With the growth of social media, there is a rise in online activity by children. Most of the children are not aware of the dangers they might face online. Hence, it is important for parents and teachers to understand the seriousness of this issue. Through this post, I would like to specifically focus on teachers and their role in protecting children from the online abuse.
There are a lot of things that teachers could do to make children more aware regarding online sexual abuse. Teachers could conduct awareness classes through audio visual medium and use examples to illustrate how predators might approach them. The most important thing necessary here is the confidence building among children. Many a times, children are afraid to talk to their elders due to fear of being blamed. Therefore, teachers should build this trust by assuring children so that if anything happens, they report the incident and not hide it. Gender sensitization classes should also be conducted so that children understand the topic of gender equality and justice from early on. However, these classes should not seem like other ‘subject’ for children and they should not feel burdened by them. Therefore, these should be conducted in a light manner by story-telling etc with giving children appropriate space to think. Deliberation and discussion should play an important role. Children should be informed about appropriate channels where they can report such incidents. All of this will help in making the world a safer place for children.
It is important that teachers should conduct awareness classes