It’s Never Too Early To Start The Discussion Around Consent

The topic of consent is a discussion that every parent needs to have at home and we want to help guide this conversation and ensure our parents feel comfortable and confident raising this critical topic with their children.

The increased usage of technology and exposure to social media means that we are seeing more and more stories of children exposed to issues such as online grooming and sexualised behaviour at an early age. For that reason, we are using tools like the Safe On Social Schools Toolkit to ensure student’s online safety education and safety is a priority at school but the conversations must also extend into the home.

Together we want to ensure children are educated, supported and prepared to safely navigate these circumstances. We wanted to pass along some tips from Safe On Social about what you need to be talking about at home when it comes to the important topic of ‘consent’. From primary age all the way up to high school, open and honest conversations between kids and their parents can do wonders to build trust and pass accurate information along to your children. Here’s some ideas to get started...

6 Tips for Sparking Discussions At Home:

1. Empower your kids from a young age to practice body autonomy and allow younger children to understand they can say no if they don’t want a hug, tickle, kiss etc.

2. Encourage children of all ages to speak up if any behaviour they see or experience online makes them feel uncomfortable in any way. Start the conversation about following their ‘gut’ feeling and why if something feels off then it’s never silly to speak up.

3. Educate yourself - make sure you know and understand the games your kids are using as a very first stop. Is it age appropriate, what is the rating? Remember the average age of a gamer is actually 34-36 years old.

4. Discuss that they need to tell you or another trusted adult if anything happens online that makes them feel uncomfortable. Some examples are: Playing Roblox against someone that they have met online and they are asked to be their boyfriend or girlfriend, asked to move platforms (from Roblox to follow the person on TikTok for example), being asked for photos or being sent inappropriate images.

5. Be brave enough to have uncomfortable conversations with your child -being proactive now is far more important than feeling like you could have done something earlier. A great conversation starter is watching TV or movies together and talking about the situations the characters are experiencing so you can get a dialogue going with real-time scenarios.

6. Young people also need to know just because they have agreed to do something in the past, this does not mean they have to agree to do it again. They have the right to change their mind at any time… even partway through an activity.

Talking about consent is not a one-off conversation, it’s an ongoing educational journey to help fully prepare our students to feel empowered. We hope these tips provide a way to start the discussion at home. If you’d like more advice or have any concerns about online safety or issues that your child may be facing in or out of school please let us know, we are here to help.