Your child's doing their homework on their laptop.  You glance at the screen, and see, ‘POS,' just as your offspring switches to the Geography homework window.  What does it mean?  That was just one of the interesting - and somewhat disquieting - questions posed by Alton Convent School deputy head, Elizabeth Hoyes, at her talk on internet safety last week.

Some, but not all of the audience, knew the answer to this particular question.  POS means "parent over shoulder," and is one of many abbreviations used by the young to signal to others and avoid parental detection.  Similarly, PAW means "parents are watching," and this, Mrs Hoyes advised, is what parents should be doing from time to time. 

Mrs Hoyes was speaking as the named person for Child Protection in the school and also as someone who had investigated the subject in considerable depth. Her talk, illustrated by PowerPoint slides and video footage, was gratefully received, as the questions and statements of support that followed it clearly indicated.

After an amusing opening (a video of an overpowering and operatic "mother knows best", the image of an intolerant parent that the talk definitely did not want anyone in the room to replicate) the evening quickly became serious. Despite the many benefits of the internet, including education, and the speaker's assurance that she did not wish to over-emphasise the dangers at the expense of the huge benefits, there was a significant hush in the room as those attending absorbed the facts on the screen in front of them.

They heard about filters, their use, but conversely their abuse; dangerous sites - not just the most obvious pornographic examples, but those offering covert and dangerous messages; the insidiousness of internet grooming; the use and potential abuse of photographs, placed innocently and naively online; and the techniques of  those who wished to exploit the young and vulnerable.  Mrs Hoyes acknowledged her debt to a nationally run course by internet safety trainer Michael Smith, but had added much more information as a result of her own local research.  Charts showed the increasing amount of time spent on the internet as children progressed through the school, from year 5 upwards. In this, Alton Convent School pupils were typical of computer savvy children anywhere in the world. But it was the subject of MSN and the hours involved chatting online that brought the subject, quite literally, closest to home.

Along with time wasting came the hazards, especially the naïve readiness with which children add new "friends" to their internet address books. It was a pleasure to be able to buy one's child a laptop, but complete with its webcam and used in the privacy of a bedroom, there were obvious dangers.

There was help however. Parents could alert CEOP, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre was a very useful resource, and their website was well worth visiting.  There were also things youngsters could do for themselves when worried about anything they came across online.

Mrs Hoyes is now using her presentation with the pupils at school to encourage discussion and awareness. She is encouraged by the maturity of their response. "It's a question of team work," she explains. "Parents, teachers and pupils - we're all in this together to make sure the internet remains what it should be, a wonderful resource."