3M Streetwise

Interactive resources educating young people about road safety
www.3mstreetwise.co.uk 

Background

Road accidents are the single largest cause of accidental death among 5–14 year olds – a statistic that encouraged 3M to make child road safety the key theme of its community programme.

Our Aim

To assist educators and parents in encouraging receptiveness to road safety, raise awareness of road hazards for children and increase their ability to stay safe.

What did we do?

We have developed worksheets, practical activities and lesson ideas which support the core subjects of PSHE and Science for 7-11 year olds and aids cross-curricular work in Geography, Maths and English.

3M streetwise is a flexible tool, for use by any teachers wishing to teach road safety in isolation, or to integrate into existing lessons in the science curriculum. The site explains why safety rules exist through exploration of the scientific principles of light, sound and forces.

Results

As of April 2011 the site had:

• 373,000 visitors
• 20,500 teacher registrations
• 138,000 downloads

This exceeded client expectation as little direct marketing was undertaken, with much traffic being generated by teacher to teacher recommendation and referred links.

Awards

BITC Big Tick 2011 ‘3M – Supporting STEM’

BITC Big Tick, 2007

Finalist, CIPR Excellence Awards, 2007 and 2008
Regional finalist, National Business Awards, 2007

The website features prominently on the Brake and THINK websites, along with 80 other organisations. It was launched by (then) Transport Minister, Dr Stephen Ladyman, who also endorsed the value of the site.

The Daily Mirror promoted a giveaway offer of 6,000 3M reflective snap bands. More than 14,000 online applications were made via the 3M Streetwise website.

It is very interactive… written in a language children will understand. The animations are excellent and very engaging – I have used the site in science lessons and leading up to their cycling proficiency tests.

KS2 teacher, Bracknell