Superclubs - Social Networking for primary children
Superclubs Plus is a fantastic site, which you really should look at. If you’ve never heard of it before, it is (as far as I know) one of the only safe, protected areas where primary-aged children can communicate online. It gives children access to a wide range of online tools which, in my experience, they all enjoy using at home and at school.
Pupils need to register via a school (and schools can sign up groups of children quickly if required). Once each pupil is registered, they can learn and use lots of different ICT tools and skills:
Email - Every child has their own email account within Superclubs, which allows them to learn about email is a safe and secure environment. They can send emails to any other Superclubber, but the system is all internal, so they cannot email people outside of Superclubs, and no-one else can email into the site. The email interface allows them to use smilies, send formatted text (styled using HTML coding which the children can learn), add attachments, and also lets them build up an address book of favourite people. Emailing is one of the children’s favourite activities on Superclubs. At present, the children at our school have sent a total of 70,213 emails. Our most prolific emailer has sent over 5,000 emails during her time using the site in KS2.
Forums - Superclubs also has a number of forums which allow children from different schools to communicate, talking about the latest news and gossip, as well as having more focussed discussions about particular topics. Schools can also set up their own school forums, which allow only their children to chat to each other. In the past, I have used this to create question and answer sessions, with children posting their questions about our History topic online, which others then have to research and post their answers back. Superclubs also set up ‘Hot Seat’ forums which give the children a chance to interview famous people, including authors and even historical characters (e.g. Henry VIII)!
Home pages - Each child also gets their own set of web pages, which they can use to tell others about their favourite things. At first, they only get one page, but they can later ‘earn’ new pages by completing challenges and producing projects. I’m always amazed by the standard of some of the pages that children produce. Their pages can include text (again with HTML codes which the children learn very quickly), polls, guestbooks and other media from the Superclubs Library. The library includes images, animations, music and games, all of which have been pre-approved by the Superclubs mediators. If children want to add anything to the Library, they can upload items and use them when they have been approved.
School tools - As well as children having their own individual web pages, schools can have their own sets of web pages, which children can contribute to. This is a really useful option, as teachers can ask children to write an article about a particular topic, which can then be added to the school home pages. Superclubs also allows collaborations between schools, so that children from different schools (and even different countries) can take part in joint projects and use the Superclubs tools to share their findings.
Assessment - Superclubs is also a wonderful environment for assessing children’s ICT skills. The site has a ‘Stars’ scheme, which children can work through. These test their knowledge of different aspects of ICT, as well as their understanding of the site. By completing the stars challenges, children can get star badges to add to their home pages, as well as receiving the prize of a new home page which they can then customise however they please. As a teacher, I can see assessment statistics showing which children have earned particular stars, and how often they are logging on / emailing / changing their homepages etc.
Safety is one of the key aspects of Superclubs, and it is clear that safety features have been carefully thought about when all aspects of the site were developed. Emails and forum posts are all recorded, with inappropriate words flagged up for the attention of the mediators. Teachers can also access children’s email, to ensure that everyone is being safe and sensible. Home pages (and any media uploaded to the Library) are also checked, either by a human mediator, or automatically by the system.
I’ve also been lucky enough to take part in mediator training with the Superclubs team. This training has reinforced how dedicated the mediators all are, and how keen they all are to give children a safe and protected experience online, while developing their learning in many different areas. The mediators generally try to leave the children to use the tools available to them independently. However, they are always there to help and to deal with problems if and when they arise, with clear rules and firm sanctions if anyone should break them.
Superclubs Plus originally began life as Gridclub, which was funded by various government departments (including the DfES in England). However, after a few years of free access, funding was stopped so that schools now have to pay for the children to access the site. This is a real shame as many schools do not have the budget to pay for such services, which means that children may well end up using some of the alternative social networking sites, which are not as well moderated or protected. I believe that sites like Superclubs should be funded centrally so that all children have a safe place online that they can use inside and outside of school.
If you’re already registered on Superclubs Plus, send me an email (my username is MWarner). If you’re not, sign up for a trial. You won’t regret it!
