Educating the Dragon: What INESS have recently been doing

Brett Lee says:

"This part of the year saw us travelling and speaking to audiences all across Australia and New Zealand. It was a privilege to pass our message onto thousands of primary, secondary and adult audiences. Mining towns throughout western Queensland, Brisbane Catholic Education PD, Melbourne Teen Expo, school communities in and around Queenstown New Zealand, Lutheran Pastors Conference, Queensland Secondary Schools Principals Conference and a Skype keynote to New Zealand where some of the interesting engagements I was given the opportunity to be involved with.

Everyday of the week, with every presentation, I learn more through the students and teachers. Being armed with this knowledge is a vital part of the process that we are involved in when it comes to bringing a relevant and up to date message to our audiences. Although we alone cannot change a person's internet based behaviours it is great to be an effective part of the overall process in teaching positive digital messages and giving users reasons for making sound online choices.

Having delivered thousands of presentations over the past years I have seen a definite change in the overall perception of communicating via the internet when it comes to our youth. I fully believe that teachers and parents are crucial in educating our youth in positive internet based skills and that YOU are making a difference.

Whilst presenting to a primary Brisbane Catholic School last term a year 4 student said to her teacher "someone asked me for my address on the computer the other day" to which the teacher replied "did you tell them". The student replied "no of course not, I'd never do that, mum said I shouldn't give my address to strangers on the internet". This is not knowledge the student is born with, it was taught to her. Most students of her age 3 years ago would have given out that information because they would have had no reason not to. We ARE making a difference."