My grade 6s all have netbooks provided by DEECD as part of 1 to 1 trail. The netbooks, while at school, are blocked from accessing inappropriate material. However, students need to turn off proxy server and therefore all protection, in order to be able to use internet at home.
Just this week we have uncovered 2 cases of boys accessing porn and suicide sites, with one of the boys showing other children as young as 7 explicit videos! While on one hand it is good that we are able to check, monitor and report concerns we have about student welfare because of their internet "footprints," it is a concern that students of this age are able to access this material at all. While I always promote and discuss responsible use and most adhere to this advice, there will always be some that ignore this.
It also makes me think about the problems around wireless technology and small devices like the netbooks and mobile phones. Computers used to live in living rooms and therefore could easily be monitored by parents. Now technology is small and mobile. It is more difficult for parents to be able to monitor student use when students are able to 'hide away' or the screen is too small to be seen easily by others.
We have now checked all student netbooks, and thankfully the remaining 14 students are using their netbooks as intended, for school work, communication and skill practice/games.
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