In a world where technology is moving at a fast pace, it is more important now than ever to teach online safety in schools.

With consideration to the 'Online Safety Curriculum Connections' on the ACARA site and our ever-increasing globalised digital society, Australia should be thinking about ways they can enrich their curriculum to teach a deeper understanding of online behaviour in their lessons. Students need the knowledge and scepticism to evaluate new developments, regardless of what device they are using.

Our Education for a Connected World Framework document complements the Digital Technologies curriculum, which covers the principles of online safety for Early and Primary years of schooling, with progression in the content to reflect the different and escalating risks that students face. Many themes are covered such as self-image and identity, online relationships, online bullying etc.

Sound scary? Well, this is where Purple Mash can help you.

Purple Mash
Our curriculum map breaks these outcomes into year groups and gives examples of resources within Purple Mash that can be used to support the curriculum outcomes relating to the Early Years and Primary schooling years. Many of the learning outcomes are already covered within the DigiTech Scheme of Work. The school year in which they are covered does not always match the year suggested in the Connected World document, but schools that follow the scheme will cover these learning outcomes.

Remember, any writing frames can be printed along with the word banks and tips so you can use them offline as well as during computer time!

If you are teaching online safety, why not use our 2Email simulations called 2Respond. Students receive a series of emails from characters where they can then respond. This puts students in a non-judgmental role-play situation where they can explore scenarios and offer advice. Teachers can view students’ responses by setting these activities as 2Dos.

Older students often appear to know it all when it comes to their online safety but struggle with sticking to their own advice. The variety of Purple Mash activities also aim to:

• Increase students’ reliable knowledge base.
• Open discussion on why people find it hard to follow advice at times.
• Help students make positive choices to stick to advice, by exploring why doing so matters beyond immediate satisfaction such as fitting in with peers, getting a ‘like’ or exploring something risky.

Our activities are only available to Purple Mash subscribers. If you'd like to use them, try Purple Mash completely free for 14 days.