The Event ... 

 

The engaging day-long event played host to over 150 children from 28 local schools, with exciting presentations from four speakers and multiple interactive exhibitions ensuring the day went off with a bang! 

 

 

Police Officers from the Lancashire Constabulary communicated the importance of adhering to gaming age restrictions through an informative slide show presentation. Children learned how to spot gaming age restrictions, and they also became aware that material available through streaming sites such as YouTube may not always be suitable for their age range. 

 

Alicia Coad stepped up next to highlight the difference between casual conversations with friends and the much more careful conversations we have online with potential strangers. Alicia is a founding member of ChatFOSS (Friends Only Stay Safe), which provides children with a secure online chat facility. Children can choose to send text, video, and audio messages to their friends. 

 

Creative education company One Day provided the next instalment of interactive learning with a high energy drama workshop. The frenetic session was delivered by child-favourite Callum Arnott, who roused the children into acting out different emotions in group activities that explored the importance of avoiding unhappiness through staying safe online. 

 

The final presentation of the day was brought by Andy Tidswell on behalf of Discovery Education. Andy specialises in providing fun and educational talks on themes such as e-safety. The children enjoyed taking part in group activities that looked at different ways of spotting potentially untrustworthy emails and fraudulent websites – there were prizes to be won for great answers! 

 

 

Event organisers The Police Community Clubs of Great Britain held an e-safety poster competition at lunch time and handed out an award for the poster judged to be the most eye-catching. Many of the children proved to be budding artists (some even came prepared with their own colouring pencils!), and the final decision was extremely difficult. The winner took home a hamper of goodies! 

 

For two lucky schools there was a pitch-side visit and a changing room tour of the football ground. This meant that the children were able to see where any visiting premier league teams would change into their strips for the big game, and pose for pitch side photos! We would like to say a big thank you to our tour guide, who went the extra mile in organising this added extra. 

 

We would also like to thank our exhibitors, who provided the children with welcome break time distractions, including a footballing robot and a range of interactive games. 

 

 

The limited number of spaces available for the Barney and Echo Roadshows always means that our full-house events are jam-packed with laughter and new friendships. With so much going on and so many new and smiling faces to meet, waving goodbye is always the hardest part of the day! As a parting gift, the Police Community Clubs of Great Britain presented each pupil with a goody bag and provided each school with teaching materials and resources to help run e-safety lessons.