School Digital Wellbeing
Program
I've developed a whole school program to address digital wellbeing. In my program I share my signature, science-backed information about how technology is shaping students’ mental wellbeing, physical health and learning. I share brain-based solutions to help students in primary and secondary school to thrive in the digital world.
I've delivered seminars and workshops to students, teachers and parents throughout Australia and internationally and have distilled my most popular and impactful workshops and seminars into a digital library. My School Digital Wellbeing Program has been designed to ensure that all stakeholders have access to and hear consistent messages about the potential impact technology can have on children and adolescents. I provide pragmatic solutions by arming students, teachers and parents with practical, evidence-based strategies to use technology in ways that are congruent with how we’re designed to operate as humans- our neurobiology.
About the School Digital Wellbeing Program
I’ve personally developed and recorded a whole-school Digital Wellbeing program to educate and empower students, teachers and parents to help today’s young people to thrive in the digitally-intense world they now live and learn in.
I’ve recorded a suite of engaging and practical digital presentations to arm and support students with research-based yet realistic strategies to optimise their mental wellbeing, physical health and attention spans in the digital world they’re now immersed in. As a former teacher and parent myself I understand the digital dilemmas facing students today. I’m on a mission to empower students to harness the positive potential of digital technologies, whilst also mitigating the pitfalls.
Digital Student Masterclasses
- Digital Distraction Masterclass Series
- Digital Wellbeing Masterclass Series
Teacher Professional Learning Seminars
- Optimise Your Digital Wellbeing- Understand how your digital behaviours are impacting your wellbeing and performance (and that of your students too)
Parent Masterclass
- Kids, Teens and Screens: Helping Young People Thrive in the Digital World
Why digital wellbeing matters:
Technology has become a constant companion in young people’s lives. It has crept into every crevice of their lives: it is their conduit for connection and their often preferred portal for leisure and a tool for learning. Students are spending increasing amounts of time with digital devices, both at school and home. There’s no denying that their digital habits are having a profound impact on every facet of their lives- their mental wellbeing, physical health and learning have all been significantly impacted by their digital immersion.
However, ‘digital amputation’ is not a viable option. Whether we love it or loathe it, the reality is that technology is here to stay. The genie is out of the bottle. What we need to do is to help young people develop healthy and helpful digital habits and behaviours. That’s exactly what the School Digital Wellbeing Program will do.
Infographic Sources- Common Sense Media (2023)- Constant Companion: A Week in the Life of a Young Person's Smartphone Use. Access here-
https://www.commonsensemedia.org/research/constant-companion-a-week-in-the-life-of-a-young-persons-smartphone-use
Goodwin, K. (2022) Student DIgital Wellbeing White Paper.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ds8gsf8Ou-JGhLF4DNzM3fjDJ2fPzXZb/view?usp=drive_link
What’s included in the School Digital Wellbeing Program?
Digital Student Masterclasses
I’ve created two student masterclasses on Digital Wellbeing and Digital Distraction as these are the topics that are most in-demand in schools in 2024. Each masterclass comes with:
Five video modules each (between 5-20 minutes in duration)
Student workbook
(available as a print or digital version)
Discussion starters for plenary sessions and to extend learning beyond the videos
Teacher resources to further support student learning
Digital Wellbeing
- Overview
- Digital appeal
- Physical health
- Mental wellbeing
- Digital DNA
Digital Distraction
1. Overview
2. Attention spans
3. Digital distractions
4. Multi-tasking myth
5. Taming attention
Want a sneak peak?
To get a feel for the content, here’s a snippet from the Digital Distraction (‘Multi-tasking Myth’ module) masterclasses and the corresponding excerpt from the Student Workbook and Discussion Starter documents. Here’s a video snippet from the Digital Wellbeing (‘Digital DNA’ module).
AUDIENCE- Students aged 11-18 years (upper primary and secondary school students).
DELIVERY- This masterclass series is designed to be watched in small groups (such as tutor or house groups) or in year groups and to be paused at various stages to allow time for student discussion (student voice is so important in building healthy and helpful digital habits). Alternatively, these videos can also be used in a flipped classroom model where students watch in their own time and demonstrate their viewing and understanding of the videos by completing the corresponding student workbooks and engaging in class discussions about the video content.
Teacher Professional Learning Seminar
Optimise Your Digital Wellbeing
Understand how your digital behaviours are impacting your wellbeing and performance (and that of your students too).
Our digital habits and behaviours are having a profound impact on our wellbeing and performance. In this professional learning seminar, you’ll learn about some of the subtle, but powerful ways that your digital habits could be impacting your physical health, mental wellbeing and capacity to focus.
This masterclass arms teachers and school leaders with science-backed solutions to counteract the always-on, distracted, digital culture that has led to many teachers and school leaders experiencing ‘digital burnout’ (unresolved stress from our digital behaviours).
Educators will understand how their digital habits, both professionally and personally are fuelling their stress, why rest is vital for their performance and the simple, science-backed micro-habits that educators can easily embed into their workdays to counteract digital burnout and thrive in the digital world.
Participants will have access to an anonymous Digital Burnout Assessment tool to determine their current risk for digital burnout. This is an online tool that teachers and leaders can access in their own time.
Participants will explore:
// How the increased DIGITAL INTENSITY of their days (and their students days) is leaving them feeling STRESSED, DISTRACTED and EXHAUSTED;
// The subtle but significant ways that our digital behaviours might be contributing to increasing rates of STRESS and POOR MENTAL WELLBEING;
// The SCIENCE underpinning REST and the three types of BREAKS that have been scientifically validated to beat BURNOUT;
// Science-backed PROTOCOLS that will tackle STRESS, DISTRACTION and EXHAUSTION in the digitally-demanding context we now operate in; and;
// A MENU of MICRO-HABITS to support our DIGITAL WELLBEING and guide their students to cultivate healthy digital habits..
