Online Safety at Home

The parent/carer - child relationship is the foundation to keeping children safe and supporting their educational attainment and social development.

Maintaining an open dialogue with your child about the use of the internet and discussion on how to behave online will help them to keep safe online.

There are a lot of resources online to support you in keeping your child safe online.

Childnet's family agreement helps to set clear expectations form positive and safe internet use. Childnet's Family Agreement Children's Commissioner's Guide to Children Staying Safe Online

Internetmatters.org has created online safety checklists for

Pre-school children

Young Children

Pre-teens (11-13 years)

Digital Wellbeing / Screen Time

Children's Commissioners Digital 5 a Day

Internet Matters Guide - Managing Children's Screen Time

Source: UK CMO commentary on screen-based activities and children/young people's mental health and psychosocial wellbeing (February 2019).

Gaming

Gaming is a fun and sociable way to spend time, encouraging teamwork and developing skills. There are some risks parents/carers need to be aware of to help their child stay safe and have a positive gaming experience.

National Online Safety has published some useful guidelines for parents and carers:

Find more information on online gaming risks here.

AI - Artificial Intelligence

At Dundonald Primary School, we embrace technology as a powerful tool for learning. However our priority is always the safety and well-being of our students.

Please click on the link below which gives you information about the associated safeguarding risks and some top tips on how to talk about AI at home.

LGFL Dundonald AI letter to parents, January 2026

Device Safety (Settings)

To make sure children are safe online, it is advised to set their devices up before use.

Internet Matters has designed a simple checklist to give parents/carers peace of mind regarding their child's safety on the internet. ('Set up Safe Checklist'). Their information about parental controls can be found here.

Information about how to set up filters on your home internet (BT, SKY. TalkTalk, Virgin Media) to help prevent age inappropriate content being accessed can be found here at the UK Safter Internet Centre (video tutorial). The UK Safer Internet Centre (UKSIC) has provided this resource.

Please click here at the UK Safer Internet Centre to find out about safety features and settings offered by the main web browsers (e.g. Google Chrome, Apple Safari, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox). (Source: UK Safer Internet Centre)

Parents'/Carers' Guide to Technology

Guide to buying an Internet-Connected Device

Advice about smartphones, gaming devices, tablets and other internet-connected devices (UKSIC)

Smartphone Purchase - Expert Tips

Internet Matters gives advice on things to consider when buying a mobile phone and compares a selected range of phones and their safety features. Find out more at Internet Matters.

CHILDNET | Online Resources for Parents and Carers

Childnet Parents and Carers Resource Sheet

Useful Websites

Kids Online Safety is a website set up by the Government to support families and encourage regular conversations about what they're seeing online. It provides tips for conversations with children, actions to support each stage of your child's life and parental controls information. They are also signposting to trusted resources from charities and trusted third parties where you can access other forms of support.

The National College has lots of guides, courses, helpful videos and tips for parents on topics such as screen addiction, online challenges, age ratings, catfishing and lots more. Their WakeUpWednesday guides can be found at the bottom of this page.

www.internetmatters.org: This website has lots of information, advice and resources which can be used to help children stay safe online.

CEOP (Child Exploitation and Online Protection Command): CEOP works with child protection partners across the UK and overseas to identify the main threats to children and coordinates activity against these threats to bring offenders to account, protecting children from harm online and offline.

BBC (Webwise): Information and support for safe use of the internet

For more advice on online safety visit: