There are two quick answers to this: Yes and No.
Yes, if the children can be directed to use safe sites. Yes, if they know that they should never give out their own personal information. Yes, if they learn to check with or inform an adult if they are in doubt. However, for many children the internet presents a tempting maze which means they easily forget the rules, or it seduces them to follow links that may take them to inappropriate places. So, No, if they are not trained in the best ways to do research and use information. No, if they proceed without understanding the risks at their own level. No, if they are left unsupervised, as dealing with potential risks requires a level of sophistication that a child simply does not have the maturity to understand.
The virtual world seems safe to children, as safe as being at home or at school where the magical portal physically exists, and furthermore it is colourful, exciting, apparently child friendly and full of possibilities. They do not realise that it is also populated with biased or incorrect information and people who are looking for their contact for advertising or other less suitable purposes. They don’t realise they are being solicited as customers for sponsored sites or that there may be far better child friendly information available through certain sites such as the brilliant Usborne quicklinks (www.usborne.com/quicklinks/eng/default.aspx). They don’t understand the potential of unkind contact or cyberbullying until it happens to them. The virtual world seems less real and therefore the risks seem detached.
Children, by their very nature are curious and enthusiastic. It is tempting for them for example, to type their own names, or yours, into Google to see what appears – it is potentially a harmless activity after all – but what happens if they find a person or a site that is not suitable? It is simply not helpful to ban the looking up of anything or everything, instead it is better to be frank with them that they might find things that are not appropriate and that they should call you and explain what they have seen. They will also understand that this enables other children to be protected. At Notre Dame Prep School we have a ‘safe surf’ program that eliminates inappropriate words or images, but children often don’t consider the reasons for this and have been heard to say “Oh, I will try that site again at home”. We teach them the risks and hope they remember, but they do need your help at home, where they often feel the restrictions and rules are different.
As often as possible schools revisit the safety issues, and reiterate that personal information should be kept private, and that it would be foolish to trust someone on any site that they cannot see but still the dangers seem remote to them. I strongly recommend that everyone should watch this fantastic BBC Newsround film created for families: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgCNGvL0g1g, which will help you, as well as your children, to understand more about the social complexities of the technological world they live in.
Cyberbullying is referred to at school, and children are encouraged to understand that writing an unkind email or texting a negative message is not only wrong, but an activity that is potentially criminal in the wider world and will not be tolerated. Most understand, but the medium is so available and immediate, that it can be tempting after a minor spat with friends (for any of us) to put frustrations or retaliation into writing and hit ‘send’. All of this needs to be talked through regularly and calmly so that the actions of a moment, so hastily committed, don’t create further conflicts or unhappiness.
In summary, I believe that the internet is a fantastic tool for all. Used with appropriate safeguards (e.g. safe surfing controls for children), adequate supervision (not everything can be caught by the filters – imagine the range of materials you might see for the word ‘schoolgirl!’) and training in how to find the right sort of material targeted at the right age, the internet is brilliant. But as ever, education is everything. Keep reminding your children about safety, take nothing for granted, check up on them regularly, look at the search history and talk to them about what they are doing and what they are seeing, especially if you think it might be something unsuitable or risky. In short, help them to develop better internet behaviours that will be useful to them for many years.
Safe surfing!
No comments:
Post a Comment