AUDIENCE- Teachers, school leaders, support staff and health professionals working with children aged 4-17 years
DELIVERY- This 60-minute presentation can be accessed by teachers, anywhere, anytime. It could be provided to teachers to watch at their own time and pace. Alternatively, it could be streamed in a staff professional learning session and paused at various intervals to facilitate conversation.
BONUSES- You’ll receive an eBook summary of the key information from the presentation for your easy reference, access to my Digital Burnout Barometer tool and a customised Power-Up Plan to identify and embed micro-habits from the seminar.
Parent Masterclass
Kids, Teens and Screens:
Helping Young People Thrive in the Digital World
I help confused and concerned parents feel confident about how they can best support their children’s and teens’ physical health, mental wellbeing and learning online, without proposing ‘digital amputation’- banning the gaming console, taking away phones or confiscating the iPad. This 60-minute masterclass has been designed to arm parents of primary and secondary school children with simple, science-backed strategies to manage screens at home so parents can be the pilot, not the passenger of the digital plane.
In this masterclass Dr Kristy will explore:
// Why children and teens are susceptible to POTENTIAL PITFALLS ONLINE given their BRAIN DEVELOPMENT;
// Why the online world is APPEALING to children and adolescents (there’s science to explain their digital infatuation and ‘techno-tantrums’);
// A simple & realistic formula to determine healthy SCREEN TIME limits for children and teens;
// The 6 VITAL DIGITAL BOUNDARIES parents must establish to ensure their children and teens develop healthy digital behaviours (there’s so much more to focus on than simply HOW MUCH time they spend online);
// The current RISKS facing kids and teens in the online world and SIMPLE SOLUTIONS to mitigate these; and
// Why DIGITAL DISCONNECTION is critical for your child’s PHYSICAL HEALTH and MENTAL WELLBEING.
AUDIENCE - Parents, carers and educators of primary and secondary students
DURATION - 1 hour
Your School Licence Investment
$3800 +GST
A school licence allows your school community to access all digital resources for 12 months from your initial purchase date. These resources can be shared from a secure and private portal that Dr Kristy’s team will send you. You can then send the link/s to the relevant stakeholders.
Your school licence also allows you to download the materials and upload them to your school’s Learning Management System or other online portal (so long as this is a password-protected site). All materials must be deleted after the 12-month licence period expires, to ensure you have the most up-to-date information available for stakeholders.
Dr Kristy has previously worked with these schools and institutions:
Dr Kristy is a very engaging presenter. She holds the audience very well with her informative, current and practical advice and strategies. Everything that she says is of great importance. Dr Kristy is highly professional and very easy to speak to and plan with. Thank you for coming to Barker College!
Elizabeth Pritchard | Coordinator of Student Wellbeing | Barker College
Dr Kristy was kind, vibrant and intelligent. She knows an awful lot about the struggles we're facing and being an educator feels deeply what we are grappling with. The staff loved it, the kids responded positively - with most making changes to their tech habits. The parents particularly loved and appreciated the parent support - it's nice for them to know that they're not alone and they felt empowered to make changes to their own families' use of devices.
Sarah Johnson | Careers and Guidance Counsellor | Springfield School - St Peters Lutheran College
You so well covered all the topics we discussed as important and shared the information in an accessible and powerful manner. Your illustrations of ROBLOX and the account of a child buying an hour of Mum’s time were really powerful.
Sally Ruston | Head of Junior School | Abbotsleigh
The parent masterclass was great, straightforward, well done, easy to access and helped demystify the challenges to really support parents where they are at.
Maria Comino | Senior Schools Coordinator | Relationships Australia
The message that Dr Kristy Goodwin presents is so important in the world we live. She finds the perfect balance between helping parents understand the importance of technology while providing research based and practical examples for families as they navigate the ever changing online world.
Drew Dickson | Assistant Principal Wellbeing | Northern Beaches Christian School
Why a whole-school digital wellbeing program works
I’ve had the privilege of delivering in-person presentations to students, teachers and parents since 2009 about the impact of technology on children’s and teens’ physical health, mental wellbeing and learning.
Whilst the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, I’ve pondered how I could genuinely (and quickly) build rapport with students and create learning experiences that resulted in real change… all within a 60-minute time slot on a Tuesday afternoon.
I’ve made the difficult decision to no longer deliver in-person presentations in schools. I feel the best way to create significant behavioural change and deliver learning experiences that meaningfully engage the students, staff and parents is via the delivery of virtual masterclasses that can be delivered and viewed, anywhere, anytime.
Some people have questioned the irony of delivering virtual masterclasses given the topic that I speak about: digital wellbeing. However, I think that a digital delivery exemplifies the many and positive benefits that technology poses.
Having all stakeholders- students, teachers and parents hearing relevant information ensures that habits are more likely to be embedded. A whole-school approach also results in consistent messaging being shared about how we can help students forge positive and helpful digital behaviours and habits that will serve them.
Who is Dr Kristy Goodwin?
Dr Kristy is a former teacher, lecturer at Macquarie University and Notre Dame University, author, media commentator and one of Australia’s most sought-after digital health, learning and wellbeing experts. She translates the latest neuroscience and technological research into practical advice and simple strategies for parents and educators. Kristy has spoken to thousands of teachers across the country, from early childhood to tertiary level, about the impact of technology on students’ health, wellbeing and learning. She is a keynote speaker at educational conferences and has delivered hundreds of professional development seminars to educators across Australia. Dr Kristy is also regularly called upon by the media for her expert opinion.
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