At the recent Parent Online Safety Meeting I held, I discussed a new app and tool that I was excited to use called GoBubble. Set up for under 13 year olds, this is a brilliantly innovative concept that allows children to learn about the use of social media and digital citizenship in a completely safe environment where all users are uploaded and validated by their school and where all content is moderated by the GoBubble team. This avoids any inappropriate content or contact for our children and allows them to enjoy the use of this app without the worry of anything unkind or unpleasant coming back.
Essentially it is social media for children, with a simple and easy to use interface where classes can get involved in class chat, discussion and learning through posts, or bubbles. Today I had the most wonderful afternoon as, after quickly setting everyone up prior to the lesson, we were able to jump straight in and group chat, just within ourselves, share photos, ideas and generally have a really productive and fun time, but with the underlying message of think before you post. This was something the children took on board right away and we had a super discussion about the potential risks of traditional social media, which requires the user to be 13 or over to create an account.
Within GoBubble we even collaborated internationally with some new friends from schools in the USA and Canada, as the platform seamlessly allows interaction between classes and today we joined the #gratitudechat, sharing what we were all grateful for in our lives, with some lovely responses.
I think the measure of how successful something is often comes from the feedback of the children. Today they were buzzing, excited and keen to try it at home. I will be sending a letter home to explain how this can be achieved outside of school hours soon.
Here are some photos of today's fun and the children, in their own words, describing what they think of GoBubble.
This entry was posted in Digital Citizenship on November 27, 2018 by Mr Rockey.