Why did you start with digital education for young people?
Malou: “During COVID-19, we obviously couldn’t stand physically in front of the class. Then we faced the question: what can and do we want to do with digital education? That led to philosophical conversations with our subject teachers.” Anne: “Yes, that was very interesting. We could talk for hours about the purpose, the pros and cons, and the risks. I must admit that I’m quite a technophobe myself and really love old school. Writing with pen and paper is, to me, an indispensable process, where you go as fast as your own brain. But we also saw for several years that the threshold for children to write this way was getting higher and higher. This insight was the deeper motivation to explore a digital program, with COVID-19 as the urgent trigger. Could we offer substantive added value in the students’ own language (digital)?”
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What did that research look like? What were your conditions for digital education?
Malou: “We explored two routes: digitizing an already existing, successful formula and developing a completely new, digital-first module. The modules had to align with our core values: creativity, freedom, and safety. Especially the latter was difficult to guarantee.” Anne: “During the research, we found a common thread in our programs: making a journey through oneself. Whether it’s about what you love to do, who is important to you, or how you envision your future, all the themes we already covered revolved around that journey of discovery. And then we realized that we could make that digital journey very personal by letting students use their own digital tool, their phone. That’s how the new module, the Selfie Safari, was born.”
What is the Selfie Safari?
Malou: “In the Selfie Safari tool, students complete assignments on their own phones. They discover that their phone says a lot about them. Their preferences, the language they use when messaging friends, or that one photo they could never delete, for example. Not only do they get to know themselves better, but they also learn to look at their external identity differently. And at the use of their phone, which contributes to media literacy.” Anne: “Afterwards, we bring all the answers together on the digital lesson board and discuss them.”
"Our lesson is about external identity, but also about media literacy."
What are the initial results? Has that substantive added value been achieved?
Malou: “Students respond very enthusiastically: they are pleasantly surprised that they are allowed to do something on their phone.” Anne: “We see that the digital setup of the Selfie Safari literally results in more words coming out of the children. They start typing faster and type more words than in other modules.” Malou: “And we even see that after this digital component, they actually find it fun to start writing with pen and paper. If they’ve typed in their own environment first, traditional writing is no longer so intimidating for the students. So the digital format turns out to have a positive effect on the content and goal of the lessons.”
"Writing with pen and paper became more enjoyable because of the digital lesson."
Has it changed your vision and strategy?
Malou: “We have seen that digital education truly has substantive added value, and we want to continue using it sustainably. But we’ve also determined that there must always be a human component. Interaction with a person, encouraging creativity and insight, and asking follow-up questions are crucial for us. We will never delegate that to, for example, AI. Additionally, the necessity of the physical component has also been confirmed for us. That’s why we’ve added an extra core value: craftsmanship. Because we will always integrate the act of writing with pen and paper into our lessons. Alongside the digital.”
What is your ambition, what opportunities do you see for digital education?
Malou: “We want to improve some technical aspects and make the Selfie Safari app more visually appealing. Furthermore, we hear from other cultural education institutions that they want to collaborate on our digital projects. That cross-pollination is incredibly interesting—imagine combining the written word, music, and visual art into one digital journey of discovery!”
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