The School Councils of the Brockville Family of Schools hosted an information night on social media and internet safety May 3rd.  Guest social media lecturer Peggy Sweeney, senior communications consultant with the Ontario Principals’ Council, spoke to a crowd of 80 people gathered at Brockville Collegiate Institute.

Sweeney offered several tips to parents on how to prevent their children from getting trapped by the Web:

• Warn your children about the dangers of posting pictures on the Net and against 'sexting.'
• Ensure privacy settings on social media sites such as Facebook are set so that only people you want to see a site can access it.
• As a parent, don't be afraid to "friend" your child on Facebook so you can take a digital peak at what he or she is doing.  It's not snooping.  It is good parenting.
• Don't be afraid to look over your child's shoulder every now and then to monitor what he or she is doing at the computer.  You do it with other activities, so why not monitor their use of social media?

For more insight and information, check out her presentation:

Social networking P Sweeney Apr 2011ppt.pdf