Toolkit topic: Communicating by e-mail

Email can be an extremely valuable tool in an educational context, encouraging the development of communication skills, and transforming the learning process by opening up possibilities that, conventionally, would be impossible to achieve.

Schools also need to be aware of a range of issues which can be associated with email use, such as bullying by email, and ensure that they have appropriate policies in place should such events occur. School procedures should protect all parties from misuse. Problems can occur in pupil to pupil e-mails, those generated by pupils and sent to staff and, more rarely, e-mails between staff. The possibility that a member of a pupil's family may use e-mail to abuse another pupil, a teacher or even a member of another family should not be overlooked.

School policy on e-mails should begin by deciding on the naming convention to be used for pupil addresses. It is essential to reduce the risk of unsolicited attention being directed towards individual pupils from people outside the school. If individual pupil addresses are used, in such formats as:

jennifer.jones@gailey.staffordshire.sch.uk

for example, there is a risk of people from outside the school being able to contact pupils direct. As with digital images, a naming convention such as this enables a pupil to be located.

A class or teaching group e-mail may be more appropriate for younger children. Individual accounts can be created as children gain the appropriate skills and knowledge to understand the security implications.

When young people are using email, there is always a risk that they might receive unsuitable messages. Pupils should be taught the appropriate behaviours to adopt if they receive an inappropriate or offensive email, such as deleting the message, or closing it and seeking advice from their teacher, but never replying to it. This will allow the teacher to go back and check the message, talk through some of the issues, reassure the pupil that it was not their fault that they received such a message, and take any other action as appropriate. Pupils should also be taught how to use email appropriately, and develop suitable writing conventions for the technology.

Last Modified: 19/01/2012 09:38:36
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