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Year 5 Parents

26 May 2021 (by admin)

Dear Year 5 Parents

We are becoming increasingly aware of children using Whatsapp to talk to their classmates.  Yesterday morning within minutes of the children arriving there was an incident which resulted in a group of girls becoming distressed and upset in front of the whole class.  This was in response to messages which had been sent between groups over the previous evening and even first thing that morning.

Whilst we do not want to become involved in use of phones and messaging outside of school, more recently and especially since the lockdown more children are coming into school unhappy, affected by the impact of the messages they are receiving.

It also appears that the latest trend in insults is to call someone “Karen” or “Ian”.  I would invite you to look this up using the urban dictionary as it is quite insulting. 

Painfully, despite our constant teaching about not sending photographs via messenger, we have also heard that pupils have been sending inappropriate photographs of poses to one another. 

When I spoke to the classes yesterday, I challenged the children to try to avoid using their phones for two days apart from calls to see if it made them happier.  We discussed them not using Whatsapp as this seemed to be causing the most problems.  This conversation was a mutual discussion and was not a directive from me.

I would personally recommend ‘Family Link’.  This is a free APP which lets you track and monitor what your child is looking at and how much time they are on their phones or devices. I will now also be planning an afterschool session for parents to work with our IT team set up filters and monitoring APPs on phones and devices. 

I can only give you advice on what I feel would help to improve the wellbeing of children in the school.  Please do also contact us if you would like support.  

 

Kind regards

 

Miss Kelly Dillon

Headteacher