Information for Teachers
Welcome to Swiggle! The free child friendly search engine from the online safety experts at SWGfL (South West Grid for Learning).
Building effective online search skills in children and young people is vital in ensuring learners get to the information they need for their studies. Generic search engines can throw up a host of difficulties and embarrassing incidents when children stumble across inappropriate content (either accidentally or deliberately).
Applying safer searching across all browsers in a school can be inconsistent and requires technical support. Even with “safer searching” filters switched on, image searches can often return thumbnails to content that is wholly inappropriate yet in full view*.
Swiggle is Designed for Kids
Having Swiggle as the class search engine page for young children ensures their search environment is safer; safer to experiment with different search strings; safer to browse image or content results. It’s a safe sandpit to develop those skills before progressing on to more open and transparent online search engines like Google or Bing.
Swiggle.org.uk is built on Google SafeSearch technology but has a number of active features that encourage children to respond to and report inappropriate online content they find, rather than “Whoops! Let’s move on!” Children are encouraged to report content they think should not be accessible from your school network.
We even provide a Screen Cover Tool to encourage self-regulation and seeking out adult support. Active participation in managing online content.
Swiggle Features
- Customised Google Safe Search technology
- Active blocking of inappropriate search strings
- Active help from our Swigglebot
- Screen-cover widget that can be installed in the browser bar for all online browsing
- Easy to access reporting page for children and adults
- Free of advertisements
- Clear and accessible design
Make Swiggle your default search engine for children; it’s a great start in encouraging responsible online searching. After all, the best way to keep children safe and happy online is for them to have a safe and happy attitude. A better internet starts with them.
*Whilst we cannot guarantee that inappropriate search returns will not be served up by Swiggle, we have worked hard to develop a system that returns educational content whilst blocking inappropriate search terms. We also provide you with tools to report content either to us or to your system administrator so unsafe content can be blocked.