Twitter

08/12/23

Happy Hannukah to the Jewish community. May this festival bring you blessings, peace, and light. pic.twitter.com/HySs2392ed

08/12/23

Today marked the end of our interhouse PE competitions the winners for each year groups are as follows:Year 7 - Newton Year 8 - Wallace Year 9 - Whitlock Year 10 - Tovey Overall winners - Wallace & Strike 🏆 Excellent effort from all house groups 🥳 pic.twitter.com/Aua9TwTWDm

08/12/23

Year 10 and 11 showcased their musical talent during the Harris Academy Ockendon Live Lounge event. Well done to all involved. pic.twitter.com/k7tB9qN3wR

04/12/23

English Literature Oxford university taster day, hosted at Harris Chobham, with 8 of our year 10/11 students! Students came away with even higher aspirations than before, after enjoying various lectures & seminars on different genres of literature. A thoroughly enjoyable day! pic.twitter.com/Bjt47OW3aw

04/12/23

Interhouse competitions have started this week in PE with year 8 starting the week off competing in dodgeball and benchball. Excellent start to the competition. Which house will take the win on Friday? 🥇🥈🥉 pic.twitter.com/FRrD80zAOu

02/12/23

Y11 walking talking their way through English Language Paper 2 with Impress the examiner. Students working hard on a Saturday, with English teachers to support. pic.twitter.com/SOXre5q9SD

29/11/23

As part of raising awareness around men's mental health, here are some conversation starters to support people to start conversations about their mental health. pic.twitter.com/b97Y3MXi9F

29/11/23

This week students had an assembly based around men's mental health. It was great to hear stories from staff from describing their challenges & how they approach self care with mental health. Giving advice to our students & exploring the stigmas around asking for help pic.twitter.com/LFVlh3H8B2

28/11/23

As celebrate birth of Guru Nanak Dev ji, founder of the faith, we can all identify with his core teachings of truth, love, gender equality, working hard for an honest living, meditating upon the One and sharing with others.Best wishes all for a blissful . pic.twitter.com/ED9nEwG0lz

25/11/23

We are delighted to offer 5 fully-funded places on the January cohort of our Sustain and Grow group coaching programme to parent-teachers from ethnic minority backgrounds.https://t.co/gAtXLJEYRZBook your place soon as these tickets will go fast!Thanks to ! pic.twitter.com/ijbAi0y3k3

23/11/23

Year 7 football girls in their new kit tonight. Winning both their Borough games. Excellent start to the season ⚽️ 🔥 pic.twitter.com/kPpWZoaNu7

22/11/23

Year 11 students engaging in the Harris experience independent learning day. pic.twitter.com/1RIxwUfUKs

17/11/23

Our year 7 boys football team in their new kit last night ⚽️🔥 pic.twitter.com/bqJTHPh5kR

12/11/23

Happy Diwali & Bandi Chhor Diwas to all celebrating. An important time to reflect on our internal light and darkness, as well as the events taking place in our world today 🪔🪔🪔 pic.twitter.com/j6PQh0Tjv9

10/11/23

colleagues can enjoy fully-funded 1:1 coaching with the . Choose from our Accreditation, Parental Leave, Return to Work or Transition coaching to support you as you start and grow your family. Find out more and sign up at https://t.co/pBZxdoXZwJ pic.twitter.com/GiwiuAMoO1

10/11/23

This morning our year 10 sports leaders had hot chocolate Friday with Ms Rainey to receive their certificates and celebrate their success over the last year on the course. Well done to all those who qualified 🎉. pic.twitter.com/dgxqb2w2dO

04/10/23

U13 girls have arrived for their Essex cup match at The Billericay School ⚽️ pic.twitter.com/ZqVg7WrhGx

03/10/23

🚨PE CLUBS / FIXTURE ANNOUNCEMENT 🚨 - Wednesday - U13 Essex Cup girls football v Billericay (Away) Thursday - Girls Football club (moved from Wednesday due to the above fixture) Friday - Rugby - all years (moved from Wednesday)

25/09/23

Excellent turn out for all years netball tonight! Over 50 students at the club. Amazing start to our netball season 🔥 pic.twitter.com/fte57ArKQ0

25/09/23

🚨 P.E CLUB ANNOUNCEMENT this week 🚨 - Monday - All years girls netballWednesday - All years boys rugby 🏉 All years girls football ⚽️ Thursday - Years 7 boys football ⚽️ If you have any questions please see a member of the P.E department.

