Online Safety
The Internet
The Internet is now an integral part of children’s lives, enabling them to undertake research for school projects, talk to their friends and access information from around the world. Increasing provision of the Internet in and out of schools brings with it the need to ensure that children are safe.
Internet development is constantly evolving into ever more innovative areas with many websites enabling amazing creativity and interaction between peers. Unfortunately though, there are times when Internet use can have a negative effect on children. Schools and parents need to be aware of the potential dangers and take measures to ensure safe usage by all.
At School
At school we take several steps to ensure that children are kept safe while using the internet and electronic communication.
We use targeted filtering to prevent access to websites that are not suitable or may be dangerous.
Internet access in supervised and we monitor the websites that are accessed.
We use a controlled email system where we monitor the children’s emails and we limit the addresses that children can communicate with. These steps are taken protect the children from unsuitable emails and identify possible cyber bullying.
Children are also taught how to use the technology safely so that they can keep themselves safe.
At Home
Parents can have a difficult job keeping up with their children on the fast changing technology available to them, let alone knowing the dangers they face. The issues of safety, privacy, online predators or grooming and cyberbullying are sometimes complex, both technically and psychologically and parents can struggle to keep up.
To help parents we have put together a selection of links to websites that will help them to ensure that their children can reap the benefits of the Internet while staying safe.
- Think U Know – http://www.thinkuknow.co.uk
- BBC Stay Safe – http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/curations/stay-safe
- Kidsmart – http://www.kidsmart.org.uk/
- Childnet International – http://www.childnet-int.org/
- Digizen – http://www.digizen.org/
- Think U Know Parents – http://www.thinkuknow.co.uk/parents/
- Google Family Centre – http://www.google.com/familysafety/
- Parent Info – http://parentinfo.org/
Another great website to support this is the internet matters website. Online safety is not just about protecting children from some of the dangers of the internet – it is also about helping them manage their use of technology and most of the parental controls allow adults to set a maximum time for the use of a device or app.
Internet Matters is a site paid for by many British companies. It has a lot of good advice on adding parental controls as well as on most aspects of online safety. Parental controls will only help keep children safe. The best safety feature that a child has is their parent or carer. Take the time to talk to your child about the apps and games they are using and don’t be afraid to say no sometimes!
Many children will at times suffer from online bullying. It is really important that they have someone they can talk to and know that it is not acceptable. Most apps and sites will have systems in place that allow bullying to be reported. Your child’s school may be able to help. Children can call Childline on 0800 1111 for advice on anything that is worrying them.
Finally, since 2015 is has been a criminal offence for an adult to send a message with sexual content to a child (This is Section 67 of the Serious Crime Act 2015). If you are concerned that this might have happened please contact The Police without further using the device. This will help ensure that evidence can be preserved. The Police can be contacted by phone or from the ThinkUKnow website.
Parental Controls
The following document give information on how to set up parent controls on different apps, games, technologies and social media platforms.
