In order to take part in OurKidsCode, all families must register.
If you are registering to take part in a workshop; your place will be confirmed by separate email when we have enough families to go ahead.
First, we need to get your consent to collect data about you and your family.
Please read what follows and click the button at the bottom of the page to proceed.
Information about our research
We aim to help your family enjoy, understand and encourage creative computing. We do this by offering family workshops where parents and children collaborate and benefit from being alongside other families. We are asking every family who attends an OurKidsCode workshop to help us to make all this more enjoyable and effective, and to ensure we are making progress towards our aims. Participation is voluntary.
Before you decide if you want to help, it is important for you to understand why the research is being done and what taking part involves. Please take time to read the following information carefully and discuss it with your family before you proceed to register. Please ask us if there is anything that is not clear or if you would like more information.
What is the purpose of our research?
We know that you want to support and encourage your family’s creative use of technology. We want to figure out the best way to help you do that
To do this we collect information from you at several times through your participation and beyond.
- About you: Firstly, we ask you to give us contact and family details so that we can arrange family workshops for you.
- Check-in: You will check-in online at each meeting. This helps us to track attendance and meeting activity nationally.
- Workshop progress: We will be recording some observations of what happens during the workshops.
- Your reactions: We ask family members to tell us how each workshop went.
- Changes: Finally, after two months, then six months, we ask how your family has changed.
All of these are designed to evaluate the effectiveness of the OurKidsCode programme and are not a test!
Do I have to take part?
We need to collect and store your contact details and track attendance to organise the workshops. So, in order to attend the workshops, you will need to read this information leaflet and sign a consent form.
All the other data collection will be anonymous, and it is up to you to decide whether to take part. Even if you decide to take part now, you are still free to change your mind at any time and without giving a reason. You can also decide to skip any questions you like.
As long as you have completed the registration form and check-in to each workshop, you will continue to receive the same level of support from us.
What will happen to me if I take part?
You will be asked to complete a few online forms during your participation:
- A registration form where we will ask you for your contact details
- A check-in form at each workshop
- A reactions form at the end of each workshop
- A changes form after 2 months and 6 months to see what effect attending the workshops has had on your family.
In each form: - There are questions that have choices and others where you write an answer.
- Do not mention yourself or other people by name – if you do by mistake, we will remove the names.
- The registration and check-in forms have to be filled out as they are need so that we can organise the workshops.
- The other surveys are voluntary and you can stop at any time – simply close the browser window. In addition, you may skip any question.
- Each form will take less than five minutes to complete.
We will also be observing what goes on during the workshops to see what works and what doesn’t. This may involve some audio recordings of group discussions. What are the benefits of taking part?
You and your family will benefit directly from taking part as we work together to give your family the best experience possible. You will also be benefitting future participants in the programme.
Keeping you and your data safe
Our team are Garda vetted which means we are approved to work with families and children.
Your privacy is important to us. Apart from the registration and check-in data which we need to organise the workshops, any information we collect from you will not be linked to you or your family or your location so that you or your family members cannot be identified.
We will store personal information on secure password-protected servers at Trinity College for up to 10 years. Only the project team will have access to it. No hard copies of the data will be stored.
Contact details may be shared, for operational purposes, with Mailchimp (for email newsletters and workshop information). We may also share contact details with our Facilitators to facilitate the organisation and running of workshops. We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to ensure that the information disclosed is secure, accurate, and up-to-date. Data is retained only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was shared. We will never sell your information to any third party. We will never share the audio files with any third parties. If you decide to withdraw from the workshops, you may request that we delete the registration and check-in data.
Since the rest of your data is fully anonymous, it is not possible to remove it after submission. If you are at all worried about how your data is kept, please get in touch and we can answer your questions.
It’s very unlikely, but if we find out about any illegal activities, child protection law means that we must let the authorities know.
What will happen to the results of this research?
There may be media reporting, lectures, conference presentations and academic publications written as a result of this project, however you and your family will not be identified.
What do I do if I have any further questions?
If you have any questions or concerns regarding your participation, please contact our project team at contact@ourkidscode.ie. They will be happy to answer any questions that you may have.
THANK YOU.
This project is funded by Science Foundation Ireland and the Department of Rural and Community Development and administered by the School of Computer Science and Statistics, Trinity College Dublin.
The project team consists of Assistant Professor Nina Bresnihan, Assistant Professor Glenn Strong, Louise Caldwell, Mary O’Mahony, Sarah Chapman and Dr Richard Millwood from Trinity College Dublin.