smartphones – Page 2 – Media! Tech! Parenting!

cell phones, communicating with grandparents, family conversations, gadget ownership, online communication

Grandma’s iPhone

Posted on April 5, 2012March 19, 2019 by Marti Weston

skype — Over Easter weekend we’ll help my parents learn how to use Skype.

When it comes to her iPhone, few learning difficulties have popped up for my mom, age 84. I am delighted at the ease with which she has transferred from her old flip phone to this one — a 3G that I retired when I updated my iPhone.

How Mom is Using her iPhone

Her first lesson focused on typing in her contacts, and she caught on right away and also understands how to make a call using the contacts app.
The visual cues on the iPhone screen are terrific.
She loves being able to sit in a comfortable chair and play solitaire — no lessons required for this!
She enjoys using the speaker feature rather than holding the phone up to her ear.
She likes to use Safari anytime and anywhere when she wants to look something up, though like me, she is sometimes frustrated when the phone is slower because there is no wi-fi.
She is starting to use the map app.

Continue reading “Grandma’s iPhone” →

cell phones, digital devices and gadgets, electronic communication, gadget ownership, parents and technology

Why People Purchase SmartPhones for Themselves (and their Kids?)

Posted on December 7, 2011February 27, 2015 by Marti Weston

The December 6, 2011 ComScore Data Mine features this interesting data chart that graphs the reasons that people purchase smartphones. The leading reason?
People appreciate the convenience of smartphone ownership. Is staying in instant communication with kids one of these conveniences?

The challenge for parents when they purchase these gadgets for kids? Balancing appropriate use with convenience. Read the MediaTechParenting family mobile phone contract.

Check out graph and explanation at the ComScore site.

digital parenting, healthy media images, media literacy, parents and technology, technology support

Location, Location, Location (Services, that is…)

Posted on April 16, 2011March 20, 2019 by Marti Weston

A tech-savvy middle school parent sent me the link to the video at the end of this post. She added a comment: “This is scary. Should I let it upset me?” As of mid-April 2011, according to YouTube, the video has been viewed nearly 2.8 million times

There is nothing quite like the queasy feeling a parent gets when a media outlet airs a story with shrill content that aims to frighten and questions the safety of their children. In this case, the report included a solution at the end of the news segment, but by then many viewers were probably too upset to focus. YouTube makes it all so easy, and we can view the segment again and again and then pass it on to others. If each of us had more media literacy skill, we’d hit the stop button, move on to something else, and not even think about forwarding it to our friends.

Specifically, this video addresses two concepts: geotagging and location services on smartphones. Setting aside the anxiety about the information revealed by digital pictures, the video highlights a critical digital-age dilemma for parents: how to develop basic knowledge about the digital devices that they purchase for their children. Location service happens to be the current concern, but by the time the next round of must-have gadgets arrives on the scene, another issue will emerge. Knowledge is power.