develops a scheme of work and a set of teaching and training resources covering both the benefits and dangers of social media. The target age group is the Secondary sector, where there is usually an ICT curriculum which covers the technical and practical uses of ICT, but there is a shortfall in the coverage of social media.
This is now a fundamental aspect of the lives of almost all teenagers, however its use can be both beneficial and destructive. There is a lack of education on the use of social media, which this project aims to address.
There is ample research to show that the negative elements of social media can have a serious impact on mental health, with access to technology a major contributor. The European Commission has made promoting safer use of the internet a priority for young people and called for improvements in critical thinking, media literacy and developing the skills necessary for ‘cyber hygiene‘.
The objectives of the project are to:
• analyse and share existing strategies and resources for dealing with social media
• identify common areas of strength and priorities for development
• develop a structure for the work schemes and a set of training materials and sample lesson plans, based on needs, covering:
types of social media and their use by young people
communication benefits including language learning
dangers of social media
social media as a news source
online safety and school policy
• pilot, test, evaluate and refine the schemes of work and training resources in schools in 5 countries
• produce a report on the outcomes, sets of case studies and recommendations for school policy including a model school policy
• disseminate the outcomes widely
This project is co-funded by the European Union in the context of its Erasmus+ initiative and is run by a team of 6 educational institutions coming from 4 EU countries and the United Kingdom.
Project Number: 2020-1-UK01-KA201-078830
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