Internet Safety

The internet is a tricky thing. In the first place it was almost driven by the pornography industry but since has quickly become an information source used by most people on a daily basis, but because it is used by so many and is free to be used in almost any manner it is very important that we, as educators and parents, need to teach the best way to use the internet.
There are safety precautions that schools an parents can take such as internet blockers but I think that it is more important to actually teach the hows and whys to children rather than only shelter them. There is going to be a time when they are on computers without filters and blockers and will be prone to a lot more if they are not taught the safety hows and whys. There are internet sites that are for teachers, parents and students that teach internet safety such as, CyberSmart and iSafe. It is also very important that as teachers we make sure that any research project given to students is meant to be supervised. As a first grade teacher I do not want my students to ever be on the internet unsupervised. To me this means they are either at school where a teacher is in the room, at the library where there are filters on the computer that are quite insuppressible or at home where a parent is at least in the room. For this I would send home a letter to parents letting them know what is going on and how the internet should be used if at all. In the end there is only so much a teacher can do to protect her students, and a parent to do to protect their child. In the end it comes down to what the child has learned and is applying in their own lives.