The Influence of Teaching Methods on Learners’ Perception of E-safety
The traditional method of teaching e-safety by lecturing is not very effective. Despite learners often being equipped with the right knowledge, they reject the need to act accordingly. There is a need to improve the way digital e-safety is taught.
The study compares four different teaching styles, examining how each affected the way students perceive a range of e-safety keywords and consequently the way they approach this issue.
The semantic differential technique was used to carry out the research. Students completed a semantic differential questionnaire before and after lessons. A total of 405 first year undergraduates took part in the study.
The paper contributes to the debate on appropriate methods for teaching e-safety, with an aim to influence learners’ attitudes.
Experience-based learning seems to be very effective, confronting students with an e-safety situation and providing them with a negative experience. This teaching method had the biggest influence on students who were deceived by the prepared e-safety risk situation.
E-safety instruction can be enhanced by ensuring that lessons provide students with a personal experience.
The semantic differential technique can be used to measure changes in learners’ attitudes during the teaching process.
Our findings may bring improvements to the way e-safety topics are taught, which could, in turn, evoke in learners a more positive e-safety attitude and a desire to improve their e-safety behavior.
More research needs to be carried out to examine how the experiential learning method affects the attitudes of younger learners (primary, middle, and high school students).
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