Online Safety

I offer advice and training to raise awareness of digital and online child safety and offer practical solutions for those working in language teaching contexts.

My interest in online safety stems from my time as an IT coordinator when I learnt to expect the unexpected from both learners and staff alike. As a consequence, we learnt to collaborate to develop appropriate, resilient policies, so that everyone understood the importance of safeguarding children online, the issues involved, and the need to be on board with implementing and adhering to these policies. 

I have given conference presentations, workshops, and consultancy on the subject. 

Past presentations

• A plenary online presentation for World Teacher’s Day on building a secure online environment for young learners and teens. The British Council and IATEFL:
• A showcased presentation for LTSIG’s (Learning Technologies SIG) on safeguarding young learners online at the IATEFL conference.
• A guest speaker presentation on online safety for the YLTSIG annual IATEFL web conference, and a following year as an invited panel expert for a debate on the use, or not, of mobile phones in class.
• Numerous national and local workshops and talks. 

Articles and web contributions

• A contribution of the online safeguarding section of the IATEFL YLTSIG website. IATEFL YLTSIG website.
• A contribution to the online safety section for children in the International House Certificate in Online Tutoring.
• A featured article in the IATEFL YLTSIG magazine on “Safeguarding children and teens online.”
• A post for the SIG blog on the importance of not posting a child’s face online.
• The safety insights section in the Emergency Remote Teaching Playbook, a rapid response publication produced in response to the situations arising from the pandemic in March 2020.