The time between the years is always special: many things still want to be done so that the new year can be kicked off with full energy. At the same time, there is some peace and quiet to organise thoughts or finally read what has been waiting for it for so long.

Maybe you have one of those moments to look at the updated and insightful features and sections our teams have created and launched on our CO:RE Knowledge Base over the last few months. We hope you enjoy reading and look forward to your feedback.

Merry Christmas and best wishes from the entire CO:RE team

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🔎 Relaunched CO:RE Evidence Base and Data Directory

Piermarco Aroldi and Davide Cino, our team at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (USCS | IT), fully re-launched the CO:RE Evidence Base and Data Directory this year. Together with our technical infrastructure partner TAKEPART Media Science and in collaboration with Kjartan Ólafsson and Rostislav Zlámal (UNAK | IS) the team created a robust and comprehensive infrastructure that brings together academic studies and research initiatives from all over Europe with a focus on children’s experiences, safety, and opportunity online. Its goals are to offer an online directory of pertinent research findings and to make important information and conclusions appropriate for a wide range of stakeholders, including academics, decision-makers, educators, and parents. To date, the evidence base and data directory collate 1,3k+ study entries and 1,7k+ publication entries from 35 European countries, which have been brought together, systematised and codified by more than 100 people across our European networks. You can navigate and filter entries by key topics, e.g. learning, risks and harms, well-being, etc. or by stakeholder focus to retrieve relevant results for parents, educators, or policymakers, respectively. Additionally, studies that report empirical data being available in an online repository for re-analysis are collated in the CO:RE Data Directory. Read more about the infrastructure and collaborators here.

📄 Set of Short Reports on Key Topics

Veronika Kalmus and colleagues Maria Murumaa-Mengel, Marit Napp (Sukk), Signe Opermann, Andra Siibak and Mari-Liis Tikerperi, our team at the University of Tartu (UTARTU, EE), established the series formats CO:RE Short Reports and CO:RE blog posts on Key Topics. Together with a range of excellent guest authors, the team published short reports on digital learning environments during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, risk classification: the 4 Cs of online risks, kid’s data and privacy in the digital age, digital skills, digital learning and (non-)cognitive learning outcomes and adolescents’ well-being in a tech-heavy era. Additionally, the series of blog posts on Key Topics covered a range of issues and stories related to kids’ online experiences - from a board game honing digital skills, over scenario planning in education post-COVID, to exploring kids' digital playgrounds, how the digital divide shapes online school education in Brazil creating new inequalities, and how social media may encourage more diverse foods in kids’ diets.

All short reports have been published with the Social Science Open Access Repository (SSOAR) and can be found here.

💭CO:RE Theories Toolkit

Sonia Livingstone and Mariya Stoilova, our team at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE, UK), published final additions to the CO:RE Theories Toolkit – the free online resource for early career and experienced researchers and research users is now complete. The toolkit navigates users through theory pathways to answer questions on understanding theory (what are the key theories and debates, how to develop theory), working with theory (how to link theory and evidence, how to adapt theory) and applying theory in practice (how to “talk theory” to stakeholders and how to use theory for policy and practice). You can also explore a map of 9 key areas of children’s digital lives (children and young people, the digital environment, access, opportunities and benefits, skills and literacies, risk and harm, health and wellbeing, social support, policy and regulation). Each of these is linked to relevant sources, discussions and debates.

📘 CO:RE Methods Toolkit and Handbook

Sirkku Kotilainen, Jussi Okkonen and Iiris Tuvi, our team at Tampere University (TUNI | FI), completed the full launch of the CO:RE Methods Toolkit and Handbook. Together with an expert team of co-authors, they created a free online resource for early career and experienced researchers that helps navigate the research journey, from observing phenomena and formulating a sound research question to finding the right methods to gather data and selecting an apt analysis approach. The goal of the toolkit and handbook is to emphasise that any decision taken on the research journey shapes the resulting knowledge we gain from it.

↪️ CO:RE Compass for Research Ethics

Elisabeth Staksrud and Niamh Ní Bhroin, our team at the University of Oslo (UiO | NO), recently re-launched the CO:RE Compass for Research Ethics - a free online resource that provides guidance on (research) ethical questions relating to doing research with children and young people. In doing so, the resource addresses frequent questions, such as “What are research ethics?”, “What are key ethical considerations in online research with kids?” or “How to protect and promote children’s rights and agency in research?”, provides helpful materials and reading lists and points to relevant resources.
Furthermore, the team continuously launched new language editions of the open-source movie informing children and young people about their rights as research participants. Read about the movie and collaborators here and find the updated full playlist encompassing all available language versions with open and closed captioning here.

📑 CO:RE Policy Briefs

Brian O’Neill and Thuy Dinh, our team at the Technological University Dublin (TUD | IE), recently launched the CO:RE Policy Directory, an extensive free online resource collating all relevant public and legal documents, law and policies available across Europe. Most recently, the team published a CO:RE Policy Brief on Ireland’s new legislation, the regulatory framework Online Safety and Media Regulation (OSMR) Act. The Irish Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, Catherine Martin, stated on its signing into law:

“The Online Safety and Media Regulation Act 2022 is a crucial piece of legislation. It modernises the regulation of the media ecosystem in Ireland and lays the foundations for the new regulatory frontier of online safety which will be of great importance to protecting children online.”

You can download and read the PDF directly here.

🚀 Soon to be launched: The CO:RE Education Toolkit

Sabrina Vorbau and Véronica Donoso together with colleagues Eray Basar, Sophie Smit and Hans Martens, our team at European Schoolnet (EUN | BE), developed an Education Toolkit which is soon to be launched. The free online resource supports everyone working in education to get comfortable with key topics and debates about children and online technologies. In doing so, the toolkit guides users through the first steps of getting acquainted with research, provides useful guidance on using research in education practice and gives tips on how to stay up-to-date with research and evidence. Keep an eye on our social media channels…

Stay healthy and stay tuned.