E-Safety
E-safety is a huge part of our lives these days, we regularly assess our own risks when we share, comment, like, buy or search online. Equally some of us are slightly more aware of potential issues or dangers than others and this can be true to staff in your school.
Over the past few years there have been huge developments in E-safety, one of the major ones is provided by the government document Keeping Children Safe in Education (2015), which was revised in May 2016 with new expectations for September 2016. Here it sets out what governing bodies should do in terms of approving policies for staff and pupil use of social media in the wider role of safeguarding. It also states that there should be procedures in place to report concerns or incidences which occur on the Internet or virtually in any form.
More can be read about this and resources can be found on my Guest Blog piece on ICT with Mr P's website here.
Policies
What are policies?
Why have policies?
Who writes policies?
What does a good policy for computing look like?
Questions, questions, questions. This is one of the parts of the co-ordinator role which gives you that big slab of leadership experience.It may be the first time you are having to look at the impact of Computing across the whole school, which makes it even more important you have strong policies in place for how staff, students and parents behave when using technology. The main aim is to outline how everyone keeps safe when interacting with technology, without sounding like a dictator but highlighting the importance and implications of following the rules.
A policy sets out the procedures for everyone and just as a behaviour policy shares what happens if situations occur and best practices to use, this is the same for an E-safety policy.
Great examplar or adaptable policies can be found here and here. You are likely to need to add details or edit it to suit your school. Some schools have a no phones in classrooms policy whereas others are happy for teachers to embrace apps in their lessons as long as they follow specific guidelines. Equally schools have different servers and online platforms which affect how we use them and understandably all schools have differing resources available.
The biggest areas I have had to monitor (as it was explicitly stated in the Acceptable Use Policy) have been sending children to the photocopier and staff charging personal i-pads and mobiles, which were not in restricted mode, using the Apple lightening chargers and children getting their paws on them in lessons. We've probably all done it, just a cheeky charge over lunchtime, but then we get distracted with prepping afternoon lessons or marking and before we know it, it's the end of the school day and we've left our phone charging in the i-pad charge box in another classroom and the teacher in that classroom is frustrated after having to sort out a situation involving said i-phone.
Social media is another topic which can cause a lot of fuelled emotions. Yes it's the Internet, yes it's your personal account, but could the information on it be used to make a judgement about you or someone? Absolutely. Could it be used as evidence for a far more serious issue? Absolutely. Therefore schools need to advise, if they choose not to explicitly state terms in their E-Safety policy. I personally advise that staff do not befriend or follow parents of children in the school on any social media platforms, whilst I know this is hard in smaller village or community schools, I've seen a number of incidences where things have gone sour far too quickly and it could have been easily avoided if they had stuck to offline communication options.
Your learning portal should have Acceptable Use Policies available to you, however if there is no standard advised document, The Key offer great policies or you may be able to access one from another grid for learning or message me directly and I can send one through to you.
Curriculum
Some of the best resources I've found for teaching e-safety come via the London Grid for Learning, however, I have also found brilliant resources from other organisations and websites, plus making my own and I've listed them below.
Every school focusses on e-safety differently, if you like to have a monthly focus or maybe you have assembly times to promote being safe online, Childnet have created a great yearly overview which can be found by clicking the image on the right.
Key Stage 1
Smartie the Penguin - This interactive story from Kids Smart, sets younger children off on a correct path for online behaviour. There are lots of activities which can be done along side the story to really engage the children.
Digiducks - From Childnet, this story helps children make decisions with Digiduck and his friends. The book is available digitally, can be ordered in their online shop and visits by Childnet can be booked.
Key Stage 2
Cyber Cafe - children appear to navigate a virtual world with 'other users' however these are simulations. The children will also be approached and talked to by these 'other users' and their online behaviour is tested in a real life setting. The kids I've used it with like it and I've found it effective for actually seeing their online behaviour as opposed to Q&A style activities.
*requires flash- meaning it's not iPad friendly*
Trust Me - Great for KS2 and KS3, Trust me provides lesson plans, powerpoints and resources to print, so work as brilliant free resources to let staff use and explore, knowing they come from a credible and respectable organisation.