Harris Academies
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Online safety

Support for parents

Studies tell us that 99% of 13-17-year olds are in front of a screen for 20.5 hours per week.  With screens playing such an important role in not only education, but also contact with friends, how do we encourage our children to create a healthy screen-time balance?

Studies show that too much ‘screen time’ on any electronic device can have a direct impact on our mental health.

Here are some effective strategies for helping your children strike a healthy balance and look after their mental wellbeing;

  • Set limits on screen use for everyone in your house. This will differ for every family but set the limit and ensure everyone sticks to it. Once the time is up, no more screens until tomorrow!
  • Ensure the hour before bedtime is screen-free – this will ensure your child’s brain has time to “wind-down” before sleep
  • Avoid letting your child take their phone/tablet to bed with them (this is even a good tip for adults as well!). Find a communal place where all phones can be charged overnight
  • Build time into your child’s daily routine for non-screen activities. Reading, exercise, a walk, gardening, baking, board games… it can be anything just so long as it doesn’t involve a screen! If you just remove a child’s device with nothing to replace it, they will quickly become bored and even resentful, which can lead to a lot of resistance to stop the use of their device
  • Avoid letting your child have a screen during mealtimes. Use mealtimes as an opportunity to talk, communicate and catch up
  • Lead by example. If you expect your child to have screen-free time at meals or any other time – parents/carers/older siblings should follow the same rules. Each one of the tips above should also be applicable to adults in the family (wherever possible)

How do we effectively monitor our children’s use of screens and online material?

In many households, children are more tech savvy than adults. This can make it difficult for parents or carers to monitor what their children access online to ensure the content is always appropriate and to ultimately keep them safe.

Here are some helpful tips to help you with monitoring their online activity.

  • Wherever possible (and this might not be in busy households), ensure your child uses their device in a communal area. Could they set up a “workstation” at the kitchen table or in the dining room?
  • Stay engaged with what your child does online. The more you get involved and understand the things your child does online, the easier it is to gain respect and be influential in their digital world. Also, making screens part of family time, like a movie or an online games night, is one way to make it more inclusive and engaging
  • Use device settings on your child’s device to set time limits on certain apps. All consoles and some social platforms have in-built settings that allow you to set alerts to tell you when you’ve reached a certain amount of time on the platform and gives you a summary of time spent to support digital wellbeing
  • Set privacy and parental controls on your child’s device- a quick Google or YouTube search with the name of the device and ‘parental controls’ usually brings up useful information
  • If your child uses an app regularly and you are not aware of the content, download the app yourself or do a little investigation to check the content and features are age-appropriate. You can use the following website: https://www.commonsensemedia.org/ which outlines the content and features of every app available
  • If your child has a profile on a particular app, you can download the app yourself and add their profile. This will enable you to monitor who they ‘follow’ or who is ‘following’ them online, as well as monitor any content they post or have access to
  • Talk about the online risks with your child. Be open and honest about the online risks teens face so they feel confident to talk to you if they get into trouble online – don’t overreact – remember that the dialogue is important and you want them to come back to you the next time they need support
  • Be aware of the signs of screen-time overuse. Often a sign that a child is spending too much time in front of a screen is when they may feel anxiety or stress if they are disconnected or separated from their phone. Lack of sleep and exercise may be a sign they need to take a break from their device
  • Make a “family agreement” about use and time online and ensure all in the household stick to it
  • Be aware of material accessed / shared. (The Internet Watch Foundation reported in 2020 over 68,000 webpages containing indecent images were removed)

Useful Websites

Harris Academy Ockendon recommends Kooth or shout 85258 to provide free, anonymous online counselling tailored to young people.

Their specialists are available every day and are on hand to support young people either over the phone or through instant messaging.

It can be used for any form of mental health support.

For further information, please visit their website at the links above.

In addition Thurrock’s Educational Psychology and School Wellbeing Services helpline offers support to young people and families.

You can contact them by phone (01375 652537) or email via sws@thurrock.gov.uk

Some other websites you may find useful are found below;

https://www.internetmatters.org/

https://www.childnet.com/

https://www.saferinternet.org.uk/

https://www.commonsensemedia.org/

If you have any queries, questions or concerns, please feel free to contact a member of staff:

Miss Dodge, Assistant Principal, Designated Safeguarding Lead s.dodge@harrisockendon.org.uk

Mr Pearce, Senior Vice Principal, Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead d.pearce@harriockendon.org.uk

Miss Thompson, Assistant Principal, Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead Alicia.thompson@harrisockendon.org.uk

Miss Stafford, Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead c.stafford@harrisockendon.org.uk