Are you a parent or family member with concerns about someone's gaming? Is it having a negative impact on their studies, family time, going out, other hobbies?
Take a look at this great website - you don't need to live in the area to ask for support from them
The Children's Commissioner, Dame Rachel de Souza, has published a guide to help parents and carers navigate the challenge of managing children's everyday online habits. Written with direct input from children and young people, including teenagers consulted in schools and the Commissioner's Youth Ambassadors. The guide is designed to make difficult conversations easier and more regular.
The guide covers setting boundaries around phone use, talking about harmful content, and building ongoing communication that goes beyond a one-off conversation. The voice of young people runs through it, including this from one teenager: "Don't be afraid to be firm… If you are worried your child is seeing harmful content and you don't know what they're watching and it's affecting their behaviour, just take it that you know best, they don't."
We were incredibly privileged to have Laura Bates come into school to give a talk on how AI algorithms work and how they may be inadvertently boosting and promoting harmful content to end users. This was an amazing talk that can now be viewed here
What to do when....
- your child is asking for their first phone
- you're worried about who your child is talking to whilst online