Digital parenting for critical thinking

Children are growing up surrounded by technology, with their online digital footprints tracked, analyzed, and often monetized.

While the digital landscape offers countless opportunities for learning and exploration, it also exposes children to a myriad of datafication risks, including harmful profiling, micro-targeting, and behavioral manipulation.

Families are increasingly concerned about the risks associated with extensive use of digital technologies. The market is dominated by monitoring-based technologies, enabling parents to restrict, monitor, or track children’s online activities.

However, research has shown that such approaches have limited efficacy in keeping children out of the bounds of the digital space or reducing screen time usage as parents had hoped. At the same time, the risks associated with these approaches are much less discussed, and we are in danger of missing the opportunity to support children’s critical thinking development.

Currently OxfordCCAI focuses on further developing and evaluating our KOALA Hero toolkit, a hybrid toolkit supporting proactive co-engagement between parents and children and helping children develop critical thinking. The toolkit is developed through two iterations of co-design with families and grounded incritical algorithmic literacy (CAL) theories.

Our evaluation with families has shown promising results. We are working with our collaborators to further analyse the long-impact of KOALA and how it may affect families’ and children’s digital well-being.

See:

• KOALA Hero Toolkit: A New Approach to Inform Families of Mobile Datafication Risks: the hybrid toolkit helping families co-develop an awareness of datafication risks associated with mobile apps
• KOALA: the earlier website describing the journey of KOALA

KOAKA Hero Toolkit

This toolkit encompasses three key components:

• A mobile tracker app, designed as a practical tool for families to navigate and control mobile datafication risks.

• A set of data cards, designed to facilitate discussion and support situated understanding.

• A task sheet accompanied by worksheets, designed to facilitate interactive family engagement activities.

The app is currently held at a private repository and is not yet publicly available on the app store. Please reach out directly for a trial.

• A two-minute video of KOALA Hero app app.video
• The data cards and task sheets have been shared as part of Christmas 2023 celebration, see here.
• The background video about data trackers tracker.video