Lesson video

Hi there everyone.

My name is Miss Shaw, really pleased you're joining me today for this lesson in which we'll be focusing on real life friendships in comparison to online friendships.

So in this lesson, we're going to be focusing on the positives of both online and real life friendships and also on when online friendships can become problematic and recognising common healthy features of both kinds of relationships.

Now, this lesson may cover sensitive topics and therefore we recommend checking with a trusted adult before starting or doing the lesson with a trusted adult nearby.

So, for this lesson, you're going to need an exercise book or some paper and you're also going to need a pen and your brains are doing a lot of thinking.

But hopefully, you've already completed your intro quiz.

Firstly, we're going to be focusing on the positives of real and online friendships.

Then we're going to look at some common healthy features of both friendships.

And we're going to look at when online friendships can become problematic.

And finally, you'll be looking at your key learning points and your exit quiz.

It was a recap from some prior learning.

Two of these keywords were covered in previous lessons.

I'd like you to pause the video here, just to choose the two correct ones.

We're correct.

We've covered digital footprint before, which was the trail of data that you create when using the internet and oversharing, which was talking about sharing far too much personal information online.

Now the other two, which were online relationships which is the interactions that we make with people online and catfishing, which refers to pretending to be someone else who is not online.

We're going to cover in more detail today.

Now the other two, which were online relationships which were interactions made with people online and catfishing, which is pretending to be someone that you are not when you are online, we're going to look at it in more detail today.

The keyword with today's lesson or oversharing meaning sharing too much personal information, catfishing which is the act of pretending to be someone who you are not when you are online in order to lure someone into a relationship that you've never met.

Digital footprint, which is the trail of data that we create when we use the internet and the fear of missing out which is anxiety caused by posts online that something exciting might be happening elsewhere.

So in this first section, we're going to look into the difference between online and real friends and the positives relating to each type.

So friends, everyone has them and everyone needs them.

But what is meant by a real friend and an online friend.

So this activity, what I would like to do is firstly, list the differences between the two types of friends, so a real friend and an online friend.

And then I would like you to produce a list of pros and cons for each type of friendship.

So we're going to list the differences between them, list the pros and cons, and think about why it's important to manage the two types of friendships.

I'd like you to pause the slide here to complete your activity and then come back when you've finished.

For the first column, how did your list compare with mine? Well, real friends are those who you can physically see and generally when you are seeing people face to face, if you have arguments with them, they are easier to solve.

Most real friends tend to be fairly local and you generally are able to trust them more because they're in your life, in your space.

Now, online friends generally are virtual.

They are easily contactable.

So at any time during the day, you're able to get hold of them virtually and they can be from all over the world, which is great in many respects but it also opens up many other issues which we'll focus on.

They also might misunderstand what you're saying because sometimes you can't read the tone of a message or a post.

You then tend to cause offence more easily.

Now for the first column, the pros of having real friends, is that they generally tend to be consistent and they add more to your life, they're there to support you and to inspire you to be better and push you further to achieve more.

They generally tend to be honest.

And you generally tend to have friends who are similar to you who think in similar ways and have similar hobbies and interests.

And in general, they genuinely care about you.

Now real friends, the cons of having them is that they may not be available to to you when you need them.

So for example, in the middle of the night, you're upset about something.

You can't just bop around to the house and wake them up and have a chat.

You might, they might expect you to be a priority to them.

So you have to drop everyone else and put them first.

You might argue a bit more because you're seeing each other face to face and it limit all the friendship opportunities that you might have with all the people.

With regards to online friends, some of the pros are that it can really help with shyness.

So if you're a particularly shy person who finds it difficult to create friendships, then having people that are online, that are there face-to-face, doesn't remove that pressure.

You can talk to them at any time.

And again, they can be from all over the world.

It's often easier to open up to people online as well because there's not the pressure of people listening to exactly what you're saying and asking you questions and responding to body language.

And it can also save a lot of times.

They're just there at the end of the keyboard, for example, or a text message.

You're not having to put that too much effort and spend too much time.

Now the cons of online friends are that they can be fake.

They can, you can't fully trust people that you've seen and meeting online and they can just disappear overnight from your lives and all of a sudden just vanish.

And that's it.

You don't know where they've gone, or if you'll ever speak to them or see them again.

They also might misunderstand what you say, because sometimes things are said online and they are misinterpreted, and they can't really be relied on as much as a real friend would either.

So in this next section, we're going to look into common healthy features of both types of relationships.

