Laugh At It And Your Part Of It!

The Goverment's new campaign called 'Laugh at it and your part of it' will run for six weeks on social networking websites Myspace and Bebo, as well as MSN Instant Messenger and Yahoo.

Children using these services will be faced with pop-up adverts showing examples of text messages and cyberspace abuse and bullying.

This move by the Government comes after a recent study by DCSF that up to 34 per cent of 12 - 15 year olds had experienced a form of cyberbullying.

The Govenment's cyberbullying campaign gives practical advice to children through the form of a quiz and facts.

As educators are we doing our bit and educating children how to stay safe or are we hiding behind the traditional methods of teaching and ignoring the realities of the real world? Children need to be taught how to use technologies effectively and safely. They need to be taught the right and wrong way to use these just like they are taught what is acceptable behaviour. Why should cyberbullying be left to the ICT teacher in many schools rather than be part of PSD? We need to educate our children about acceptable use now rather than leave it too late and the child turns around and states 'but I did not think this would happen!'