5 Components for Building Digital Resilience in Kids

Internet use and access to technology play a vital role in everyday life in this digital age, especially for children. But as you might already know by now, while it’s true that technology comes with great benefits and opportunities, it also has its risks and challenges.

Misinformation, fraud, grooming, radicalization, hate speech, and cyberbullying are just some of the many dangers and risks that kids face from which they should learn to keep themselves protected and safe at all costs.

Based on this context, digital resilience emerges as a fundamental skill to teach children. Training kids to become more confident and responsible digital citizens is not only an educational task but it is also a social imperative.

What is Digital Resilience?

Before discussing its components, first, let’s start with defining digital resilience. Digital resilience is the ability of a person to respond and adapt accordingly to threats and challenges in the digital world. This involves developing digital skills to browse the internet safely.

But this particular trait goes way beyond the usual technical skills. Digital resilience also involves self-efficacy. Simply put, it is also about steadfast confidence in using technology to defend yourself and other people in the vast online realm.

The following are the five essential components to hone more digitally resilient kids in this day and age.

Age-suitable interactive social technologies such as games can give kids the perfect opportunity to practice and develop social skills including self-regulation, empathy, and collaboration. All of these strengths contribute to digital resilience.

For example, some games offer infinite opportunities to gather resources and put up anything you can imagine and share and collaborate with other players.

Games can offer kids a way to become more confident. As you might have already noticed, children demonstrate a lot of persistence and resilience every time they try to beat a level in their video games.

Several apps can also help not just kids but even adults to become digitally resilient by practicing different skills like empathy, cognitive appraisal, and mindfulness.

2. Hone Digital Skills

Digital skills are vital to enable kids to use technology safely and positively. As they start using digital devices and gadgets from a very early age, they need to enhance their digital literacy and skills in a safe and secure learning environment.

These digital skills include the ability to look for and assess online information, as well as protect privacy, and communicate safely and respectfully on social media.

Educational intervention focusing on the improvement of digital skills has already been shown to enhance the ability of kids to have critical interactions with online data and boost their health and well-being.

Guiding kids in honing skills required to successfully and safely navigate the online world will gear them up better to overcome challenges that may come their way and protect both themselves and other people around them.

3. Let Them Stand Up for Others

Children need to develop the willingness to stand up for their friends or anyone they know who is dealing with digital challenges. Cheering them on to become upstanders or someone who steps in and helps people going through challenging digital situations can significantly contribute to the overall well-being of both their offline and online communities.

4. Teach Them the Importance of Seeking Help

While the ultimate goal of honing self-efficacy and digital resilience in kids is to empower them to have the sense of agency and competency necessary for safe and confident navigation of the digital realm all by themselves, there is still the possibility of them encountering some tricky situations online, such as cyberbullying and violations of privacy.

Once this happens, most children will be hesitant to ask for help. This is why one of the fundamental components of digital resilience has something to do with making kids comfortable enough to seek help from support systems if they ever find themselves in sticky digital situations. This way, they don’t need to deal with these challenges on their own.

5. Let Them Develop a Sense of Self-Efficacy to Defend Themselves

Aside from the components mentioned above, it’s also ultimately critical for kids to develop some sense of self-efficacy when it comes to technology use to defend themselves as well as their peers better. Self-efficacy pertains to the belief of a person in his or her ability to wield control over his or her functioning and deal with the events that can affect his or her life.

Children with a higher sense of self-efficacy are more geared up to protect themselves from the harsh consequences of cyberbullying considering that they will be more inclined to defend themselves.

But aside from having a good sense of self-efficacy in general, it’s also imperative for children to feel confident in their capacity to manage their experiences when it comes to using new technologies. These kids are the ones who are more likely to consider the internet as a helpful tool they can use to reach their goals.

Wrapping It Up

Building digital resilience in kids is easier than ever. Encourage them to use age-appropriate interactive social technologies, hone their digital skills, let them stand up for others, teach them the essence of seeking help, and allow them to develop self-efficacy to help them turn into digitally resilient children.

Image Source: Freepik