The issue of online safety crops up in the media, time and again.  Constantly, we are alerted to the fact that children and other vulnerable people can access pornographic or other inappropriate material. Reports also indicate that online bullying is happening on many of the social networking sites.  We also know that there are people out there who know how to steal credit card details, and even enough information to create entire identities.

All of this is a matter of concern to adult educators. It is not only children who are vulnerable, and adults also have a responsibility to protect themselves and their families. If you are not a parent yourself, the chances are that you teach people who are. Where better for your learners to acquire an improved understanding of e-Safety, than in your classes?

Help is at hand. Earlier this year, the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS) published a new set of materials on e-Safety on the Excellence Gateway, entitled “Safeguarding FE learners in a digital world“. The pages consist of some sound general advice, supported by some specific case studies. Don’t be put off by the title, these useful web pages are relevant to teachers and managers in ACL and the Third Sector, as well as in Further Education.

The American site ‘The Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use’ is also worth looking at. While it is very schools centred, it has some useful advice backed by some solid research. Some of this will reassure you that for example sexual predation on the Internet is not as rife as some of the newspapers would have us believe.

Closer to home, the excellent Wisekids site is a good source of information in its own right, as well as being a portal to a vast range of other resources. The emphasis is on  ‘positive, innovative and safe Internet use’. More power to their elbow!

This entry was posted on Monday, June 8th, 2009 at 8:01 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.