Digital Etiquette for Teenagers Program Conducted at Malaysian Middle High School, SMI Al Amin Kemaman

In February 2025, CODA helped administer the Digital Etiquette for Teenagers program to the students of SMI Al Amin Kemaman Middle-High School in Terengganu, Malaysia. It was the first time the program was conducted in Southeast Asia.

SMI Al Amin Kemaman is a private Islamic middle-high school. It aims to foster the individuality and abilities of its students with not only academic but also religious Islamic studies. Students from middle school first year to high school third year engaged in an exchange of ideas about topics such as the individuality of creative works and creator's rights in digital spaces, while touching on recent themes such as copyright in AI content.

What were your impressions of the Digital Etiquette for Teenagers program?

(Student Impressions)

"Up until now I didn't have an opportunity to properly learn about copyright. This digital etiquette program was my first experience. I have friends who know about copyright and friends who dont, so this lesson was important. Before I took the lesson, I didn't know much about copyright, but through the program I was able to understand the structure and design of copyright.

I am a realist artist. I spend a lot of time and give a lot of thought to my works, so it would be terrible if one of my works was used without my permission or copied. Through the program, I learned in detail what I can do to protect my work. I think sharing accurate information online and not spreading fake news are important actions to protect content and copyright."

(Teacher Impressions)

"Through this program, I was hoping that students would develop an accurate understanding of rights and copyrights and become more aware of their responsibility in the digital world. Furthermore, I wanted them to be aware of their position as they share their own content. Upon taking the lesson, students actively in the material and shared with those around them. I think they learned to think more seriously about the behavior in the digital world.

At the moment, there aren't many opportunities to learn much about copyright in school. Students don't even know about the existence of copyright. I feel there is a similar trend throughout Malaysia. This is all the more reason we must share the importance of copyright and intellectual property through everyday means such as social media. In digital citizenship studies, social media sharing and behavior is a critical theme. Asking questions like "is it okay to share this?" or "am I using someone's work without their permission?" will be crucial for students going into digital society. Students used AI tools such as ChatGPT regularly in school lessons. We say things like "to use it to gather ideas is okay, but copy-and-pasting it as-is is wrong," but in this lesson students learned that this too has to do with copyright. In this program, not only were students able to become more knowledgeable, but they had an opportunity to think about protecting the works of others and themselves."