No, I was not surprised to read that kids figure out how to how to get around the Apple iPhone parental controls. The Washington Post published an October 15, 2019 article that tells all about it, and in my experience, the kids’ actions are not limited to Apple parental controls.
Continue reading “No Surprise that Kids Figure Out Parental Controls”
After nine years of blogging at MediaTechParenting, I’ve written posts about kids, technology, parenting, screen time, citizenship, 21st Century life, digital devices — well you get the idea. Now a New York Times Smarter Living published report summarizes a good deal of what I’ve been writing about in a parents’ guide to raising and guiding kids in the digital world.
How (and When) to Limit Kids’ Tech Use by Melanie Pinola (@MelaniePinola) includes just about everything a digital age parent needs to know. The comprehensive and well-packaged guide overflows with information. Keep it nearby, whether your child is a new baby, a teenager, or any age in between.
Pinola breaks her digital parenting guide into three parts: Continue reading “Learn Lots More from the New York Times About Addressing Kids’ Tech Use”
Social media and the digital tools that we use every day have transported us into a strange new era. As we use these tools to work and play we tacitly allow them to collect incredible amounts of our personal information — content that documents our lives, likes, loves, and dislikes — and we become sitting ducks for sham news and fraudulent information. Those who possess our information, good guys or bad, can use impersonal algorithms to assess and use our data. Read my post about using Duck, Duck Go.
Fast Company’ article, Alphabet’s Eric Schmidt On Fake News, Russia, And Information Warfare describes how Google and social media companies were caught off guard by the manipulation of their systems and the prevalence of divisive news. The October 29, 2017, article by Austin Carr contains two interesting comments by titans of digital industry, though neither of them testified at the Capitol Hill hearings. Continue reading “Two Pithy Quotes on Social Media & Democracy”
Take a few minutes to read Five Ways Parents Can Help Kids Balance Social Media With the Real World, appearing in the July 11, 2017 Washington Post.
Written by Adrienne Wichard-Edds, the Post article offers common-sense suggestion that parents can use to establish a sense of balance between digital endeavors and the rest of a family’s activities. Most of the ideas come from Ana Homayoun’s, Social Media Wellness: Helping Tweens and Teens Thrive in an Unbalanced Digital World. Continue reading “Can You & Your Kids Balance Life With So Much Social Media & Tech?”
If you use Google, take a few minutes to check out the Google Dashboard and look over a detailed digital footprint snapshot of your Google activities. Learning about digital footprints is an important 21st Century connected-world skill.
The Dashboard keeps track of everything — and I mean everything — that you do on Google. It’s a dynamic digital footprint collection. To sign in and examine your Gmail or Google Alerts is easy, and you can also check out the other features offered by Google such as Google Docs, Google Calendar, Blogger, or Google Reader (many more Google products are available and new ones become available on a regular basis).
Google Dashboard is an awesome connected-world teaching tool for 21st Century children at any age and for adults, because it makes a point — concretely — about the amount of information that Google accumulates on each of us. Many people are surprised, and a bit disconcerted, on a first visit, because the Dashboard depicts a good deal about each user.
Continue reading “Google Dashboard: A Connected-World Teaching Tool for All Ages”
Have you ever thought long enough about digital footprints to imagine how many digital tracks family members or students make in a day or two?
Early in the school year fifth graders and their parents kept a short diary, estimating the footprints in a range of categories and then returned to school with the results. Footprints were estimated for sending texts, banking, receiving texts, purchasing groceries, cell phone calls, online banking, web sites, online purchases, and about a dozen more categories.
Continue reading “How Many Digital Footprints Does Your Family Make?”
Given the chance, kids can offer remarkable insight — good ideas for their parents to consider.
I’ve heard many kids reflect thoughtfully, and not so thoughtfully, on their parents’ digital skills. I often hear my students wonder aloud about why parents don’t always model the digital citizenship expectations that they want their children to learn and apply.
Below are the nine most common “I Wish” statements expressed over the past several years by digital children that I teach. Two of them, I’ll admit, were even mentioned to me by my daughter some years ago. Mea culpa…
Kids Wish Their Parents and Other Adults Would
Media! Tech! Parenting! 
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