Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she plans to introduce standardised digital literacy guidance for schools to teach children critical evaluation skills for assessing the reliability of online information.

Following the independent Curriculum and Assessment Review’s final report on 5 November, the department will update the national curriculum to prepare young people for life and work in a changing world. In line with the Review’s recommendations, refreshed programmes of study will include critical thinking skills, in addition to digital and media literacy and artificial intelligence.

To ensure consistency, we are legislating so that academies will be required to teach the refreshed national curriculum alongside maintained schools. Content will be shaped through expert engagement, with a public consultation on draft proposals next year.

Currently, media literacy is taught through citizenship, relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) and computing, whilst digital literacy is addressed in computing and RSHE. To support teachers now, the department-funded National Centre for Computing Education provides free resources and continuing professional development, including materials on messaging in digital media, the credibility of sources and identifying ‘fake’ news and edited images.