The digital world is a reality of daily life and, to support parents and students with the challenges presented through mobile devices and social media we are working with Digital Awareness, an organisation which aims to empower young people to survive and thrive online. Free resources from Digital Awareness UK can be found here https://www.digitalawarenessuk.com/resources 

Device management at home is another way to support children's learning journey of using technology and navigating the digital world. There are multiple tools available to parents to implement this at home. These can be mostly separated into device restrictions and web filtering. Below, we have outlined some Top Tips for parents, links to the most common devices used at home for parental controls and information on Web Filtering. It is important to remember that many sites can be accessed on many devices, including Smart TVs, so you may consider including these when looking at Device Management at home.

• Create Separate Profiles/Login on all devices for every user
• Do not share accounts/logins, for example iCloud, as this can allow children to see parent's iMessages
• Set up accounts/devices together 
• Do Discuss the minimum age for certain platforms, for example, you shouldn't sign up for Social media under the age of 13.
• Discuss with your child what they should do if they see something that concerns them.
• Set up appropriate web filtering and device restrictions. 

At home, students may have access to multiple devices, please see some links below to set up parental controls for various devices.

One tool we can utilise to keep children safe online is Web Filtering. There are many ways this can be achieved.

Web Filtering on your Home Router

Most Home Routers have the ability to help you filter content on your home WiFi. Each brand and even model may have different instructions on how to achieve this. One downside to using this method is that it only works when connected to your home WiFi, which means it can be easily avoided by using 4G/3G is avalible.

On Device Filtering

Another way of filtering web content is to use a product which is installed at a device level. One App we have tried is Ad Guard (https://adguard-dns.io). Ad Guard allows you to install a profile on your child's device which forces all traffic to use Ad Guards DNS servers which can then filter the traffic based on the rules you set up. This app has a free plan.

Social Media Monitoring

Another area which can be challenging to support your child with is Social Media. One tool that can help with this is Bark (https://www.bark.us/monitor-content/?irclickid=QArSdoXv5xyPUoByH83HA2GuUkHUib1g12Xo100). Bark can assist parent with monitoring Social Media platforms, email and Chat apps such as WhatsApp and alert parents if there is content for concern.