Equiessence

This advice came from a school newsletter and I think is good reading for all families.

■ Start early. Experts recommend discussing good online behaviour from when children are 6 or 7 years old.
■ Establish rules around where, when and how your child can use the Internet and mobile phone. Online communications should be as respectful and courteous as face-to-face conversations. Cyber bullying is as harmful as offline abuse.
■ Keep technology out in the open if possible. The safest place to have Internet access is in an open family area, not in the child’s bedroom. Kids who are online or receiving text messages late at night are probably not getting enough sleep and impact on their school day.
■ Consider a technology curfew.
Recharge phones and laptops in the kitchen overnight. If there are computers in the bedroom, make sure they’re turned off at an agreed time.
■ Educate your child about the permanent nature of things posted online. Teachers, prospective employers, friends and family can view offensive comments and photos they put on the Internet years later.
■ Familiarise yourself with social media your child uses. If possible, when they are 13, have them accept you as a Facebook online friend, so you can read what they – and their friends – are publishing. If they are worried about their privacy, remind them the World Wide Web isn’t private.
■ Take cyber bullying seriously.
Really listen to your child and discuss the situation with them. Find out the entire sequence of events so you can understand both sides of the story – whether your child was the victim or the bully.
■ Remember nice kids also cyber bully. The combination of being anonymous online, how quickly messages can be sent (faster than one thinks through consequences) and how easy it is to forward an unkind message from one person to the other all make online bullying an easy pitfall for any child.
■ Don’t overreact. Kids also fear parents will make the situation worse – and we often do, unintentionally. Your child also needs to learn resilience and that hurt feelings are an unavoidable part of life. Bullying is not.
■ Stop – take a breath and consider if the offending comment was intentional or just poor communication. Misunderstandings happen easily online.
■ Report any abuse to your child’s mobile phone provider, or the website if you think it’s warranted. (Facebook, MySpace and Bebo all have information on their sites about reporting abuse.)
■ Get your child to take a break from the interactions and gain a little perspective. Online bullying can seem relentless because it can be reread 24/7, comments can fly thick and fast and it can genuinely seem like the world is against them. This is why a technology curfew can also give you or their friends a chance to counteract the abuse with some positive comments.
■ Make it safe for your child to tell you or another adult about being bullied – they won’t if they believe you’ll respond by restricting their access to the computer or mobile phone.
■ Tell the school principal if you feel the behaviour is intentional and you fear it’s likely to continue. (Friends break up and make up regularly, bullying has the specific intention of harming or harassing someone.)
■ Keep the evidence. You don’t want your child rereading it, but you may want to print it out, screen save it or send it to your own email account before deleting abusive messages. *(Police advise however that if it’s something they are going to be asked to investigate, the original message is the best evidence.)

Tips for Online Communication include:
■ Don’t say anything online you wouldn’t say to someone’s face.
■ Be nice and friendly. Use emoticons so people know when you’re joking.
■ Tell your mum or dad or another adult if someone sends you a mean message.
■ Don’t reply to a bully. They like upsetting people and you can’t win against them.
■ If a friend upsets you, remember it’s easy to accidentally sound hurtful online because people can’t hear your voice and can’t always tell if you’re joking.
■ Never give your real name, your address, your phone number or your email address to someone you meet online.
■ If someone sends you a mean or embarrassing message about someone else, don’t forward it to your other friends. Don’t help bullies hurt other kids!
■ Be a good friend. If one of your friends is being bullied online or face-to-face, tell an adult.
■ Treat online communications as carefully as you would face-to-face discussions. Written messages are easily misinterpreted because we convey much of our meaning through facial expressions and our tone of voice.
■ Stop. Don’t jump to conclusions. Was it meant as a joke? Could you have misunderstood the sender? It’s so easy to crack a joke in writing and have it fall flat – or worse, sound like a criticism.
■ Let the sender know the message was hurtful if you think they may not have intended to upset you.
■ Don’t respond at all if you think their intention was to be abusive. If a bully is baiting you, the worst thing you can do is respond.
■ Block them. Unfriend them, remove them from your list of contacts or find out if your phone company can block them from phoning/ texting you. (Some providers can do that.)
■ Try to have the abusive messages deleted. If you can’t do that yourself, report the abuse and ask for it to be removed.
■ Reread your messages. Could they be misinterpreted? Have you sent it to the right person, or have you hit “Reply all”?
■ Be patient – if you are upset about something, wait 10 minutes before you write a message. Remember, once you hit “send” it has gone into cyberspace forever!
■ Use emoticons to indicate you are joking, smiling etc. Simple as it sounds, they can totally change how someone reads your message.
■ Keep your private details private. Never give your password or logon details to anyone, even your best friends.
■ Leave chat rooms when you don’t feel comfortable.
■ Tell your parents or an adult you trust if you receive hurtful messages, texts, emails etc. If you’re worried they’ll overreact or remove your mobile phone “to protect you”, explain that it will just make you feel more isolated and victimised.
■ Give yourself some time out. If you keep rereading the abusive messages, or continue communicating with the bully, you’re giving them more power to upset you. Online bullying can seem relentless and comments can fly thick and fast, making a bad situation worse. Spend some time (online or offline) with a good friend, get some exercise or just get out of the house for a while. If it’s nighttime, turn
the computer off and do something else. The more upset you become the less you’re able to handle a situation.
■ Be a supportive friend. Experts say kids can have a bigger impact than adults can when they support their friends who are being bullied. You don’t need to expose yourself to abuse – if you see someone bully your friend in a chat room or on a Facebook wall, you can contact them privately and offer emotional support.
■ Tell an adult you trust if your friend needs help.
■ Don’t forward hurtful messages, photos or videos. It’s hard to step in and stop physical bullying, but you have absolute control over what messages you forward.
■ Keep all harassing emails (and any replies you’ve made) as evidence. Save them, but don’t reread them.
■ Tell your year adviser, school counsellor, sports coach or someone you trust at school. You may not want to, but if you’re worried about the bullying it could affect your schoolwork. You have every right to feel safe and supported at school.

For further information
www.schools.nsw.edu.au/click
and:http://www.schools.nsw.edu.au/news/technology/cybersafety/index.php