Category: parents and technology

Posted in digital parenting, generating content, parents and technology, research on the web, resources to read

Parents (and Teachers) Ask Why Wikipedia?

Posted on by Marti Weston

“Why use Wikipedia?” adults often ask. What they are really asking is, “Should my kids use Wikipedia, and is it a real reference?” For adults who grew up in the age of multiple volumes of well-documented references, it’s hard to wrap our minds around Wikipedia — and even harder to use it.

Digital natives, however, consult Wikipedia all the time, and the number of users and the content is increasing. According to a 2006 review in School Library Journal, “The popular online encyclopedia, whose entries are written and edited by any user, may inspire trepidation, even fear, yet the behemoth is impossible to ignore.” So just who is writing for Wikipedia? A March 2010 MSNBC article Who Writes Wikipedia, describes a research project that aimed to develop profiles of writers who contribute content.

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Posted in digital parenting, home computer security, online safety, online security, parents and technology

Computer Virus Tour

Posted on by Marti Weston

The bad guys in our digital equipment world are mini-programs of all sorts — often called viruses — that invade, infect, and incapacitate our computers. The medical metaphor is apt because digital viruses replicate and multiply just like those that infect the human body.

Different types of intrusive programs exist, though sometimes all are generically referred to as viruses. Another term, malware (short for malicious software), is often the umbrella term for the entire category.

A Few Important Terms

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Posted in great sites for students, homework, parents and technology, web research

Museums: For Schoolwork, Fun, and Even Travel – Bookmark It!

Posted on by Marti Weston

Summer is over, but your family can still travel virtually to out-of-town museums by visiting one of the web-based museum portals described below. Each leads to a wide range of museums close by and around the world. Some of the sites feature travel information as well as museums.

While it is easy to search for the larger, most well-known museums, these search sites can help people find hidden museum gems. Becoming familiar with these museum portals gives parents and students an additional bonus — museums are great resources for students to use when they work on school reports and projects. Below are four sites that provide hours of fun, not to mention unlimited information. Continue reading “Museums: For Schoolwork, Fun, and Even Travel – Bookmark It!” →

Posted in digital parenting, online security, parents and technology, privacy

Back-to-School Digital Reading #5: Your Child’s Privacy

Posted on by Marti Weston

Privacy is important for adults and children. Now an investigation has found that children who use well-known web sites are opening the door for small information-collecting programs called trackers to be installed on their computers.

In a September 17, 2010 article, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on its investigation into tracking technologies that are widely used by popular websites visited by children and adolescents. The article, On the Web Children Face Intensive Tracking, explains how investigators examined 50 popular children’s Internet sites to find out how much tracking occurs. They found that these sites install large numbers of tracking programs on personal computers without the knowledge of children and their parents.

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Posted in cultural changes, parents and technology, social media, social networking, teens and technology

Experiment: Go Without Social Media for One Week

Posted on by Marti Weston

Can your family go for a week without social networking activities? In my family we go nuts when our Earthlink DSL goes down, which happens for a few minutes at least once each evening, let along not getting to use some of the most valuable web-based tools for a week.

Harrisburg University, a small college in Pennsylvania asked students and faculty to go without YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and more for one week, not to punish the college community, but to examine why they use these resources and why people need them. The university community is asking questions such as “What part the social networking tools play life and business?” and “What would happen if social networking were not around?”

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Posted in digital parenting, great sites for students, homework, parents and technology

Quick and Easy Graphing Site – Bookmark It!

Posted on by Marti Weston

Have you ever wished you would make a quick graph as you help a child with homework or explain a complex concept by depicting it with a graph?

The National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) offers a “Create-a-Graph” site, and more than 20,000,000 users have made graphs  since 2005.  The site provides a quick getting-started tutorial to help get started, but the graph making is simple enough that a user can get started almost immediately. Graphs can be saved, printed, and e-mailed.

Be sure to check out the other math and statistics facts on the NCES kids’ site.

Posted in acceptable use, digital citizenship, digital parenting, online safety, online security, parent education, parents and technology

Visit Google Family Safety Center – Bookmark It!

Posted on by Marti Weston

Comprehensive web-based resources on digital safety, cyber-bullying, media literacy, and general technology information can help parents learn more about the web and how their children use it. Most of these sites update their content daily with timely tips, strategies for parents and kids, blog postings, and other helpful links. Yet, with so many sites to choose from, parents may have difficulty keeping track of any single location, let alone navigating among the sites on a regular basis.

Now Google, as so often happens, has come up with a terrific solution — the Family Safety Center. The center is well laid out with clear explanations about safety tools and connections to many of the best digital and media safety sites — all partnering with Google.

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