ICT is an everyday part of people’s lives and schools are making increasing use of technology.
Here at Batley Girls’ High School, we have systems in place to protect your daughters and urge all parents/carers to enable security settings on home devices to help protect your children online. We recognise that we encourage students to go online for work out of school where there is less supervision and they have more freedom.
Golden rules to safe internet browsing:
- Children should ideally only add people on social media platforms those they know and trust in real life.
- Some predatory paedophiles can convincingly pose as another teenager and may spend months or years ‘grooming’ the victim until they meet face to face.
- Children must always be accompanied by an adult if meeting an online friend in person.
- Don’t ban children from these sites; they will just use them at friends’ houses or on their phone, personal media player or hand-held games console.
- Take an interest and suggest they add you as a friend so you can keep an eye on them when they are using these sites.
- Have the main computer in a communal area of the home where there is passive supervision and be reasonable about time online.
- If they have a wireless laptop and you want to stop them going online after a quota of hours is up, unplug the ‘router’ where the phone line comes into the house.
What to look for on a website:
- The CEOP report button is the online equivalent of dialling 999.
- We need to train young people, just like we do with 999, to recognise it and know how to use it if they need to.
- Look out for good websites that have the button built in.
- Some websites refuse to add the button, so visit direct: ceop.police.uk
Online Bullying/Cyber Bullying:
Cyber bullying is the use of the internet and related technologies to harm other people, in a deliberate, repeated, and hostile manner.
- Children can be unkind to each other online. Bullying is not new, but the technology has changed making it is easier to track and prove who is responsible.
- If you suspect your child is having a problem, the evidence may be on your computer. If you can print off copies of messages and screen shots of web postings (ctrl + prnt scrn) we can investigate.
- The law is very clear about what cannot be shared online – for further details, check out the CEOP website.
Want to find out more about understanding and stopping Cyber Bullying?
If you are concerned that a child is a victim of any form of bullying, please contact their Pastoral Manager or Progress Leader as soon as possible.
There are also a range of resources available for parents, please view the links below:
Batley Online Safety Policy
Think You Know
CEOP
Childline Social Network Bullying Advice
Childline Online Bullying Advice
Anti Bullying Alliance
UK Safer Internet Centre
Parent Zone
KidScape
Anti Bullying Pro
Childnet
Internet Matters
