Online safety starts with awareness

I’m seeing more and more worrying stories about how children and teenagers use social media. And those concerns are valid. Because no matter how well you try to protect your child in the offline world, online the boundaries are often invisible.

At the same time, it’s unrealistic to keep children completely offline. That would exclude them from the world their peers are actively part of. As long as there are no firm regulations from big tech companies or the government, we need to focus on something else: self-reliance.

But that’s not easy. Because children often don’t yet understand the long-term consequences of their online behavior — their brains simply aren’t developed enough for that. They think in the now, not in the later. And that makes it all the more important not to control them, but to teach them how things work.

That’s why, with Media At School, we give lessons focused on media awareness. Not by scaring them, but by encouraging them to think for themselves — and to create media themselves. Because once you understand how something is made, you start to see it differently.

When I worked in the media industry myself, I learned to see through every production. I could see exactly how something was built, directed, and edited. I wish that kind of insight for every child. Because only when you understand how something works, can you truly look at it critically.

Awareness is the first step toward protection.