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From educating children about e-safety in the classroom to helping parents teach online safety to their children when they’re at home, the role teachers play in keeping children safe online is ever expanding. 70% of parents look to their child’s school for advice about internet safety.

The internet is a wonderful development both for children and teachers. Long gone are the days when children had to wade through an encyclopedia to learn about the wider world around them. Nowadays, the answer to any question they have is merely a click away: on the worldwide web. Enquiring young minds are now endlessly able to expand their knowledge: learning and socialising, adapting to different technologies and engaging with the world around them in new and exciting ways. However, that same curiosity that makes teaching so fun and rewarding also has its drawbacks when it comes to keeping children safe online.

Dangers that children may face in the ‘real world’ such as being bullied, watching something that’s inappropriate for their age, or inadvertently revealing personal information about themselves to predatory adults are issues that they also need to be aware of in their online worlds.

Whilst schools have always taken these issues extremely seriously, the addition of e-safety to the new National Curriculum for primary schools acknowledges something teachers have known for a long time: parents are looking to teachers to help educate their children about e-safety. With only half of parents feeling equipped to teach their children about e-safety at home, the challenge for teachers is not simply finding the best resources to teach about e-safety in an age appropriate way, but also to communicate that message in ways that will help parents to continue teaching their children about e-safety when they’re at home.

As an online portal for parents about how to keep their child safe online, InternetMatters.org already offers a wide range of resources and e-safety advice for parents. To coincide with the new National Curriculum, a recently launched ‘Schools’ section now offers resources for teachers too.

E-safety Support members can also access a selection of resources the help parental engagement, including an online training module specifically for parents. To find out more, visit our online training page.

If you have any examples of parental engagement issues or successes in your school, please let us know using the comments section below.

Just before the summer break, Ofsted published a new, and rather reduced set of inspection guidelines, which took away a great deal of published guidance about good and outstanding practice across a number of safeguarding areas. It also sparked rumours that e-safety was now largely off the Ofsted inspection radar.

In order to shed some light on the current situation, we turned the E-safety Officer for Kent County Council and regarded contributor to the UK Safer Internet community, Rebecca Avery. She suggests that if anything, there is a renewed focus on the importance of integrating online safety into a school’s wider safeguarding agenda.

Here is just a snapshot of the comments made on the matter in a recent article by Rebecca. Click on the links below to read the article in full.

E-safety within the Ofsted School Inspection Framework
A range of e-safety concerns that schools will need to consider and address are highlighted within Keeping Children Safe in Education under “specific safeguarding concerns” including child sexual exploitation, bullying including cyber bullying, radicalisation and sexting. Schools (specifically leader, managers, governing bodies and proprietors) should therefore ensure that e-safety messages are embedded throughout the school’s curriculum to ensure that pupils are prepared for life in modern Britain and the wider world.

Prior to an inspection Schools can demonstrate that e-safety is an important and established issue as part of their safeguarding responsibilities by ensuring that their school website (and other online communication channels) has up-to-date and appropriate information and guidance for parents/carers and children regarding online safety at school and at home.

During the inspection, inspectors will request that certain information is made available, such as any self-evaluation and the school improvement plan. They may also wish to see incident logs including actions taken as well as identifying a designated person who is responsible for e-safety concerns in the school. The inspectors will also gather evidence from pupils about cyber bullying and online safety education and behaviour in school.

Read more

E-safety within “Inspecting Safeguarding”
The September 2014 safeguarding briefing identifies that schools should be safe environments for children and young people to learn and that inspectors should consider how well leaders and managers create and promote a safe culture within settings which will include vigilance and timely and appropriate action when children may be at risk of harm. Today’s children live in a world where the online environment has become seamlessly embedded into everyday life and this must therefore be acknowledged by schools.

When inspectors are considering and evaluating the effectiveness of safeguarding within schools and settings, many points will include e-safety practice. They may include:

Effectiveness of Safeguarding Arrangements

Leadership and management

Behaviour and Safety

E-safety should therefore be embedded throughout school safeguarding practice and be clearly identified as an issue for leaders and mangers to consider and address. Online safety is an essential element schools safeguarding responsibilities and should be considered to be a key priority for all members of staff. The e-safety agenda has shifted towards enabling children to manage risk, rather than filtering/blocking and therefore requires a comprehensive and embedded curriculum which is adapted specifically to the needs and requirements of pupils and the technology with which they are exposed too.

Read more

We would love to hear your thoughts and experiences of e-safety inspections in you school – please let us know by using the comments section below.

The Community Education Awards is an annual celebration of schools’ efforts to help children and young people to become positive community members.

The Police Community Clubs of Great Britain use the Awards to demonstrate the most innovative and effective approaches currently in use and encourage the development of more projects that will have a positive impact on pupils.

The awards for 2014/15 include categories spanning; Health, Safety and Lifestyle; Finance, Enterprise and Employment; Environment; Individuals and; Technology. The Technology category includes the two following awards:

SCC Internet Safety Award
The Internet can be an invaluable resource for entertainment, making new friends and helping children learn. However, the Internet poses many dangers with users potentially at risk. In the same way children should learn about safety in school, they should also be taught the importance of staying safe online. Schools should enter this Award with projects that deal with educating children on how to avoid inappropriate content, how to keep personal information safe and the best practice for downloading information.

The Cyber Bullying Project Award
With social networking, the Internet and the use of mobile technology (texting) having a bigger impact on how we all communicate on a daily basis, it is crucial that children do not become victims of cyber bullying. With pupils just as likely to experience cruelty from children in internet chatrooms as in the classrooms themselves, this award would like to hear about projects that have looked to tackle cyber bullying.

The awards are supported by a number of big names including Axa PPP Healthcare and Childline, and their Brand Ambassador is once again Esther Ranzen, who has been involved with the awards since their launch in 2011.

Awards Organiser Kelly Griffiths said: “The Community Education Awards continue to go from strength to strength with pupils and teachers gaining recognition for their work in a number of areas such as internet safety and the environment, amongst many others.

“For the 2014/15 academic year we have expanded our Awards to incorporate more topics and we are already looking forward to hearing success stories from schools and teachers up and down the country.

“We are proud to offer schools the opportunity to have a project or person rewarded for their achievements. As we open the Awards for entries, we would like to encourage schools to visit our website and enter one of the awards on offer through our online form.”

Enter your school now

For more information and to get involved in the awards, simply visit the Community Education Awards website and choose the category you wish to enter.