NEW! Principles for providers of children’s residential care – the help you need to support young people’s online experiences. Developed by Adrienne Katz and Traci Good for the UK Internet Centre’s Vulnerable Users Working Group with contributions from group members. Simple clear ideas you can put into practice.Read More
These principles are aligned with those for Social Workers and work alongside the Digital Passport for carers and young people, also published by this group. These documents will help those with a mixed caseload to work consistently with foster carers and residential care teams. The Principles for Providers of Children’s Residential Care were developed within the work of www.enable-pathway.com, our online accredited training courses created with young people and carers.
A new HUB of advice, support and activities for young people with SEND enables them to make the most of their social media.
Created in partnership with Internet Matters and supported by Facebook, this is where you will find an array of ideas, tools, downloadables and animations to guide teens and their parents, carers and teachers. We address important issues and concerns expressed by parents and young people.in workshops and consultations.
Launch of The Digital Passport for children in care, by Minister for Children, Vicky Ford.
May 2021.
Youthworks was privileged to lead the development of a Digital Passport for children in care and their foster carers. Created by Adrienne Katz with the expert advice of the UK Centre for Internet Safety working group on vulnerable children and focus groups with foster carers and care experienced young people.
Infographic: Online Safety Advice from Parents 2017/8
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infographic: Bullying 2017
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Making Your Secondary School E-Safe £22.99 DISCOUNT OFFER & REVIEWS
‘Making Your Primary School E-Safe‘ £15.99
Please order from www.jkp.com
Read about it or order a copy
This new title from Adrienne Katz argues for a whole school coherent approach to teaching e-safety to primary school children. Schools are offered a complete package: classroom activities, ideas for staff training, policy and procedure, what children need to know and how to help the vulnerable ones.
Are we delivering e-safety messages that stick? The author has questioned over 36,000 children and young people since 2008 and finds that we are not becoming more successful. In this book she argues that we need to make e-safety exciting, relevant and fun.
232pp A4 size, paperback. £15.99
ISBN 9781849055
CYBERSURVEY Current projects 2023
Youthworks issued reports on a wide range of issues. between 2019-2022. Please visit our Cybersurvey pages for the latest news and practice reports from the lockdown years.. The data we collect from children and young people yields rich insights which we use in research and in accessible reports for frontline professionals and policy makers.
Research
Research papers on Online life for Vulnerable Children
- Vulnerable Young People and Their Experience of Online Risks El Asam, A. & Katz, A. (2018). pp 281-304 https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2018.1437544
- Children’s services for the digital age: A qualitative study into current procedures and online risks among service users. El-Asam, A., Katz, A., Street, C. Nazar, N.M and Livanou, M. (2020) Children and Youth Services Review. Volume: 122. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2020.105872
- The “Glaring Gap”: practitioner experiences of integrating the digital lives of vulnerable young people into practice in England. El-Asam, A., Katz, A., Lane, R. (2021). Information, Communication and Society. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2021.1991976
- Psychological Distress and its mediating effect on experiences of online risks: The case for vulnerable young people. El-Asam, A., Katz, A., Lane, R., 2022. Frontiers in Education. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2022.772051
- Social Isolation and Online Relationship-Risk Encounters among Adolescents with Special Educational Needs. El-Asam, A, Colley-Chahal, L. and Katz, A. 2023 https://www.mdpi.com/2673-995X/3/2/44
Partnership
With our research partner, Dr Aiman El Asam, Associate professor in forensic pshychology at the University of Kingston, we were awarded a research grant in the e-Nurture programme.
The project titled “Vulnerability, Online Lives and Mental Health: Towards a New Practice Model” has financial support from the e-Nurture Network and UK Research and Innovation (Research Council Grant Ref: ES/S004467/1).
REPORTS
In Their Own Words. The Digital Lives of Schoolchildren 14th October 2020
This report looks at the entire Cybersurvey, explores new themes and changes over the years.
Look At Me: Teens, Sexting and Risks.
June 2020
Here we explore the reasons teens are sexting,
how they understand relationships and the ripples of risk that frequent image sharers come across.
Refuge and Risk
Evaluations
BULLYING Youthworks evaluated ‘Make a Noise’ a two year anti-bullying programme, run in a partership between Internet Matters and the anonymous reporting tool, tootoot. Funded by DfE. This tool allowed young people to directly report concerns and incidents, while staff were empowered to manage cases, keep track of trends or follow up where needed. Because it was easier for young people to make a report without being seen by other students in school, they found it easier to come forward and felt more supported.
EQUALITY We surveyed student opinions and experiences on equality issues for Sussex Coast College in a project with Priority 154.Funded by HEFCE.
OFFLINE VULNERABILITY We wrote a report for policy makers and frontline professionals describing our research:findings:
Vulnerable Children in a Digital World
CYBERBULLYING & E-Safety
MEDIA
GUEST BLOG for Teach.com: When political waves hit schools, teachers can be bastions of calm.
GUEST BLOG for JKP publishers,
Guest blog for e-safety support
Delivering continuous e-safety support to prevent online bullying
Article for Teachers’ Media, here
Article in Education Business here
GUEST BLOG for Osiris Educational with infographic
Animation of the Reach Cybersurvey messages on homophobic cyberbullying
‘Safeguarding Hub’ Nov/Dec 2013
‘Children and Young People Now’, 12-25 November 2013 contributor to ‘Taking on the Cyberbullies’ pp 23 -25
A new round of the Cybersurvey will take place in autumn 2023. The Cybersurvey is an online survey to explore the online experiences and wellbeing of children and young people. Free to schools, it is a vital aspect of your safeguarding, wellbeing and mental health support.
This survey can give your service the local information you need to shape your practice. Compare your data year on year, focus on specific issues or compare with other local areas.
We look at issues such as viewing harmful content, cyberaggression, contact, conduct, problematic internet use and the positive impacts of living in a digital age – what does connectivity mean for teens? Hearing from them directly and annually means you can respond fast when new issues emerge such as life in lockdown.
Current issues include cyberhate, pro-anorexia sites amd wellbeing. We consider the offline vulnerabilities of our respondents, the support thye have from schools and parents or carers, along with a host of current and developing concerns.
We offer CPD accredited training to schools, care settings, local authority front line practitioners and professionals. Currently our programme is developing training for foster carers.
Our research programme forms an evidence base for our work with those who deliver online safety education or work with those children and young people who are vulnerable online. Dr A. El Asam of Kingston University leads the research programme.
Over 53,000 young people have participated in this valuable time series project.This information is vital for:
- Local e-safety teams,
- Training programmes
- Safeguarding boards
- Local Authority Action Plans
- Schools’ internal e-safety programmes
Please contact us to enquire about your county, local authority area or academy chain undertaking this survey, or for the CPD accredited training programme. Explore the richness of our reports:
All publications from the survey are free and online.
Reports and special briefings exploring particular issues are offered.
Animation of the Reach Cybersurvey messages created by charity Each Action Challenging Homophobia with whom we collaborated in 2015.
Please contact us if your local authority or academy chain would like to commission a Cybersurvey for your area or schools. We can survey a group or cluster of schools or other settings.