Safeguarding Responsibilities:
It is the right and responsibility of parents and carers to make decisions that keep their child safe outside of school, and we are providing this information and associated recommendations to support that responsibility.
As with all areas of safeguarding, we will inform the parent/ carer if we become aware that a child’s behaviour or choices may potentially be posing a risk to their safety.
Our school position:
We do not allow mobile phones to be used on school premises. If a child walks to/from school on their own and their parent/carer wishes for them to have a phone to enable them to communicate with home during these times, the phone will be stored by the class teacher throughout the school day.
If you would like your child to have a mobile phone, there are two options:
- A non-smart phone
- A smart phone
As a school, our recommendation is that our children do not have access to:
- Social media
- Unrestricted internet browsing (e.g. through Safari or Google)
- Age-inappropriate music and video
This can most easily be achieved by choosing a non-smart phone for your child, on which these functions are not available.
If, however, you do decide to provide your child with a smart phone, it is important that you place the necessary parental restrictions on its use and operate within the law by not allowing them to download age-restricted apps such as social media (e.g. TikTok or Snapchat).
We have risk-assessed the functions of each type of phone as follows:
The Importance of Education
We continue to develop children’s understanding of the potential harms present online and through smart phone use in our E-safety lessons in school and wherever possible through organisations such as Papaya, who have delivered interactive workshops with our KS2 children.
Useful Websites:
For more information about how to safely navigate mobile phone use for your child, we recommend you explore the following links:
Internet Matters
A very useful website for parents and carers to gather all sorts of information about the online world which includes helpful guides and practical support for parents and carers both on understanding online issues as well as how to support your child dealing with issues, should they arise.
Online safety issues - Advice to support children | Internet Matters provides you with online safety advice by age group.
Internet safety advice and information | Internet Matters supports parents and carers with setting controls and understanding how to increase your child’s safety online and when using devices like smartphones.
Parental controls & privacy settings guides | Internet Matters supports parents and carers with understanding the in-built security settings within Android and Apple Smartphones
Guides for Apple and Android devices parental controls | Internet Matters
CEOP website
Again a useful guide for all parents and carers regarding online safety. It also splits into different age groups introducing the children to different characters that can take them through some online learning activities.
Get advice (ceopeducation.co.uk)
Crimestoppers
Crimestoppers is a useful website to understand how online platforms can be used in a negative way.
Understanding Crime Types: Information and Resources | Crimestoppers (crimestoppers-uk.org)
It also provides support to children and parents on how to report information / crimes anonymously.
Smartphone Free Childhood website
The Smartphone Free Childhood website provides lots of information about the harmful aspects of unrestricted smart phone use and provides the opportunity for parents and carers to collectively commit to not providing their child with a smart phone.
You can access this here: https://smartphonefreechildhood.co.uk/