Helping children lead a safer digital life
Children are growing up surrounded by digital media at every turn. Navigating this constant stream of messages and images requires an understanding of digital security and responsible media use. Save the Children Finland and Microsoft are working together to bring digital media education to children and their caregivers, with a special focus on children who face extra barriers to safe online access.
Making digital education accessible to all
Since 2023, Save the Children has offered Huippula, a free, bilingual service to support digital media education for 5th graders. Developed together with Microsoft and other partners, Huippula offers ready-made lesson modules and an interactive survey to help teachers integrate media education into their lesson plans. These teaching resources provide an easy and fun way for children to strengthen their knowledge of digital well-being and build skills to use digital media safely. Huippula has already reached more than 10,500 children across Finland.
In 2024, Save the Children and Microsoft organized a series of workshops for children in comprehensive schools across Espoo, Kirkkonummi, and Vihti. In total the workshops reached 518 students from grades 4 to 6, including 119 students learning Finnish as a second language.
The workshops covered topics that teachers had identified as essential, including responsible online interaction, cyberbullying, and navigating challenging online situations. Designed to be accessible to all, the workshops included materials in Finnish and Swedish, visual and technical elements to support different learning styles, and a guide for parents on how to support children’s online safety at home.
Learning how to navigate the digital world
The Huippula curriculum helps children learn to identify risks and navigate the digital world safely. A key part of the curriculum is the interactive Huippula survey, which encourages students to reflect on their actions and decisions in the virtual world through the adventures of animated characters Vili and Timma. “It was nice to be able to review and try out how well I know these things,” reflected one student on the Huippula survey. “It was fun to do it.”
Some children were surprised to discover how challenging security could be. “The hardest task was the scam message,” observed one participant. A teacher remarked, “The students said they knew [digital safety skills], but when you looked at the results, you noticed that there are quite a lot of gaps.” The survey identifies these gaps in a report that teachers and parents can use to target their support and strengthen the child’s digital skills.
In addition to the interactive survey, the Huippula workshops gave children the opportunity to discuss and reflect on their internet use with peers. They reported using several social media platforms and games as a means of keeping in touch with their friends. “In general, the pupils liked to openly discuss and share their experiences of using the internet,” reported a workshop leader. In an anonymous survey following the workshop, the students responded that they felt better equipped to use the internet more safely, with an average rating of 3.7 on a scale of 1 (no change) to 5 (a lot safer).
The workshop series culminated in Huippula Day, a focused lesson plan in digital security skills delivered by teachers across Finland during Digital Security Week, September 30 to October 4, 2024.
Promoting digital safety for all children
Save the Children’s Huippula program is dedicated to helping children avoid the risks and enjoy the benefits of digital life. Children encounter various phenomena online that threaten their rights and well-being, including bullying, grooming, harmful content, and misleading information. “We want to ensure that children are safe, and their rights are realized in the digital world,” says Lauri Sundberg, team leader of Digital Wellbeing at Save the Children Finland.
The collaboration with Microsoft specifically targets children facing barriers to digital education access, such as not speaking the local language fluently or a lack of digital media literacy at home. “Not all children are in an equal position in online environments,” explains Sundberg. “In this collaboration, we pay special attention to children who need stronger support to be able to stay safe online.”
Together, Save the Children Finland and Microsoft are working to strengthen the digital skills of all schoolchildren so they can play, connect, and learn safely online.
Not all children are in an equal position in online environments. In this collaboration, we pay special attention to children who need stronger support to be able to stay safe online.
—Lauri Sundberg, Team Leader for Digital Wellbeing, Save the Children Finland