Student Wellbeing

Digital Citizenships...

What does this term even mean?

In today’s rapidly evolving digital environment, students often find themselves becoming digital citizens the moment they begin using digital technologies, such as signing up for an email address, using the internet and mobile phones. It is therefore important that students should come to recognise the value of taking responsibility for themselves and their actions, and of treating others with an appropriate standard of behaviour online.

During weeks 5 and 6, the Senior School Wellbeing team organised for the Orange Police Youth Liaison officer, Jane Heffernan, to visit the school and speak with Years 7, 8 and 9. The aim of Jane’s sessions was to empower the students with the knowledge of how their reputations can be affected by their interactions online, what language and actions are considered appropriate online, and to give them practical strategies to avoid participating in negative online behaviours. Jane discussed three main topic areas; cyberbullying, sexting and online grooming and the talks were invaluable. Below are links to two fact sheets that outlines the main point discussed in these sessions; one on cyberbullying and the other on sexting.

http://www.lawstuff.org.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/14883/CyberBullying-fact-sheet.pdf

http://www.lawstuff.org.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/14888/Sexting-fact-sheet.pdf

What can we do as parents to help guide our kids on this digital citizenship journey?

Stay involved in your child’s use of technology.
Set up your own account and learn about privacy settings so you can understand how you can best protect your child (I now have snapchat much to my eldest son’s disgust and understand what it means to be in ‘ghost mode’).
Show your child how to manage location services on their phone so they are not inadvertently broadcasting their location. Help them to set up alerts to let them know if they have been ‘tagged’ in photos that have been posted by others.
Read the ‘terms of use’ on social media services and make sure your child understands what is expected. Some sites, like Club Penguin, are created especially for children. Many, such as Facebook and Instagram, require users to be at least 13 years.
Ensure that your children set their accounts to private so that the only people who can view their information are those they trust.
Encourage children to think before they put anything online and to be respectful of others. Information posted online can be difficult or impossible to remove. An inappropriate image posted today may have a long term impact on their digital reputation. In the last two years I have had one student knocked back for an apprenticeship owing to pictures on his ‘public’ Facebook account and another student being ineligible for a Gap Year with a company due to his inappropriate email account name.
Finally remind children to be careful when making new friends online as people may not be who they say they are.

Please do not hesitate to contact your child’s Head Tutor or Tutor should you have any concerns about your child and their use of technology.

Mrs Emma Bylsma

Head of Student Wellbeing