Making media for children

The BBC hosted the Children’s Global Media Summit in Salford, bringing together leaders from the children’s media sector. Here’s a quick sample of some of the highlights from the three day event. 

Technologist Dave Coplin (above) asked the audience to focus on Generation U, a generation who have yet to be born. His vision is of a world where machines don’t replace humans because of three key skills they will always lack: creativity, empathy and accountability. 

BBC Director-General Tony Hall talked about Own It (above), a new BBC website to help kids handle life online. He also explained how the BBC will be going into schools to tackle the issue of ‘fake news’, giving children the skills to judge for themselves the reliability of information they see online.

Malik Ducard (above), Head of Family and Learning at YouTube, spoke about their Kids App. He said that in 2018, YouTube plan to have over 10,000 people working on keeping family content safe.

Alex Okosi (above) told a compelling story of his life and work and his vision of how to create ‘edutainment’ and education for all.

In a discussion about the future of play: Ash Perrin described how his play project works with children in situations of forced migration. Ash and Vu Bui (above) from Mojang (Minecraft) could not agree on whether ‘gaming’ should be called ‘play’!

On the second day of the conference, James Harding from BBC News hosted a discussion about Fake News. Nicky Cox from First News said that “there's this desperation to be first rather than to be accurate. There's this deception that bad news is what sells - people doing good things don't get reported. It's not good for the health of people or children”.

Richard Scudamore, the executive chairman of the Premier League, talked about how the Premier League is the best unscripted television or drama in the world. BBC Learning and the Premier League have launched Super Movers, a programme for schools across the UK to incorporate physical and active learning more often throughout the school day.

The Duchess of Cambridge took her seat to listen to the Duke of Cambridge (above) talk about how the world of digital technology is not all positive or understood. He talked also about being hopeful about the future of society when protecting our children.

The Rise of the Machines panel which featured Tawny Schlieski from the Oregon Story Board, a non-profit dedicated to building diversity and inclusion in the VR economy. Dave Coplin spoke about how “it's not the rise of the machines, it's the rise of the humans. The tech is one thing, but what are really important is the humans that use it”. 

In the panel on the Future of Storytelling, Resh Sidhu (above) spoke about how excited she is by the pace of change. “What I thought I couldn't achieve yesterday, some new technology comes out and it's possible today”.

Manchester poet Tony Walsh, wrapped up the Summit by reading poems about empowerment and equality, about valuing creativity and learning and how ‘this little box’, a phone, unlocks a world of wonder and discovery, entertainment and company for the young.

The BBC Academy is hosting a full collection of the sessions from the event.