In the final part of a series of posts, we examine the latest research on how young people and the wider population in the UK use the internet, and what it means for Local Authorities, schools and teachers.

Education
Education for parents on effective means of locking, privacy control and timing. This means developing adult skills so that they feel empowered to have conversations with children about online safety as well as understand how to take appropriate technical steps to manage online risks on behalf of their children, which are appropriate to their age and competence. Furthermore, we will empower children to develop their own skills and become strong swimmers in these rapidly moving online waters. This is part of what some
people call ‘media literacy’.

Filtering
Not a top-down approach. Must be collaborative with children, empowering them to take responsibility for their online behaviours.

Safety
There is too much information about web safety, so much it appears daunting. Web safety information will be drawn into a “one stop shop” later this year by a UK Government (Westminster) task force.

Increasing creativity
Creativity is limited to uploading photos on SNSs and creating profiles, with girls, who are more active on SNSs anyway, being more likely to do this than boys.

Other ‘creative’ activities are: making a playlist of music, adding comments (all above 30%). Other activities like making ringtones, short movies on mobile phones or camcorders or writing a blog are done by small amounts (less than one fifth of 12-15s). Rural teens seem to be more likely to be creative online.

Categories: Learning and Teaching Scotland, Research