Exploring Internet Safety with Your Child – With the internet so deeply ingrained in our lives, parents must explore safety with children from a young age. Issues such as privacy, cyberbullying, and what to share online are just a few to explore. Below is some guidance for parents from an independent school in Kensington that you may find useful.
Internet Safety – Sharing
It’s easier than ever to stay in the loop with friends and family as posts can be uploaded with the click of a button. Before doing so, it’s wise for children to take a moment to think about whether what they are posting is appropriate. What they share online can be accessed by anyone if privacy settings aren’t utilised. Even amongst their friends, they must be cautious of whether what they’re posting is offensive. Sensitive information should also not be shared. This is personal information regarding where they go to school, their address, passwords etc.
Internet Safety – Privacy
To stop information falling into the wrong hands and protect their social media accounts, children can utilise their privacy settings and adopt a private profile. This will help protect them from having their pictures etc being stolen, as well as other malicious activity.
Internet Safety – Cyber Bullying
Unfortunately, the internet can be used for good and bad. Cyber bullying, or trolling can happen and as you would imagine, can be damaging for a child’s self-confidence and mental health. Privacy settings also allow them to restrict who can message and interact with them online, and if they still receive abusive messages, they can block and report to the social media platforms themselves.
Internet Safety – Communication
Also remind your child to use their instincts and to speak to you if they ever experience strange encounters online. You will need to create a safe space for your child to confide in you.
Internet Safety – Screentime
Another thing to keep an eye on is screentime. While experts share that access to digital tools help children develop digital literacy, it’s also important to be mindful of what they spend their time on and for how long. Excessive social media use for example can be harmful to a child’s mental health.
As a parent there are also various measures that you can put in place, such as monitoring tools that allow you to restrict what your child can access and keep an eye on the content they have been viewing. However effective these tools are, this conversation is vital to have with children to help prepare them for the future and the potential dangers they may come across.
*Collaborative post