Foster Carers' TSD Standards covered:
- 1.3 Person centred approaches
- 1.4 Confidentiality and information sharing
- 2.2 Legislation, policies and procedures
- 2.3 Relationship with parents and others
- 2.4 Team working
- 3.4 Personal safety and security
- 3.5 Risk assessment
- 4.1 Encourage communication
- 4.2 Knowing about communication
- 4.3 Communication with parents, families and friends
- 4.4 Communication with organisations
- 4.5 Principles of keeping good records
- 5.4 Supporting play, activities and learning
- 5.6 Understanding contexts
- 5.8 Supporting disabled children and children with special emotional needs
- 6.2 Keeping children safe
- 6.3 Recognising and responding to abuse
- 7.1 Your role and approval as a foster carer
Author Details
Name: Lynn Findlay
Job Title: Senior Social Worker
Current place of work: Sheffield and South Yorkshire The Foster Care Co-operative
Protecting our Online Reputation – Self Care as a Digital Parent “Secure your own mask before helping others”
Introduction
In my previous article on digital parenting I wrote about how we can understand our child’s digital world by being part of it; by interacting, asking questions and showing an interest alongside our young people. We thought about how we have embraced the digital world and what are our values, knowledge and skills.
This article looks at our online world and how we can maintain our professional identity online and manage our digital footprint. An important aspect of parenting is self-care and looking after ourselves and, just like the seamless online-offline world for our young people, we also need to look after ourselves online. So, make time to relax, meet friends, play sports, learn a new skill in our offline world and spend time looking after ourselves online by maintaining and protecting our professional and personal identity.
Foster carers and adopters are in a unique situation as professionals, with agency expectations, but with an interwoven personal self at home. We explore how carers can protect and manage their own identity online, whilst following the procedures of their organisation and maintaining confidentiality for the children.