How can e-safety be taught?

As social media is getting bigger children should start to learn about safety on computers, how to protect themselves from any harm, and exploitation. Biggest problem that arises over technology is ‘Grooming’ under age children being groomed, children need to be taught how to keep themselves safe and avoid this situation from happening. Parents and teachers should also be told and taught on how to protect children from this too.

Parents should always know what their child is up to on electronics these days as the world is growing bigger especially around social media and having big effects on children these days. When children start up a social media account, parents should put a parental protection on, this could contain having consent off parents before adding friend requests, play games, pay for thing online and so much more. A setting should be put on to avoid children seeing pop up rude and unnecessary adverts. Also every social media has an age limit. 

There is a website suitable for children ages 5 to 7 years old, called ‘Safety Snakes’, it is a game board online where children face challenges and when landing on a square they are then provided with different online scenarios. “Good scenarios are placed at the bottom of ladders, so pupils are rewarded with a lift onto a higher square when they land there. Squares with details of unwise scenarios sit at the top of the snakes, so pupils learn that they literally go backwards if they land on these squares. This ‘carrot and stick’ methodology helps pupils understand what they should and should not do when they are using the internet.” (SafetySnakes, 2019)

When planning to use the internet in the classroom, it is important to check the websites carefully beforehand, including pages the website links to. A thorough check is a requirement because even the most ‘innocent’ websites may include content that is not suitable for children. When teaching in class and children are on computers or tablets, they need to be carefully monitored, this could mean re-organising the room, that allows you to stand behind students as they work. In other words, you need to be able to see what they can see. But some schools have policies and apps installed into school electronics to stop children continuing a website if its unsafe, it doesn’t allow them to go forward on what their trying to click on. Also, when assigning homework, assign safe website pages to use for them to research on. (BritishCouncil, 2015)

“Government guidance across the UK highlights the importance of safeguarding pupils from harmful and inappropriate online material (Department for Education, 2018; Department of Education (Northern Ireland), 2017; Scottish Government, 2017; Welsh Government, 2015). This includes material accessed through devices such as computers, laptops, tablets and mobile phones, as well as platforms such as social media and online games. A whole school approach to e-safety helps ensure staff, governors and parents can teach children about staying safe when using internet technologies. It also helps make sure pupils themselves know how to behave responsibly online.” (NSPCC, 2019)

Here is a short video relating to e-safety, giving a lesson if something pops up on the computer you aren't sure about ask for help:   
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5kW4pI_VQw

 

Bibliography 

BritishCouncil (2015). E-safety. Available at: https://www.britishcouncil.org/voices-magazine/how-help-young-learners-stay-safe-internet [accessed 01/05/19]

NSPCC (2019). Overview. Available at; https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/research-resources/schools/e-safety-for-schools/ [accessed 01/05/19]

SafetySnakes (2019). Online safety. Available at: https://www.barefootcomputing.org/resources/safety-snakes [accessed 01/05/19]