About the resources for schools
The Lurking Trolls campaign has been designed to support the teaching of the Government’s internet safety strategy for supporting children to stay safe online – Education for a Connected World. To do this we have developed seven resource packs for schools that support many of the aspects in this framework for online education.
These are suggested learning journeys and the content may not be appropriate to the ability and development stage of all children in your class, so will need to be adapted accordingly. However, we hope they will act as a guide and give you some useful ideas.
Please bear in mind that in some cases, a pupil will want to make a disclosure following a lesson or activity. The lesson may have provided the knowledge that enabled the pupils to realise they are being abused or harmed and/or give them the confidence to say something.
This is why it is essential all pupils know and understand the school’s reporting mechanisms. Following the advice in Keeping Children Safe in Education, reporting mechanisms should be child friendly and operate with the best interests of the pupil at their heart.
As well as being able to be utilised to support teaching children about online safety, the themes in Lurking Trolls also link closely to many of the framework objectives in the relationships education curriculum for primary schools. Particular areas within the framework that you could use the trolls to support your teaching are:
Caring friendships
How to recognise who to trust and who not to trust, how to judge when a friendship is making them feel unhappy or uncomfortable, managing conflict, how to manage these situations and how to seek help or advice from others, if needed.
Respectful relationships
How to recognise who to trust and who not to trust, how to judge when a friendship is making them feel unhappy or uncomfortable, managing conflict, how to manage these situations and how to seek help or advice from others, if needed.
Online relationships
- That people sometimes behave differently online, including by pretending to be someone they are not.
- That the same principles apply to online relationships as to face-to-face relationships, including the importance of respect for others online including when we are anonymous.
- The rules and principles for keeping safe online, how to recognise risks, harmful content and contact, and how to report them.
- How to critically consider their online friendships and sources of information including awareness of the risks associated with people they have never met.
Being safe
- What sorts of boundaries are appropriate in friendships with peers and others (including in a digital context).
- How to respond safely and appropriately to adults they may encounter (in all contexts, including online) whom they do not know.
- How to recognise and report feelings of being unsafe or feeling bad about any adult.
- How to ask for advice or help for themselves or others, and to keep trying until they are heard.
You are of course not limited to using the trolls only n the ways suggested in the resource packs. We are sure as teachers you already are thinking of lots of fun, creative and imaginative ways in which you can use the lurking trolls to support areas of the curriculum.
For English it can support their reading and children may be inspired to develop their creative writing skills, making up their own stories of the trolls adventures. The opportunities to also utilise these fun characters in art and design are endless! From making a poster featuring the trolls in highlighting online safety messages to creating a story board for their own version of a trolls cartoon.
You will have heard the lurking trolls theme tune and in music it might be interesting to see if children can come up with their own version, write a verse to go along with it or play an instrumental version.
We would love to hear about ways in which you have used the trolls in your school. It would be great to add additional suggestions and resources to this website, to inspire other teachers and develop a hub based on the ways you’ve used the campaign with children. If you’d be willing to share your ideas, then please email them to pscp@portsmouthcc.gov.uk.