Online safety and engagement

Media Literacy: Fostering A Cognitive-Emotional Approach

This online course on media literacy from UNESCO seeks to integrate social and emotional learning with cognitive skills and academic knowledge to empower and prepare individuals to develop positive engagements with media.

Students can sign up and enroll if they want a certificate.

The course is designed to foster whole-brain learning by integrating content knowledge with social and emotional learning through digital pedagogies such as reflection, critical inquiry, storytelling, dialogue and play.

Teaching resources

Ctrl-F is a digital media literacy site from CIVIX, a Canadian organization dedicated to civic education. "CTRL-F is an evidence-based program that equips students with the habits and skills needed to evaluate online information to determine what to trust." They focus on four strategies:

Investigate the source
Evaluate expertise
Check the claim
Trace the information

Activity examples are available without an account. They can be filtered by level of difficulty, skill and subject. Videos, discussion topics and related online activities are included.

You will need an account to access complete lessons. Lessons are "supported by videos, slide decks (in Google Slides and PowerPoint), interactive practice activities in Google Forms and Microsoft Forms, pre/post assessments and a suggested culminating activity." Once you sign-up you will have access to a teacher's guide and the complete lesson collection in Google Drive.

Copyrighted for instructional use. Link sharing, PDFs and Google Drive access provided.

Resources are designed for Grades 7 to 12.

Student site

Also from Ctrl-F is Find the Facts, an online course for students. You can share the link to the whole site or each of the following sections:

Follow-up activities using Google Forms are also available.

NorQuest college preparation for online learning video modules

The digital literacy course developed by NorQuest College is designed to help students participate in online learning. The developers write the following:

Digital literacy involves more than basic access, it involves competence and understanding to use technology effectively and critically. Digital literacy skills and strategies are survival skills for a digital era. Digital literacy increases learner confidence and promotes autonomy when learning in an online environment.

Here is a list of topics. Each topic includes follow-up quizzes:

Digital citizenship
Netiquette
Rights and responsibilities
Privacy and security
Time management
Online learning strategies
Digital collaboration and communication
Using online information
Digital fluency

The complete course or individual modules can be integrated into a learning management system using the SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model) files.

No copyright or CC licence.

Access the complete course and individual SCORM files

Mozilla web literacy activities

Mozilla has produced an open and evolving collection of engaging instructional activities designed to promote reflection, critical thinking and agency when online. Here is what the developers write:

The Core Activities are designed to teach the web in the context of learners’ own needs, interests, and everyday experiences. Brainstorming and sharing, discussion and reflection, and fully participatory, collaborative work are integral to this community-based Web Literacy learning experience. To make Web Literacy accessible to as many learners as possible, a number of these activities can be done “offline”—without an internet connection and/or with limited computer access.

Users are invited to adapt, remix and share their changes.

Learning for Justice activities and videos that focus on misleading, manipulative and harmful information

Learning for Justice, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Centre, has developed a Digital Literacy Framework and a series of learning activities designed to help students develop the capabilities described in the framework. Lessons are organized into four K-12 levels (K-2, 3-5, 6-8. 9-12). We have listed the activities in the Grades 6-8 and 9-12 groups. Also available are a series of videos that can be used on their own or with the lessons.

Copyrighted for instructional use. Icons available for printing, syncing and sharing.

Activities designed for students in Grades 6-8

Activities designed for students in Grades 9-12

How Does "Fake" News Become News?

How to Balance Your Media Diet

Your Personal Information Is for Sale. Now What?

Teaching Tolerance Countering Online Hate Speech

Government of Canada resources

The Government of Canada's Get CyberSafe materials could be integrated into courses and learning groups or they could be assembled into a stand-alone workshop.

Terms and conditions - Free to use in any format with attribution and links to the original content but no derivatives and no commercial uses.

The following resources can be used for promotion:

Factsheets are available:

Activities are also available:

Take the Get Cyber Safe Checkup (interactive)

Cyber security checklist (PDF)

Get Cyber Safe Challenge Worksheet (PDF)

Your offline password organizer (PDF)

What to do about a suspicious-looking message (PDF)

Choose the specific topics that impact your learners. Information on the topic pages could be cut and paste on to slides.

Internet use and security workshop

Introduction to Cybersecurity is designed as a workshop that you can deliver. The modules are listed in alphabetical order and each one can be used individually. The developers suggest starting with Internet Concepts and Security Concepts. Each online module has a video presentation, a set of slide illustrations and a quiz. In addition, the information is available in print form. The PDFs are available in a Google folder.

Copyrighted. Share links and use PDF's without alteration.

Access PDF files here

An introduction to AI (videos and lessons) from Common Sense Education

The following three videos provide brief overviews of AI and its major applications that learners use and encounter. They can be used as part of your own lessons or with grab-and-go slide lessons created by Common Sense Education.

CC BY-NC-ND 4.0