The internet, your child’s friend or foe?

posted by Kate - 14:38 05/04/11

As more and more adults use the internet to shop, find and share information, book a holiday and keep in touch with friends and family, it’s easy to see how complacent we can become about using the web.

But what do we know about young people’s activity? In this day and age when everybody is so busy it’s not so easy to find quality family time and chat about the day. More and more children are fortunate enough to have a computer in their room but how much time do they actually spend on it?

In a report from the NFER 2010, prepared for the UK Council for Child Internet Safety it was found that more than 4 in 5 young people aged 5-15 now access the internet at home. Of these 66% are under the age of 7! As well as this evidence also suggests that children in the UK aged 8-17 spend 44 hours per month online; while their parents thought it was more like 19 hours each month (Symantec Corporation, 2009b). In fact it was found that children were spending more time on the internet than watching TV!

So how safe are they? There are lots of great sites out there for children of all ages that are safe and easy to use but how can we monitor children’s activity and make sure they understand the simple rules to stay safe. There are some simple rules which once in place will help.

• Try and keep the computer in a communal area where it is easily visible
• Use a filtering software
• Agree on some suitable sites together
• Explain about viruses and how they can be avoided
• Have strategies in place to deal with any nasty or bullying messages
• Use a username rather than real name
• Keep all personal information private, including passwords
• Don’t share accounts
• Explain that people aren’t always what they seem and to be wary of accepting unknown people as friends
• Treat each other with respect

Cyberbullying is becoming more widespread and can be very nasty especially if it gets out of hand. Make sure your child knows what to do and who to tell if it happens to them or someone they know.

• Tell someone they trust
• Change their contact details including email address
• Block contacts who may be causing concern
• Change mobile number if necessary
• Keep any evidence as more serious cases may need to involve the police

There are some great site to help parents and young people of all ages which you can have a look at together

www.thinkuknow.co.uk/

www.childline.org.uk/explore/onlinesafety/pages/safesurfing.aspx