Keeping children safe online
Although useful, exciting and entertaining, the online world is posing an ever-increasing risk to our children, and it is important that schools, parents and carers work together to take an active role in understanding and teaching our children about online dangers. Learning how to act safely when using the internet is an incredibly important part of safeguarding our children.
Did you know that:
- Half of 8-12 year olds have online friends or followers that they don’t know1
- Predators online can contact 10,000 children in a minute2
- 64% of 8-11 year olds have a second account that their parents don’t know about (the most common reason given for this was that they kept one just for their parents to see) 3
- 91% of parents say that their child would tell them about negative experiences with the internet, but only 26% of children say that they would tell4
Sadly, the answer to this is not just stricter controls, because children say they wouldn’t say if they saw something inappropriate because ‘my parents would stop me using the internet’.
This means that we need to be able to talk to our children openly, make them very aware of the dangers and give them the skills and knowledge to keep themselves and others safe online.
To help you to keep your child safe online, we have signed up to the National Online Safety hub where you can access free courses, videos and guides. Sign up here
1 DCMS Online Media Literacy Strategy
2 ”A widely accepted figure for email and direct message distribution rates once contacts are known (most children having open profiles to increase follower rates / contacts on most social media platforms)” Oliver Wellsby Brightcore Consultancy
3 Ofcom: Children and parents media use and attitudes report - 2022
4 Roblox survey re: Online bullying in 2019