Ofsted (2013. pp. 6) encourages the use of technology within schools arguing ‘technology offers unimaginable opportunities and is constantly evolving’, however in order to advise schools in keeping children safe online they have devised guidelines to ensure they are taking appropriate E-safety precautions. In order to achieve features of good or outstanding practice regarding e-safety, schools must have in place rigorous e-safety policies and procedures, and all staff must have received regular and up-to-date training. Additionally, the 'E-Safety in Initial Teacher Training' PowerPoint explicitly states that teachers need to be aware of the current legal requirements in safeguarding children and of what to implement if there is a safeguarding issue. However, in order to help them implement this teachers need to be aware of what children are doing online and to understand the current dangers they may face.
Although the role of schools and educators in keeping children safe online is seen as perhaps the most significant, Smith (2007) argues that the role of parents and the children themselves must not be forgotten. Evidence of this is shown through the extent of e-safety resources available which are aimed at both parents and children, as well as at teachers.
Despite providing more opportunities for ‘fun, learning and development’, there are concerns over the potentially inappropriate and harmful material accessible online, ranging from ‘content (e.g. violence) through to contact and conduct of children in the digital world’ (Byron, 2008. pp. 2). Byron (2008) uses these ‘three C’s’ (content, contact and conduct) in order to highlight and categorise the main issues of internet safety, some of these being: meeting strangers, cyber-bullying, pornography, misleading information and hateful or violent content. These points are also reiterated by Becta (2010).
One of the major concerns associated with children’s safety online is explained by Byron (2008) as the ‘generational divide’, which can be related to Palfrey and Gasser’s (2008) theory of digital natives and digital immigrants. As the majority of parents and educators feel less technologically advanced than children, they feel less able to help them online (Future Lab, 2010), and therefore feel unable to support them if they are encountering a problem.
In overcoming these barriers many resources have been made available of which address the concerns regarding adult’s lack of knowledge about what children are doing online. One of these being ‘The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre’ (CEOP), an agency which works alongside child protection partners, intended to help teachers and parents understand the technologies that children are using in order to help and protect them. This easily accessible site also offers children friendly advice about staying safe online, as well as addressing any concerns they may have. The website can be accessed at: http://ceop.police.uk/.
The Internet Advisory Board (IAB) also insist that parents are made aware of exactly what their children may be doing online, and ways in which to keep them safe. In light of this, IAB have provided a very useful online booklet called ‘Get with it’, which reference is included at the bottom of this blog entry as a beneficial resource, recommended to both parents and teachers.
This resource takes into account that children may not be aware that what they are looking at is bad and should not be accessed, and in addressing this, the website aims to help children stay in control when online as well as showing them how to report anything they feel uncomfortable with. This resource is very child friendly and so could be shown to children during school time to make them aware of how to be safe online. There are also very valuable resources provided on this site for teachers such as presentations, lesson plans and activities designed to increase awareness about being safe online both inside and outside the classroom.
Another useful resource is the website of Next Generation Learning which is a government campaign initiated by Becta. As well as providing information on how to use technology to make learning more successful, fun and exciting, it aims to keep children safe whilst using this technology. There is lots of information provided both for teachers and children, particularly useful for advice on cyber-bullying and its prevention. This site can be assessed at: http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110130111510/http://nextgenerationlearning.org.uk/safeguarding
Becta (2010) Safeguarding in a Digital World Coventry: Becta
Becta. Next Generation Learning website [online] at:http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110130111510/http://nextgenerationlearning.org.uk/safeguarding
Byron (2008) Safer Children in a Digital World: The Report of the Byron Review [online] at: http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/7332/1/Final%20Report%20Bookmarked.pdf (accessed 06/03/14)
The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP) website [online] http://ceop.police.uk/. (accessed 06/03/14)
'E-Safety in Initial Teacher Training' PowerPoint' http://learn2.winchester.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=1246
FutureLab
(2010) Digital Literacy Across the Curriculum (Sections 3.1-3.4 Digital
Literacy in Practice) http://www2.futurelab.org.uk/resources/documents/handbooks/digital_literacy.pdf
Internet Advisory Board. A Parent’s Guide to Social Networking Sites- Get With It: understanding and sharing the world of social-networking websites with your children. [online] at:http://learn2.winchester.ac.uk/pluginfile.php/315525/mod_resource/content/1/get%20with%20it.pdf (accessed 06/03/14)
Ofsted (2013) Inspecting e-safety [online] http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/briefings-and-information-for-use-during-inspections-of-maintained-schools-and-academies (accessed 27/03/14)
Palfrey, J. & Gasser, U. (2008) Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives New York: Basic Books (Introduction p. 1 – 15) (pdf on LN)
Smith, G. (2007) How to
protect your child on the internet: A Roadmap for Parents and Teachers.
Westport: Greenwood Publishing
In correspondence to your argument I agree too, I too am interested in internet safety. I was utterly shocked when visiting a school on my First Year school placement (SE1) when the class teacher and I were discussing internet safety and a campaign that many schools now run to educate children about the potential dangers of the internet and how they can keep themselves safe. Consequently, when on my Third Year placement (SE3) the school ran this exact same campaign! When informing me of this, during SE1, the teacher stated that many children had social networking accounts with Facebook. She continued to add that despite the campaign imploring both children, and parents, to close these accounts due the potential dangers of grooming and cyberbullying, they had not. After our conversation, she asked the children a question after registration to demonstrate the shocking effect of her claims; 'hands up if you still have a Facebook account and Mummy or Daddy haven't helped you to close it down'... Approximately 29 of the 33 children, of whom 3/4 were EAL, all raised their hands. I was so shocked! Despite working with agencies to promote the dangers of social networking and highlighting how it is illegal and against rules set via Facebook, children still had their online accounts.
ReplyDeleteWhilst we cannot prevent children from having these accounts online, we can urge them to be safe when on the internet and stay out of harm. A few of the online resources you mentioned, such as CEOP and NGL, I too came across and explored when researching internet safety. These websites are a very useful guide for parents and teachers alike, I do also believe they can be used with children as long as they are shown how to, as you have also mentioned.
You briefly raised the topic of cyberbullying, something I have unfortunately witnessed all too many times in schools. Cyberbullying is also a current issue in the media with teenagers and, unfortunately, a high number of suicides. A book which I have at home explores cyberbullying its roots from 'traditional' bullying; this is by Shaheen Sharriff; it is called 'Confronting Cyberbullying'. The full reference for it is in my bibliography on my week 8 blog should you wish to explore it further.
Thank you for the reccommendation, I definitely intend to research further into cyberbullying having undertaken this module. It has really opened my eyes as to how much technology can be used in the classroom, therefore making room for more of its potentially harmfull side effects such as cyber bullying.
ReplyDelete