Tactics for teachers

What can teachers of 13 to 15 year old adolescents do to help keep them safe?

  • If children are using school computers, ensure that there is filtering software on the computer.
  • Reinforce the public nature of the Internet and provide adult monitoring of online activities.
  • Monitor increased independence. Even though adolescents can appear as though they can handle things, they actually require and unconsciously seek adult guidance and supervision.
  • Explain where it is appropriate for them to have privacy: confiding in close friends face-to-face, writing in a journal, private space in their bedroom (there is no privacy on the Internet).
  • Explain that once a picture is sent online they lose control of what is done with it. It may never be completely removed from the Internet.
  • Reinforce to be careful with whom they share their personal information as someone could use it to humiliate them or try to manipulate them into sending pictures.
  • Teach them that it is illegal for people to manufacture, possess or distribute naked or sexually explicit pictures of children under 18 years old. They need to tell a safe adult if they are presented with this situation.
  • Reinforce the importance of protecting their friends’ and family’s personal information and pictures. This should apply even when they are upset with people.
  • Encourage them to be leaders and not to forward messages or pictures of others that they receive.
  • Teach them that it is illegal for adults to offer gifts or money in exchange for sexual pictures.
  • Explain to children that it is illegal to threaten someone online or offline. If someone threatens them, they need to tell a safe adult.
  • Explain to children that there is no need or urgency to respond to any messages. Teach children not to respond to messages that make them feel uncomfortable.
  • Discuss dignity and self-respect and how it can be preserved or destroyed by messages sent online and offline.
  • Discuss the difference between healthy and unhealthy relationships. Adolescents should never meet in person someone they first met online without being accompanied by a parent.
  • Discuss high-risk behaviour online and offline and create ‘what if’ scenarios together to help them anticipate dangerous situations and possible solutions.
  • Teach them how to get out of relationships.
  • Encourage open communication and be conscious of their sensitivity to social judgment. They may be hesitant to share personal experiences.