So what do you think are some common healthy features of both types of friendships? I would like you to pause the video here to complete this activity, to create a list of common healthy features of both types and then return when you've completed the task.

So how did your list compare with mine? Well, common healthy features of both types of friendships include having someone to turn to and talk to, being able to share experiences and perhaps you have similar interests or hobbies.

You can encourage each other to do things better.

You can share your experiences and have fun and enjoy yourself.

You can help other people to do things and you can offer emotional support and care via both types of friendships.

This next section, we're going to look into what happens when online friendships become problematic but I'd like you to read the following cases today and identify how you, what you think the problem is and how you think you would respond.

So, Zoya is originally from Russia and she now lives in the UK.

She's made friends at school, but she still stays in touch with old friends in Russia via social media.

Recently she's met a Russian boy online who seems too good to be true.

And her school friends are quite concerned about him.

He's asked her to send money and also inappropriate pictures of herself but she's never actually verbally spoken to him or had face time with them and has only seen pictures of him.

He also only has 40 followers and never tags anybody in his pictures.

I'd like you to pause here to think about what you think the problem is and think how you might respond.

So did you pick up on the same issues as me? He might not be who he says is.

So, for example, she's not met him in person or ever actually spoken, and she's only seen images.

So it could be anybody pretending to be a young boy from Russia.

She has no way of being able to tell whether he's real or not.

He's also pressuring her to send inappropriate images and money and if someone's asking you to send money that you've never even spoken to or also asking you to do things or pressuring you into things that you really feel uncomfortable with, that's not okay.

He also doesn't have many followers.

So it's quite suspicious that he's not following many people and he's not got many people following him.

And the fact that he's not tagging people in any of his photos that he does put online and also set a suggest that he might not be who he says he is.

Now some top tips to look out for and to respond to these issues, is that if they're too good to be true, if they're too nice or they're paying you too much attention or they're giving you too many compliments, that's a danger sign.

If they're offering you presence and making you promises, if you do things in return for them, that's also a danger sign.

If they're asking you to do things that you're not comfortable with, or they're putting pressure on you, that's again is not acceptable behaviour.

And if they're also asking you to maybe message in private or to keep your chats a secret from other people or other trusted adults then that should also be a major red flag.

And if anyone is making you feel uncomfortable, you should speak to a trusted adult or report it to CEOP via the website listed above here.

So I'd like you to complete this activity to think about what are some of the warning signs of a problematic online friendship.

So have a look and pause the video here, pick out the ones that you think are correct.

Complete the activity, and then come back when you're ready.

Well you are correct.

If they're showing you too much attention, offering you gifts, putting pressure on you, asking you to message privately, being overly complimentary and gushing and making you promises or being demanding of your time and asking you to keep secrets, there are lots of things that you can do to get support and help.

And we'll look at those in more detail.

Generally, online friendships tend to be consistent, supportive, and inspire you to be better.

So they are not warning signs of problematic friendships.

So in this scenario, Chelsea struggles with anxiety over schoolwork and home life, she's quite shy, and she's easily led by her peers.

And she follows lots of people online and doesn't keep her profile private.

Now this has led to her having many friendships and she often over-shares information about her life in order to make friends with people more quickly.

She often meets up with people that she's met online without letting anyone know where she's going and quite often hasn't actually spoken to any of them beforehand.

For your task here, I would like you to identify at least three ways that Chelsea could be safer in her online friendships.

Like to pause here and complete the task, and then return when you have them.

So the task was to identify at least three ways that Chelsea could be safer in her online friendships.

So do your answers match mine? Now you could change her accounts to private and only accept trusted people.

You could chat over the phone or video call before meeting up with people.

You should also tell someone trusted where she's going.

She could meet in a public place.

she could be more careful not to overshare personal information and she should do some research on her friends.

Are they actually who they say they are? On this next activity, I'd like you to pause the video to complete this task which is to create a top tips fact sheet aimed at educating other young people in recognising problematic online friendships.

I'd like you to pause your video and then can resume when you've completed.

If you'd like to share your work with Oak National, please do so.

But remember to ask your parent or carer to share your work on Twitter by tagging @OakNational and #LearnwithOak.

So pause the video here and complete your task and return when you've done.

The key learning points from this lesson are that there are differences between real and online friendships.

Not all friendships created online can be trusted and it's important to recognise and react to problematic friendships.

Talking to a trusted adult can really help.

So I'd now like you to complete the exit quiz to check your understanding of the content of this lesson.

Well done on completing the third lesson in this unit.

And I look forward to seeing you again.

Bye for now.