Unit 4: Create or find a classroom resource that teaches students about creating strong passwords, passcodes, or passphrases.

https://usingtechnologybetter.com/blog/two-classroom-activities-for-teaching-students-about-password-security/

This classroom resource is to aim to learn how to design a strong password that is easy to remember. Level band: open age

Background information for the teachers:

Designing and remembering a strong password can be difficult, however an easier way to do it is to use a passphrase.

Activity 1:

Write a sentence that is easy to remember. This might be a line from a song or movie, a story about a place you have been, or any other phrase you can remember.

E.g. The cat is Milo and the dog is Otis

Take the first letter from each word to make your password (including capitalisation).
E.g. TciMatdiO

Change the letters to numbers and symbols where possible.
E.g. Tc1M&td10

Can also add a symbol on the end for extra length and complexity.
E.g. Tc1M&td10!

Activity 2:

Put three or four totally random words together.
ToasterChocolatePetunia

Change the letters to numbers and symbols where appropriate.
T0ast3rCh0c0l@t3P3tun1@

Steps
1. Introduce the aim of the activity. Advise students that they should not share their own passwords at any time during the activity! They should also not use any of the passwords the class develops during the activity!
2. Explain to students the two ways to create a passphrase by working through examples.
3. Split the class into teams of two. Each team has a short amount of time to create a password based on a passphrase (adjust time to suit the age of your students).
4. Two teams at a time write their password on the board / into a shared document. Ask each team to explain how they came up with the password.
5. Time to vote! For each pair of passwords, have the class vote on which is stronger and discuss their reasoning.
6. Use https://howsecureismypassword.net or https://www.experte.com/password-check to check if the voting was right!
7. Ask the students to spend time at home sharing the passphrase method with their families and designing some passphrases they can use for their own passwords (and then changing them!).