Teachers to be trained in online safety
30 January 2020
Western Cape teachers will receive training in the Online Safety Curriculum next month.
This follows the Africa Web Rangers Summit hosted by Google in Nairobi, Kenya last year.
Ismail Teladia, Senior Curriculum Planner: Life Orientation/Life Skills, was part of the South African delegation which included representatives from the Film and Publications Board (FPB), Childline, Media Monitoring Africa and Web Rangers.
The Web Rangers is a Google initiated programme initiated in 18 countries around the world and three in Africa currently, namely South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria. It focuses on learners being safe online. The Web Rangers are learners that have volunteered their time to be trained in online safety and to assist other learners to be aware of the dangers of the internet.
Teladia said educators responsible for Life Orientation (LO) and eLearning have engaged with Google to develop an Online Safety Curriculum in line with a Cyber Wellness programme. “Life Orientation Subject Advisers, in collaboration with Google, developed an Online Safety Curriculum aligned to the LO CAPS curriculum. We trained 45 teachers in the Cape Winelands and Metro South districts to pilot this support material for Life Orientation. The teachers have been very impressed with the content and the learners have responded positively to the content. Online safety equals cyber wellness and is a critical component of our curriculum as we take learners into the 4th Industrial Revolution.”
At the Africa Web Rangers Summit, Teladia shared a panel discussion with colleagues from Kenya and Nigeria as well as a Google representative on the importance of online safety for learners to combat cyber bullying, sexual grooming, identity theft, human trafficking, and other ills lurking in cyber space.
He said the WCED will collaborate with Google to provide teacher training across the province in February.
Need guidelines on e-safety in schools? Visit our cyber wellness page.
