This article explains how the government is planning on banning social media for children under the age of 16.

Online Safety Newsletter Primary July 2026 6 Heritage Coast 29-06-2026

[pdf 275KB]

This months newsletter contains information about online scams and the risk of auto saving photos on apps like Whats App.

Online Safety Newsletter Primary June 2026 6 Heritage Coast 19-05-2026

[pdf 258KB]

Search engines are now an integral part of everyday life. This guide explains the risks associated with search engines and offiers practical advice to help safeguard young users online.

search-engines

[pdf 2MB]

This months newsletter provides advice on age appropriate gaming, how to understand PEGI ratings and how to set parental controls. It also containd information about AI and how to talk to your child about harmful online influencers.

Online Safety Newsletter Primary April 2026

[pdf 449KB]

Our EYFS and Key Stage One children at Hawsker had a fantastic day learning all about AI and creating their own robots! We talked about the difference between real friends and robots, learning that computers can be clever but dont share fellings like real people do. They expolored what is safe to share and the golden rule - Always ask a grown up before sharing anything online. 

This months newsletter is all about Instagram, snapchat and parental controls.

Online Safety Newsletter Primary Jan 2026 6 Heritage Coast 18-12-2025

[pdf 366KB]

This months newsletter features information on new technology and snapbots.

Online Safety Newsletter Primary Dec 2025 6 Heritage Coast 27-11-2025

[pdf 594KB]

The first newsletter of 2025 features parental guidance features on Fortnite and age guides for social media apps. 

Online Safety Newsletter Primary January 2025 Heritage Coast 06-01-2025

[pdf 327KB]

Any child or young person can experience online abuse. If you’ve noticed something worrying, are concerned about something that's happened, or a child or young person has spoken out about abuse, then it’s important you respond appropriately.

Take a look at the below article on how online abuse can be recognised and dealt with at home:

Online Abuse Article

This months newsletter features information on CapCut and help for those families who have experienced un-kind words online. 

Online Safety Newsletter Primary July 2024 Heritage Coast 28-06-2024 (1)

[pdf 363KB]

This months newsletter features Fortnite and its Battle Royal feature:

Fortnite Battle Royale is rated PEGI 12 because it features moderate violence which means it is not suitable for persons under 12 years of age.
It is important to remember that when rating games, PEGI do not take into consideration the communication features of a game. Fortnite does include a chat facility, which adds further risks.

Take a further look at our attached newsletter for more information and guidance. 

Online Safety Newsletter Primary March 2024 Heritage Coast 29-02-2024 (1)

[pdf 788KB]

Oak Class have had two amazing workshops lead by Rachel from the Children's Society.

These sessions focused on the importance of staying safe on social media. The children had so many questions and discussion points that Rachel kindly gave up some more of her time to work with us again today to explore these ideas in more depth and develop our knowledge and awareness of cyber-bullying.

A huge thank you to Rachel for providing us with such valuable lessons for life and some very important discussions.

Our Digital Footprint 

What is a digital footprint? We have the NSPCC to help us describe what a digital footprint is and what it can mean for your child:

'Whenever you visit a website, share a photo or make a comment online, you leave a digital footprint that other people can see. Your digital footprint includes all the information you share or that’s collected about you online, and there can be a lot of it.

Lots of the information you share can be seen by other people. It can be used to target adverts at you, or it could be seen by a potential employer years later. Sometimes people can use the details you share to work out your identity.

Your footprint can be both good and bad. It could show things you’re embarrassed about later, or help people to see your skills or things you’re proud of.'

With this in mind, and with Santa possibly delivering electronic devices this year for Christmas, it may be time to speak with your child about what their digital footprint could be and how to manage this effectively. 

The NSPCC have a wonderful guide aimed at older children on how to secure their information online and make their online behaviours as safe as possible:

NSPCC - Our Digital Footprint

We have recently been visted by a local PCSO who spoke with Oak Class about internet safety, keeping both themselves safe, keeping an open dialog with parents and carers about online activity, what could be classed as dangerous online activity and warning signs to look out for when using the internet. We are so grateful to have such a helpful local police force and for the PCSO's  time. 

Online Gaming

Something which a lot of children engage in is online gaming whether it be Roblox, Fortnite or other platforms. Knowing and understanding these games can really help parents to explore these games safely with their children, boundries with gaming can create a healthy relationship with gaming!

