Being reasonable, not hysterical, about e-safety. Plus, EduCare's online e-safety training.

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In the frenetic discourse surrounding child safety online, many of us well-intentioned adults forget to actually talk to any children about what they think. That is, until those rare but unforgettable cases where something has already gone terribly wrong. A group of academics from the London School of Economics sat down and talked to 378 children about e-safety. What they found out may surprise you.

Unlike what concerned teachers may often assume, many children reported "planning" and "reflecting" on ways to stay safe online. Older children who frequently use social networking sites (such as Facebook and Twitter) generally don't do so without using preventative strategies to combat the risks of stranger danger and cyberbullying. These involve taking precautions, such as tweaking their Facebook privacy settings.

Unfortunately, while children are quick to react proactively to online bullying, either by blocking the sender of abusive messages or by disabling their account, they are much more hesitant to seek support from a teacher. This is problematic as cyberbullying incidents can sometimes escalate very quickly.

Many schools have taken the correct first steps by producing quality e-safety lessons which include anti-bullying campaigns. But as teachers, we also need to encourage children to trust us with their online problems. How can we do this? Well for one thing, we can approach the internet in a way that is more reasonable than sensational - afterall, the internet has many positives and it generally brings much more benefit to our lives than harm.

For better or for worse, both social networking sites and the internet have become part of the world around us. By taking steps to earn the trust of older children, by respecting their need for a certain amount of privacy, and by not spying on their social networking site usage, we do much more good than by preventing their internet usage. We need to let children know that we are not afraid of the internet, and that they can always come to us if they have a problem which they cannot face alone.

Learn more about e-safety, protecting children online, how children and young people use technology, and it's associated risks in EduCare's Child Exploitation & Online safety online training. Click the course's front cover, below, to visit the product page:

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