18 | TECHNOLOGY SPECIAL
E-SAFET Y
www.ie-today.co.uk SAFETY FIRST
Get ing e-safety right is vital for schools. Here’s a case study from Manor High School and RM Education
part of Ofsted’s inspection.
To help schools get e-safety right, RM Education published a wide range of free e-safety resources throughout November, including E-safety: A Practical Guide, lesson plans, tips on how to make e-safety policies eff ective, case studies and insight from e-safety experts. In schools, excitement about the amazing learning opportunities presented by the internet is
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tempered by worry about the potential dangers online. But the answer isn’t to run, hide and pretend the internet doesn’t exist or ban its use in school. What schools need are robust, fully embedded e-safety policies and e-safety lessons delivered within a culture
where online behaviour is given the same focus as behaviour in the classroom. Combine this with eff ective monitoring, fi ltering and training and you’re on the right path.
ith mobile devices proliferating, e-safety has never been more important, not least because it now forms
We can’t eliminate the risk, but we can educate our young people how to behave and what to do if things go wrong.
Case study: Manor High School Manor High School is a convertor Academy with approximately 900 students aged between 10 and 14.
Assistant head teacher, Ian Wilson, shares the story of how e-safe’s monitoring system quickly became a valuable tool “Although there was lit le
Ian Wilson
inappropriate use of the system, there was a small but constant number of referrals to pastoral staff from students concerned
about name calling and some bullying using various social networks along with school provision. The assistant head teachers responsible for e-safety and pupil welfare (both of whom are DSP and CEOP Level 2 trained) became aware of the potential of the e-safe system to provide timely data relating to actual student behaviour.
“An initial trial of e-safe, over a term, showed that although the extent of system misuse
was minor, a small number of students were using the
system inappropriately. The most common fi nding was abusive language in emails. On the basis of the trial we commit ed to the on-going use of e-safe education; it was installed, with off -site monitoring and tiered response reporting. Initially, weekly reports showed several dozen youngsters using ICT inappropriately. Some was relatively trivial, such as bad language in emails; nonetheless pastoral staff and class teachers were alerted by the e-safe system and able take suitable steps. In a minority of cases students used ICT to harass or bully their peers and immediate action was possible - in the most serious cases e-safe’s response is extremely rapid. “Awareness of the extent of the misuse led to a re-emphasis on proper use of ICT by students and greater vigilance by staff . Students rapidly became aware that activity was actively monitored, and quickly modifi ed their behaviour. By the second month, the number of reports had reduced to a handful. “A youngster already known to the safeguarding team at empted to investigate a suicide web site. In this case action was possible within an hour or so. In another case a student previously unknown to the safeguarding team made a disclosure in a piece of typed work that may never otherwise have been seen by an adult; support was swiftly put in place and a vulnerable child protected. “The extent of the information generated by e-safe provides an insight into off -task behaviour using ICT which is valuable for class teachers as the hard data enables them to challenge students and call them to account for mis-spent time.
“My advice to other schools is simple: don’t be complacent. We were originally unconvinced of the need of monitoring but our trial and subsequent adoption has convinced us of the value of it. E-safe should be seen as part of the safeguarding provision in a school not as part of the ICT infrastructure. The insight that can be gained into young people’s needs and behaviour is extremely valuable.” iE
Go to
www.rm.com/esafety for more information on e-safe as well as a free guide E-safety: A Practical Guide for Schools plus lesson plans and a whole raft of e-safety resources.
EDUCATION I N D E P E N D E N T
T O D A Y THE
TECHNOLOGY SPECIAL
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