A Guide to Parental Controls

This guide will help you set up parental controls to provide your child with a safer online environment. Parental controls can help to protect your child from seeing something that they shouldn’t - although it is important to emphasise that no system is effective all of the time so it is important to engage with your child and talk to them about their online life regularly

Parental Controls booklet 2022 (1)

[pdf 4MB]

Online Safety Newsletter

We have joined forces with Knowsley City Learning Centres to share an informative newsletter looking at online safety including safety when using our money online and an update to age restrictions on Omegle. 

Online Safety Newsletter Primary June 2023 Heritage Coast 21-06-2023 (1)

[pdf 394KB]

Have you heard of Swiggle?

Are you worried about what your children may stumble across when searching online? Even the most attentive parent can’t always be looking over their child’s shoulder 24/7, checking if what they’re viewing is appropriate.

Welcome to Swiggle.org.uk, the ad-free child friendly search engine.

Great Online Skills Start Here

Good practice starts young and encouraging healthy attitudes and behaviours from your child as part of their online life is best when it involves you. After all, wouldn’t you want to be the first person your child goes to when they find online content that makes them feel upset, embarrassed or frightened?

Swiggle has been designed to support young children when searching for images or content online. Generic search engines can throw up a host of difficulties and embarrassing incidents when children stumble across inappropriate content (either accidentally or deliberately). Even with “safer searching” filters switched on, image searches can often return thumbnails to content that is wholly inappropriate yet in full view.

Ofcom’s research has shown that 86% of 3-4 year olds have access to a tablet at home and 21% have their own tablet.

Children of all ages enjoy using technology. We now see young children going online to play games, talk to family, watch videos and even learn to use voice enabled tech like Alexa and Siri to find out about their world.

Having a conversation about online safety can begin as soon as your child is engaging with technology. Use these conversation starters to help get the conversation started:

1. What is your favourite thing to do on the iPad/tablet/my phone etc?
2. What is your favourite game/app and why do you like it?
3. Where do we use the iPad/tablet/games console and when can we use it?
4. What can you do if something online upsets you?
5. Who can help you with your favourite games and apps?
6. If a message appears on the screen, what should you do?
7. Who can go online? Do we know everyone online?

Gaming is loved and enjoyed by children and adults across the UK, which has the sixth largest games market globally, with 37.3 million people playing games including 69% of 6 to 10-year-olds. However, whilst it can be a great way for children to socialise, learn new skills, be part of a team and relax, it also carries risks. The YGAM website provides parents with a wealth of really useful information to give you a better understanding exactly what those PEGI ratings mean and how to ensure children stay safe online. There are useful guides about different games to demystify these for parents and alert you to potential risks of microtransactions.

https://parents.ygam.org/gaming-topic/information/

National Online Safety Accreditation

We are delighted to announce that we have successfully achieved our third National Online Safety Certified School Accreditation for our whole school community approach to protecting children in the online world. Staff, parents and pupils have successfully completed a comprehensive online safety training programme from this multi award winning provider, demonstrating our commitment to keeping children and young people safe online.

National Online Safety provide a wealth of educational resources to support UK schools and help all members of our community to make the internet a safer place for children. We all know that it can be increasingly difficult for parents to stay ahead of online threats and ensure that everyone is safeguarded from potentially harmful and inappropriate online material. The site includes safety guides for most of the popular social media sites and games, which can arm you with the knowledge you need to understand online dangers and react in the best way possible to any problems. Please speak to a member of staff if you would like information about any of these.

We are really proud to have achieved this accreditation once again, and we would like to thank and congratulate everyone who was involved in the process. Special thanks to Mrs Ludlam, as she has really supported our Federation journey in this area.

Lots of children tell us about watching content on Youtube, but some of you may not be aware that there is YouTube Kids, which is a child-friendly version of YouTube, offering a colourful and easy-to-navigate environment which is more suitable for young children. The app is easily accessible and can be downloaded for phones and tablets without needing the YouTube app to be on the device already. Although YouTube Kids is obviously intended to be (and mainly succeeds in being) an extremely child-friendly platform, it has still raised concerns over its advertising policy as well as inappropriate content seeping through the curation process.

In the guide, you'll find tips such as disabling the search option, restricting viewing time and monitoring the watch history to support online safety.

You Tube Kids

[pdf 2MB]