The Digital Leaders at Borras Park Community Primary School got fully involved with #SaferInternetDay (February 11), but they took it one step further by stretching it into their own week-long ‘Digi Week’ event, during which they visited a retirement home to teach residents how to stay safe online.
The youngsters visited Cae Glo on February 12 to give a PowerPoint presentation on internet safety that included topics such as password safety, phishing, secure browsing, privacy settings, recognising when you’ve been hacked, and checking for suspicious activity and cookies.
The Digital Leaders are involved in the Welsh Government digital inclusion project ‘Digital Communities Wales’, and they completed their Digital Hero training in December 2019. The project focuses on supporting the local community with their digital confidence, health and wellbeing.
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Officers from Digital Communities Wales put the school in touch with ClwydAlyn, who manage homes across six counties, to arrange for the Digital Leaders to visit their residents at Cae Glo, Wrexham, and it was a great day for everyone involved.
The pupils prepared a quiz for the residents to take part in and they also experimented with augmented headsets. The school encourages pupils to take internet safety and digital citizenship seriously and act the same way online as they would do offline, and this was the message they took with them to Cae Glo.
Lisa Jones, Digital Learning Coordinator – who leads the Digital Leaders, said: “We have an established team of Digital Leaders from Year 3 to Year 6 who are an essential part of our School Parliament. They have various roles including preparing and delivering assemblies, teaching and supporting both staff and pupils with their digital skills, keeping abreast of the latest software and apps, as well as managing devices in the school.
“My heart has doubled in size watching our Digital Leaders work with pupils and members of the community. We visited Cae Glo as part of our school Digi Week and I’m beyond proud.”
The pupils have put a lot of time and effort into representing their school as Digital Leaders, which hasn’t gone unnoticed.
Lisa added: “Becoming a Digital Leader was no easy task. They were required to complete an application form, demonstrate their digital skills and take part in an interview. We often meet up three – sometimes four – times a week…their kindness in giving up their time as well as their initiative and ideas continues to amaze me.
“As a treat, I planned a mystery Skype call with a school in Long Island, New York. Their faces lit up with excitement as you can see from the photographs. They couldn’t believe they had spoken with pupils in The Big Apple!”
"I can't believe we have just spoken to children in New York" Our Digital Leaders were delighted to take part in a #mysteryskype with @JerichoUFSD @Iaccarino3Maria. A great way to finish our Digi Week off @HwbNews @SkypeClassroom pic.twitter.com/gEpBxVly4f
— Borras Park CP (@BorrasPark) February 14, 2020
Quotes from the Digital Leaders
Here’s what the pupils had to say…
Alfie said: “I liked helping to teach the residents how to be safe online and talking to them about computers. I didn’t think the residents would already use the internet so it was a nice surprise to find out that they did.”
Freya said: “I enjoyed preparing and learning the PowerPoint presentation and how we worked as a team to deliver it. The residents completed our quiz and we had fun marking it together ensuring they understood the answers.”
Finley said: “I enjoyed my visit to Cae Glo. I feel the residents learnt a lot from our talk. I especially enjoyed the augmented reality headsets. The coffee cake was nice too!”
Lucas said: “I think we taught the residents about new apps, such as TikTok, and we also told them how to keep safe online. The residents learnt a lot from us and we also learnt a lot from them.”
Aled said: “I had a great time teaching them how to be safer online and I really enjoyed spending time with Ann, especially with the augmented headsets. I would love to go out again to visit other people and teach them about technology.”
Lenka said: “A few of the residents changed their passwords to more secure ones. Overall, it was really fun, as they already knew quite a lot about the internet.”
Rhys said: “I really enjoyed going to Cae Glo and meeting the people there. When I found out they already had some digital skills and some of them did online banking I was very surprised.”
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