E-safety is a huge part of our lives these days, we regularly assess our own risks when we share, comment, like, buy or search online. Equally some of us are slightly more aware of potential issues or dangers than others and this can be true to staff in your school.
Over the past few years there have been huge developments in E-safety, one of the major ones is provided by the government document Keeping Children Safe in Education (2015), which was revised in May 2016 with new expectations for September 2016. Here it sets out what governing bodies should do in terms of approving policies for staff and pupil use of social media in the wider role of safeguarding. It also states that there should be procedures in place to report concerns or incidences which occur on the Internet or virtually in any form.
More can be read about this and resources can be found on my Guest Blog piece on ICT with Mr P's website here.
Policies
What are policies?
Why have policies?
Who writes policies?
What does a good policy for computing look like?
Questions, questions, questions. This is one of the parts of the co-ordinator role which gives you that big slab of leadership experience.It may be the first time you are having to look at the impact of Computing across the whole school, which makes it even more important you have strong policies in place for how staff, students and parents behave when using technology. The main aim is to outline how everyone keeps safe when interacting with technology, without sounding like a dictator but highlighting the importance and implications of following the rules.
A policy sets out the procedures for everyone and just as a behaviour policy shares what happens if situations occur and best practices to use, this is the same for an E-safety policy.
Great examplar or adaptable policies can be found here and here. You are likely to need to add details or edit it to suit your school. Some schools have a no phones in classrooms policy whereas others are happy for teachers to embrace apps in their lessons as long as they follow specific guidelines. Equally schools have different servers and online platforms which affect how we use them and understandably all schools have differing resources available.
The biggest areas I have had to monitor (as it was explicitly stated in the Acceptable Use Policy) have been sending children to the photocopier and staff charging personal i-pads and mobiles, which were not in restricted mode, using the Apple lightening chargers and children getting their paws on them in lessons. We've probably all done it, just a cheeky charge over lunchtime, but then we get distracted with prepping afternoon lessons or marking and before we know it, it's the end of the school day and we've left our phone charging in the i-pad charge box in another classroom and the teacher in that classroom is frustrated after having to sort out a situation involving said i-phone.
Social media is another topic which can cause a lot of fuelled emotions. Yes it's the Internet, yes it's your personal account, but could the information on it be used to make a judgement about you or someone? Absolutely. Could it be used as evidence for a far more serious issue? Absolutely. Therefore schools need to advise, if they choose not to explicitly state terms in their E-Safety policy. I personally advise that staff do not befriend or follow parents of children in the school on any social media platforms, whilst I know this is hard in smaller village or community schools, I've seen a number of incidences where things have gone sour far too quickly and it could have been easily avoided if they had stuck to offline communication options.
Your learning portal should have Acceptable Use Policies available to you, however if there is no standard advised document, The Key offer great policies or you may be able to access one from another grid for learning or message me directly and I can send one through to you.
Curriculum
Some of the best resources I've found for teaching e-safety come via the London Grid for Learning, however, I have also found brilliant resources from other organisations and websites, plus making my own and I've listed them below.
Every school focusses on e-safety differently, if you like to have a monthly focus or maybe you have assembly times to promote being safe online, Childnet have created a great yearly overview which can be found by clicking the image on the right.
Key Stage 1
Smartie the Penguin - This interactive story from Kids Smart, sets younger children off on a correct path for online behaviour. There are lots of activities which can be done along side the story to really engage the children.
Digiducks - From Childnet, this story helps children make decisions with Digiduck and his friends. The book is available digitally, can be ordered in their online shop and visits by Childnet can be booked.
Key Stage 2
Cyber Cafe - children appear to navigate a virtual world with 'other users' however these are simulations. The children will also be approached and talked to by these 'other users' and their online behaviour is tested in a real life setting. The kids I've used it with like it and I've found it effective for actually seeing their online behaviour as opposed to Q&A style activities.
*requires flash- meaning it's not iPad friendly*
Trust Me - Great for KS2 and KS3, Trust me provides lesson plans, powerpoints and resources to print, so work as brilliant free resources to let staff use and explore, knowing they come from a credible and respectable organisation.