Children in action at The Challenge Factory

After much thought and preparation, the first version of our participation tool in the 'Let's Movez Together' Healthy Start Sprint project was ready to be tested. Researchers from the Movez Lab and professionals from You!ng organized two times, two sessions to test and especially improve the participation tool called 'The Challenge Factory' together with sixteen children from the BSO.

In the Challenge Factory, children think for themselves in a fun creative way about solutions to challenges in the online world. Specifically, they write an action plan to help a peer with an online challenge. Examples include setting a screen time to avoid screen addiction, reporting annoying content or asking for help from an adult when you get annoying messages, or see something you wish you hadn't seen.

We often hear from the kids that they have learned more about online risks and solutions to them. They often have a better understanding of their own online world.

Just like in a real factory, the kids just run into something. Their action plan cannot be implemented and playfully the children discover why, for example because the peer is embarrassed or cannot stop scrolling. In groups, the children think about who could help their peer implement the action plan (think parents, other peers or app and game developers) and what that person could do to help.

The kids thought well about possible solutions, as well as tips on how to make it more fun. Which, of course, we will take to the evaluation!

We incorporate the solution thought up by the children into advice for the children, parents, teachers, app and game developers as well as policy and intervention developers. 

Purpose of the sessions

The sessions did not only have a content purpose, the second purpose was equally important namely evaluating the participation 'tool' we call The Challende Factory. The children were given a lot of space to give their ideas about the sessions and were invited to give feedback and points of improvement. With the goal of making the tool more fun, meaningful and empowering for other children.

The evaluation is in full swing, and we've also implemented a lot of changes! We are going to test these changes during the weekend of science to see if this version works better.

We are now at the start of phase two of the project, where we are going to take all the learning points and we are going to organize participatory sessions again. Our goal: give kids a voice when it comes to their online world, so we can support them to grow up to be happy, healthy and smart media users! Want to keep following the project? Then be sure to keep an eye on our website and LinkedIn page.