How to Teach Internet Safety to Kids
Teaching your child about Internet safety is an important part of keeping them safe while online. Although you may already have taken measures to block accessibility or restrict your children’s time spend online, helping your children understand why you do these things and what they can do to further their safety is also essential to Internet safety.
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Show your children how to use the Internet. When your children are first introduced to the Internet, they might be overwhelmed by the power it gives them. This can cause your children to make dangerous mistakes, and learn from them only after the damage from those mistakes has become readily apparent. The first part of teaching Internet safety to your child should include showing them how to use the Internet, and explaining why they shouldn't visit certain websites, talk to strangers or use chat rooms, and so on.
To make it easier for younger children to navigate the Internet safely, find their favorite websites and create a list of bookmarks for your child under your "Favorites." This will allow your children to safely surf online by allowing them to choose from a "pre-approved" list of websites, and reduce the risk of your child stumbling onto an inappropriate website.
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Teach your children that predators pose as other kids. At this point, your children have likely already learned all about strangers and how to act when they come across one. This knowledge can be applied to the Internet, as well. Teach your children about online strangers and predators, making sure to emphasis that just because someone says that are another kid, doesn't mean they are. Sometimes, adults pretend to be other kids so they can gain a child's trust, and then get information out of them that they normally wouldn't share with strangers. Teaching your children to treat everyone as a stranger – unless they already know them well offline, like a school friend – will help them keep their personally identifying information concealed.
Be careful when explaining this, especially to younger children; you could accidentally instill a fear of the Internet in your children. Emphasize to your children that the risk for being found can be decreased to almost nothing by practicing Internet safety every single time they sign online.
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Explain what information should never be revealed. Everyone who has ever used the Internet has likely revealed personal information that he would normally never share with strangers – and many of us have done it without even realizing it. Children are even more likely than adults to reveal information that should never be shared online, especially since they don't understand how certain pieces of seemingly useless information can actually help a stranger find that child offline. Obviously, your child should be taught not to discuss their basic personal information – such as their first and last name, date of birth, address and phone number – but you also need to explain the importance of keeping other seemingly innocuous information concealed, as well. Things like the name of your children’s school, their teachers' names, the sports teams they play for, where they practice, and any extra-curricular activities they participate in can give away where a predator can find them instantly. Stress the importance of keeping all information about your child confidential, and to never discuss any names or locations of anything they do with anyone online that they don't already know in real life.
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Make your child's social networking profiles private. Some online predators use websites like MySpace and Facebook to track down and befriend children, gaining access to the most sensitive information, and using it to find intended targets. Even if your children don't reveal any of their personal information on their profiles themselves, comments from friends can give online predators all the information they need. For this reason, you should require your children to keep any social networking profiles that they maintain completely private, and request that they use your email address as their log-in name. That way, any Friend requests or messages can be seen and tracked by you, and you will have the final approval whether an individual can be friended by your child – which will give that new "friend" access to your children’s otherwise private profile.
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Tell your children to report any suspicious online activity to you. If your children ever feel uncomfortable while talking to others online, or come across a website that makes them feel uneasy, tell them to report what they find immediately to you or another adult. This will allow you to review the situation and take any appropriate action necessary. If an individual makes suggestive or offensive comments to your children while they are chatting with them, you can save a record of the conversation and report it to the authorities, if it's deemed necessary. This will also encourage your children to turn to you for guidance whenever they run into trouble online, while simultaneously keeping you informed of any problems that arise so you can better protect your children while they are online.
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