E-safety - Reflect and discuss the meaning and parameters of e-safety

E-safety is a vital part of a child’s life whether they know it or not. ‘’E-safety refers to the safeguarding of young people when online – some of the biggest dangers in the modern world are found online and include the likes of bullying, inappropriate sexualised or other behaviour’’ (Hopping, 2018, p.1). As E-safety is such a broad term there are many different definitions on it, Barnard-Wills states that UK ‘e-safety refers to the way young people are taught about risks online, how they can protect themselves and whom they should report worrying activity’’ (202, p, 240), both definitions include the negative part of the internet, the ‘worrying activity’ this is so big at the moment as there are so many more networks that are being introduced. Children need to keep safe online in order for them to reach their full potential when they are on it.

 As technology is getting more popular by the day, and there is so any resources on the internet, children need to be taught on how to stay safe when they are on it, the internet gets a lot of negativity when it comes down to this, but as long as children know how to stay safe the internet is a very positive place where they can learn so much. It has been identified that we need to engage with digital technology in schools, but e-safety is putting many teachers off (Cranmer, Selwyn, and Potter, 2009). It is a hard situation with the fact that if a child is on the iPad at school, and they do something they shouldn’t, it will reflect on the teacher, and this is why many teachers are worried about using technology in the classroom. As Ofsted (2014, p.4) states that it is the school’s responsibility to protect and educate pupils and staff in their use of technology and have appropriate mechanisms to intervene and support and incidents where appropriate. This is one reason to why e-safety is becoming a bigger topic, for teachers to speak to pupils about how to stay safe on the internet, so that teachers can become more confident using technology in the classroom.

There are many dangers of the internet, you can get easily addicted to it, whether that is in general or to certain aspects of the internet such as games, gambling or social media. There have been many articles that have been speculating around the fact that young people are spending too much time online, all the more reason for schools to teach e-safety in the classroom from a young age. Another danger is dealing with negative comments, this would most likely apply to the older children in school, when they are just starting to get social media, such as Facebook, Instagram or snapchat, if you are not private on these apps, anyone can comment on your photos, this would be very upsetting for young people and they would not know how to handle the situation, being private on social media for children so young is vital, when you are not private anyone can message you, which may leave a child in a vulnerable position, as they may be scared not to reply, or feel obliged to reply. There has been a recent problem that when children are watching ‘Kids YouTube’ a character called ‘MOMO’ appears and tells the children to hurt themselves, this is coming from ‘Kids YouTube’ where everything should be filtered, and everything should be safe, it goes to show that nothing is ever one hundred percent safe.  

Some theorists believe that children in today’s society need to know how to use the internet in order to be successful in the future. Younie and Lock (2015) believe that children entering schools today will need to create a ‘digital self’ and have to manage their online and off-line presence. E-safety can be taught in many ways, there is a fine line between guiding the children about keeping safe on internet and making them too scared to even look at the internet ever again, however, children need to know the consequences the internet has, and need to be encouraged to tell someone when something does not seem right. Children need guidance and support and they need to have the mechanisms to inform adults about fears or concerns they have about the digital world (Younie, 2015). The internet brings so many opportunities for children, and therefor need to be very independent on there in order for them to be heard. A key task for primary schools is to empower children to become responsible in their online lives (Younie, 2015) However, Ofsed (2014, p.4) states that those in school with lock down systems are more vulnerable as they are not given enough opportunities to learn and how to manage risk for themselves. Therefore, although schools try to make using the internet independent, by having blocking systems on automatically takes away the fact that children cannot learn how to stay self themselves. The picture that I have added below is an easy way to address e-safety to children, and an easy way for them to remember, this may be very useful for very young children. Having a poster of this in a ‘iPad corner’ or ICT rooms and in the classroom, the poster is very bright, so children would remember it can go back to it when needs be. As an alternative it could be set as a desktop background so that they know the rules are always there (2 simple, 2019)

An example of technology being cut where the children can only use certain apps, is in the placement I am currently at, in the reception class, the children are only allowed to go on games, they are not allowed on the internet to research anything. This could be a problem in the fact they are not really learning anything about E-safety as the games they are playing are children’s numeracy games that are made for the classroom. Another example of where technology is such a big part of children’s lives, is there is a ‘iPad corner’ in the school I am at, along with sand pits, slime bowls, and many other things children love to play with, and the iPad corner is always the corner where everyone fights over.

Overall, the internet is a very positive place for young people, where they can learn so much and expand their knowledge, when they are using the internet properly, it also comes with many risk’s that can be very serious when they are not dealt with properly, children need to be taught what is wrong and what is right, and if something does not seem right, they need to tell someone.

References:

2 simple (2019) 5 Ways to address online safety. Online at https://2simple.com/blog/5-ways-address-online-safety/. Last accessed 6^thJune 2019. 

Hopping, C. (2018) What is E-safety?: London. 

Selwyn, N., Potter J., & Cranmer, S. (2010) primary schools and ICT: Learning from pupil perspectives. London: Continuum.

Younie, S., Leask, M., & Burden K. (2015) Teaching and learning with ICT in the primary school,(Second edition / edited by Sarah Younie, Marilyn Leask, and Kevin Burden. Ed)