Modern approaches to creating a safe space for children: educational security projects in Ukraine

Abstract

The article argues that the education system as the social institution for masses should play a leading role in reducing the existing risks to children’s safety and developing a responsible attitude of children to their lives and health, the world around them, so it is important to design and organize a safe educational environment for children’s development. The article analyzes the essence of the concepts “space”, “environment”, “safe educational environment”, “space of a safe childhood” and their correlation. The research has found that the space of a safe childhood is a characteristic of the child’s life world, which includes a set of actions, conditions and relationships that provide physical, emotional and psychological protection. The space is filled with interconnected local environments built into it: physical, social, educational, cultural, and others. Creation of a space for a safe childhood is a prerequisite for the development of a child and formation of real prospects for the future. The formation of such a space is carried out through education in the field of life safety, subject-subject interaction of the child, teacher and parents, the creation of adaptive and developmental conditions aimed at overcoming existing threats in the implementation of various projects. The research has identified and characterized modern approaches to creating a safe space for children, such as: metasystem approach (representation of a safe childhood space as an open self-organized and self-developing system), environmental approach (influence of climatic, ecological, man-made conditions and regional risks on the success of a safe space childhood), culturological approach (connection of a child with culture as a system of values, formation of child’s humanistic values: life and health, the values of nature), activity-reflexive approach (joint activity of teachers, parents, children, public organizations to ensure environmental, informational, technical and legal protection of a child through sensory experience, which is then evaluated). The article suggests an overview of domestic and international safety projects, such as Gdansk Security Program (Poland) and Ukrainian projects “Safe and child-friendly school”, “Online safety school for children”, anti-cyberbullying project chatbot “Cyberpes”, “Stop sexting”, “Safe childhood” (“Safe School” and “Security Educator” projects).