When it comes to technology, kids are always ahead of parents. Why? Unlike parents, kids have the time that parents don’t have to play-with, explore, experiment, and learn about the newest and latest gadgets, software, and apps that the market has to offer. Parents, on the other hand, are constantly playing catch-up.
Nevertheless, parents need not necessarily know all the workings of any given gadget, app, or software-program to be able to set limits and priorities and to entrust responsibility to their children for their use.
There is no shame for a parent to admit to his/her child, “I don’t know how to work this,” or “I need help programming my phone.” However, it is a shame when parents fail to empower a child to take responsibility for a gadget’s proper use. In other words, parents need not teach their children the ins-and-outs of the latest technological breakthrough. But parents do still need to teach their children how to be responsible in their use. An impossible task, some may think, since “kids will be kids,” as some may say.
Precisely! And since “kids will be kids,” it is all the more reason why parents need to be on top of the game in teaching their children responsibility—wisdom, etiquette, respect, and protection, among other things—when using smart phones and other high tech stuff.
Okay, so what DO you teach children about engaging in the digital world?
First of all, make it easy by sticking to basic life principles and then show them how these basic principles apply when engaging in the cyber world as well.
For example, take the basic principle in life that there are always natural and/or set limits and boundaries in one’s life. No one can have everything or anything one wants—ever! There are always limits. Boundary lines are everywhere. There are speed limits, purchasing limits, charging limits, filling limits, take-out limits, entry limits, drinking limits: Don’t cross this line, no entry beyond this point, limit two purchases per customer, no one under this height may enter this ride, and so-on and so-forth. Teach children to get used to it and deal with it. Hence, there are to be limits for cell-phone usage, texting, messaging, surfing the web, and game-playing. Teach your children while they are still very young. Children need to understand, accept, and live with limits and boundaries in their lives.
Secondly, teach children the very real and immediate connection between hard work, income, and expense as well as the value of hard earned money and fleeting time. The sooner a parent teaches a child that “Money doesn’t grow on trees,” the better. But the way to teach them this truth is not say it but to show it. Demonstrate the connection between work, time, money, and expense. How?
They need to experience it firsthand. If a child has $5.00 to spend and chooses to spend it on this, they must see that they are also choosing not to buy that: It is an “either/or” proposition not a “both/and” proposition. Hence, children need to learn the lesson of choices and consequences regarding the earning and spending of money and, by extension, the use of technology. They must see that money is earned and not given. Free-time is also earned, a value that many parents overlook. Playtime is important for all children. But as children grow older, playtime should not be taken for granted. The older a child gets the more a child must realize that work comes before play, as a life principle. And so, likewise, having, owning, and using smart phones is not a child’s right. It is a privilege that should be earned and valued appropriately. It is up to parents to help their children understand this.
Other basic principles that children need to learn in life is that of mutual respect, cooperation, and trust while also providing personal and social protection and anonymity.
There are reasons why we have personal and private spaces like bedrooms, closets, and bathrooms. The privacy dynamics that we attitudinally apply to these literal spatial places in our homes must also be applied to our spatial world in cyberspace. Smart phones, tablets, and computers now connect us to people all over the world. Thus, there is a greater need for learning to understand and respect what it means to be open and socializing as well as closed and protective as we digitally connect nationally and internationally.
Closed personal privacy AND network socializing openness are to be held together in a healthy tension with balance and integrity. In this case the “both/and” category overrules the “either/or” question: We can’t have one over against the other, we must have both—private boundaries AND social-network connectedness. It may be difficult at times, but not impossible. Again, the earlier children learn this, the better. True: everyone has a different idea as to where that happy balance may lie. Thus, parents will first have to grapple with this question within their own minds before wrestling the issue with their children. Then a clear determination will have to be made between parents and children as to what should be considered safe boundary limits for social networking and what is viewed as adequate openness in order to retain privacy protection for children and other family members.
As in all other areas of life, parents need to be communicating with their children about the issues surrounding cell-phone usage and other high tech gadgets: “Communicate, communicate, communicate.” Have a strategy. Determine what needs to be addressed and why, how best to do so, and what you want your children to learn, understand, and embrace responsibly.
Avoid extreme reactionary action or sentiment. Avoid over-controlling on the one hand or totally absconding parental responsibility with a hands-off approach, on the other hand, leaving your children free to do as they please. Avoid demonizing the technology itself: In the same way that money is not evil in-and-of itself (it’s how it is used), so technology is not evil in-and-of itself, it’s what we do with it.
Be age appropriate with your rules and oversight, as you apply levels of trust for allowing usage, ownership, and payment responsibility. But do maintain adequate and vigilant oversight. When they are young, yes, most certainly do review their phones, messages, texts, etc. Lighten up on this as they grow older and as you and they mature learning to trust and respect each other’s boundaries. You can show them the bill so that they can see how much it costs the family to have these phones and gadgets. You can enlist their participation in paying for the increasing cost over the years. They should become fellow participants in paying their way through or at least be made to understand their role in adding to the cost of such expenses as they mature.
Of course doing these things is easier said than done. Yet, if it is not said, it will most certainly not be done. Parents need to do more than just cope and get by. With regard to the cyber-world, parents need to establish direction and give guidance as to the greater social values and principles that a solid and healthy family, community, and nation must live by. High tech gadgetry is not going away. We are in a new and strange (for us older types) digital era. But the basic principles of life still apply, even in the 21st century. We just have to find new and relevant effective ways to pass them down to the next generation.
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