Friday, August 18, 2006

Internet Safety

Now, more than ever it is important to teach our children at a very young age to be safe online. This ties directly to Acceptable Use Policies that most schools or districts now have in place.

You can find many sets of rules online, but it's sometimes difficult to explain to younger children. This week's post will contain links to resources that help teach students of all ages about Internet safety.

CyberSmart!
This is a very user friendly site for K-8 teachers. You can find complete lesson plans with worksheets and links. Lessons are divided into K-1, 2-3, 4-5, and 6-8. You can find these activities at http://www.cybersmartcurriculum.org/lesson_plans/ .

NetSmartz Kids- http://www.netsmartzkids.org/indexfl.htm
Elementary age students can learn to be safe online with Nettie, Clicky, Router, Webster and Gig as their guide. Colorfully animated games, songs, and activities make it easy for students to learn valuable lessons.

Disney Internet Safety
Disney has several videos for teaching online safety.
Snow White's Bad Apple- Teaches not to accept gifts- online or otherwise- from strangers
http://disney.go.com/webtoons/badapple/index.html

Who's Afraid of Little Sweet Sheep- demonstrates the dangers of giving out personal information and agreeing to meet online "friends" http://disney.go.com/webtoons/threepigs/index.html

Safety Tips from Doug's Online Adventures - http://disney.go.com/webtoons/doug_safety/index.html
A set of rules for staying safe online

Mr. Toad's Webmania- learn about spam and rules of netiquette
http://disney.go.com/webtoons/webmania/index.html

SurfSwell Island - http://disney.go.com/surfswell/index.html
Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Donald and Daisy take students on an adventure to learn about viruses, protecting personal information and Internet etiquette with a fun sequences of questions.
Comes complete with a glossary, parent's guide and teacher's guide.

I Keep Safe - http://www.ikeepsafe.org
Teach students about the dangers of strangers online with Faux Paw. The site contains information for teacher and parents to use to keep children safe online.

Nortel LearnIt Videos
http://www.nortellearnit.org/technology/
Geared for middle and high school students these videos provide detailed information to help them stay safe online. Digital ethics covers copyright and rules of the road. Discovering the Internet provides history and an understanding of how the Internet works. Online safety discusses protecting privacy, firewalls, spyware, and viruses. Most of the videos are about five minutes long and packed with good information.


There is a lot of good information packed in these sites to make it easy to teach our children to stay safe.

Until next time...keep our kids safe and
Happy Computing!

-Cindy

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