Cybersafety+Letter+to+Parents

Dear Parent / Caregivers

As part of our ongoing development of e-Learning we have reviewed our policies and procedures with the use of digital devices and online etiquette. As a result of this we have developed a Digital Citizenship Agreement form for students.

This agreement outlines the rules for acceptable and safe use of digital devices. This includes computers, iPads, digital cameras and other technologies. It needs to be signed by all students and a parent / caregiver.

Digital Citizenship will be covered as part of the annual Pinehill Way programme and our **“Keeping Ourselves Safe”** programme. Teachers will have gone through the agreement with the students and discussed what it means. Please take this opportunity to reinforce with your child appropriate use of technology especially when using social media eg Club Penguin, Facebook, Minecraft etc. We strongly suggest that any devices used by your child should be in a general family area where they, and the content they are looking at, can be monitored.

While we cannot guarantee that your child will not gain access to inappropriate material we have taken steps to ensure that children are as safe as practical. These include: * only allowing supervised internet and e-mail use * where possible teachers preselecting and screening sites for student use * teaching sessions to reinforce appropriate use and how to keep safe on the net * internet content filtering - WatchDog

Further information can be found at [|**www.netsafe.org.nz**]

Please read through the enclosed information carefully and return the signed agreement to your child’s teacher as soon as possible.

If you have any questions or require further information please contact your child’s teacher.

Yours sincerely

Julien LeSueur