Introduction:
The Research Center for Childhood Accidents is a close and long-term partner of Safe Kids Austria. Together, these two partners are very interested in using findings from injury research to create effective accident prevention activities.

Objectives:
*Analysing main traffic accident scenarios for children *Using the results in traffic safety education projects

Methods:
Over the last three years, the Austrian RTA and the hospital injury database have been analysed to learn more detailed information about the circumstances of traffic accidents related to distraction, public transport, and blind spots. The results have been summarised in three accident reports, and key activities to prevent such kind of accidents have been defined.

Results:
From 2021 to 2023, three projects were designed to improve traffic safety and to give children more competence and skills that would enable them to practice safety and watch out for danger in several traffic situations. The overall target of these projects has been to focus the children’s attention on road traffic, help them to avoid distractions, and to teach them how to behave passively and forgivingly when other road users make "mistakes." *Project 1: Keep Your Eyes and Ears Open - Safety on the Streets! Content: visual and acoustic distractions and attention, multitasking challenge *Project 2: Keep Your Eyes Open - Sure-footed on the Road! Content: Body control and sure-footed locomotion in road traffic *Project 3: Keep Your Eyes Open - I Spy with My Little eye! Content: Check out, what can be seen from several positions and different views and angels in a particular traffic scene! For each project, a toolbox has been developed consisting of PPT files that provide theoretical input in the classroom, video tutorials combined with teacher´s manual for practical safety training, and e-learning sequences with references to a blended learning approach. Information about these teaching resources toolboxes has been sent to teachers via the Styrian Board of Education and via the homepage “Network Traffic Safety Education” maintained by the Austrian Ministry of Education, Science and Research. In some schools, workshops have been held as a kick-off activity. Financial support has been provided by the Traffic Safety Fund.

Conclusion:
Research findings resulted in action. Analyses of traffic accidents data enabled us to define risk scenarios and develop prevention projects, which are suitable for increasing the risk competence of the relevant target group.

Keywords: traffic safety education, children, distraction, reaction, anticipation

Research Center for Childhood Accidents - Graz - Styria - Austria