With the ever-changing world of social media, it is essential that we equip our children with the skills needed to ensure safe use of the internet. The key aspects of any online safety guidance are:
1) Content: being exposed to illegal, inappropriate or harmful material e.g. fake news, pornography, extremist views;
2) Contact: being exposed to harmful online interaction with other users e.g. commercial advertising or adults posing as children;
3) Conduct: personal online behaviour that increases the likelihood of or causes harm e.g. sending of explicit images or online bullying behaviours;
4) Commerce: risks such as online gambling, inappropriate advertising, phishing, scamming.
The internet is a powerful and exciting learning tool but we need home support with ensuring that children make the best but safest use of it.
We have added a selection of documents that may be of some use when helping to keep your child safe online. Do take some time to have a browse.
Creating a family agreement is a great way to start positive family conversations around online safety, and to agree clear expectations and boundaries. Please do take a look at the template and example on this page.
We have also added a number of parent and carer guides for you. We have a number for you to download including:
- What parents and carers need to know about age-inappropriate content
- Online content: 10 tips to keep your children safe online
- Top tips for adopting safe and healthy online habits
- What parents and carers need to know about age ratings
- 7 questions to help start a conversation with your child about online safety
- Supporting children to deal with upsetting content
- Influencers
- Managing device stress and anxiety
- Online safety for under 5s
- Minecraft (age rating 7+)
- Youtube
- Youtube kids
- Video streaming apps and sites
- Setting up apps, games and software
- Roblox (age rating 7+)
The best way to keep your child safe online is to add parental controls onto all of your devices. The website below will guide you through, step by step, with setting up parental controls – you can choose your device and network from the drop-down menu.
https://www.internetmatters.org/parental-controls/
We understand that in the ever evolving world of the internet, it is hard to know all the different age restrictions, so we have also included a poster with the age ratings for popular apps and websites for you to use. Please do familiarise yourself with this. Remember, age restrictions are there to keep your child safe and protect them from the four cs of online safety: content, contact, conduct and commerce.
