Does Your Family Need New Web Rules?

As I travel the country working with middleschoolers and high school students to build their self-respect and spread respect for all, I also speak with hundreds of parents. And it’s no surprise that their top concerns are issues like cyberbullying, sexting and online safety.

Keeping kids safe used to be about curfews and “Don’t talk to strangers.” But now, savvy parents are quickly realizing that the Web – and all the devices kids use to get online – needs to be a part of the family rules too.

Here’s my advice to come up with your own set of Web family rules that will keep your kids better protected – and give you some peace of mind:

1. Ask your kids what they think.

Nobody likes rules just handed down to them – and this makes getting compliance with the rules even tougher. Ask your kids: What are your friends or other kids doing online that you think is unsafe? When you’re online, are you ever worried about your safety? See what they say.

Then share your concerns, like: “I know that when you’re on social networks, anyone can talk to you, and I worry about people with bad intentions reaching out to you or trying to meet you offline.” Or “I don’t like cyberbullying either – what can we do about it?”

Also mention any concerns you have about other online privacy issues – like how hackers can steal identities or predators can lift personal information to try and harm your kids offline.

The bottom line: Get their ideas first for your family Web rules. They’ll have great ideas, and they’ll be more likely to buy into the rules if they help create them. Commit to yourself to listen to their ideas – without interrupting or criticizing. At The Respect Institute, the No. 1 way kids tell us they feel respect is: “When people listen to me.” If you listen to them in noticeable ways every day, when your kids face a safety issue online, they will be more likely to open up to you for support.

2. Set the rules.

With a quick Web search, you’ll be able to find many resources to help you round out your rules. Check out NetSmartz.org or IKeepSafe.org for tutorials and tips. Once your family rules are set, talk them through with your kids. Ask your kids to comment on each one, pose questions and suggest changes. When your family rules are final, post them where everyone can see them.

3. Decide on consequences.

Again, have your kids do the work! Ask them what they think should happen if a rule is broken. Add your two cents. (As a parent, you always reserve your right to set the final boundary to keep your kids safe.) Then, write and post the consequences next to the rules.

Most important, create a space where your kids can ask you for help. We are all afraid of getting in trouble if we break the rules, right? But the goal here is to keep your kids safe. And that ultimately comes down to them seeing you as someone they can trust. So even though you’re all setting the rules together, let them know they are guidelines to keep them safe, and that if they ever break a rule or face a situation they don’t know how to handle, they can come to you. Let them know you will listen and you will hold off “freaking out” to support them. In the end, this kind of connection with your kids will go a long way to protect them.

Is Your Tween (Illegally) on Facebook?

You have to be at least 13 years old to legally use Facebook, and there’s a reason for that: According to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), websites that collect information from a general-audience population must receive guardian permission to gather data from children 12 years old and younger. Often, sites like Facebook choose to make the legal age of usage 13 and up to bypass the litigious headaches that parental consent incurs.

But, as I’m sure you know, rules are made to be broken. Even if you help your child set strong privacy settings on Facebook, the service frequently changes its privacy policies. This makes it difficult to continuously adjust the settings to create a “bubble shield” around your tween.

And of course, many unsuspecting parents out there have tweens who are sailing on Facebook, playing games and socializing. Many parents aren’t aware of relationships their children are building on the social network.

The Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project found that 46 percent of 12-year-olds surveyed in the United States use social networks. That sounds like a high percentage, but the number makes sense when you consider that today’s children meet and connect emotionally through their digital devices.

You can imagine how difficult it is to find those tweens who are feverishly posting pictures, taking quizzes and making friends through the service. However, the website says it does take measures to find those young ones and remove them from the system. Recently, Mozelle Thompson, Facebook’s chief privacy officer, told the Australian Federal Parliament’s cyber-safety committee that the social networking giant deletes 20,000 accounts each day for age violations. Although an impressive number, he went on to say that the tools employed to find underage users are not foolproof.

What You Can Do

Just because Facebook is intended for 13-year-olds and older kids, it doesn’t mean that you as a parent should wait to introduce their kids to the concept of digital citizenship. Instead, you should carefully choose online environments that are specifically created with tweens in mind.

Currently, there are plenty of fun social networks for children on the Web. The level of control, permission and oversight needed to play in these realms makes them more secure than other spaces. More importantly, getting your children set up on age-appropriate sites is a great way to start talking about the boons and burdens of social media.

Remember: Don’t close doors — just guide your children through the ones that lead to safer and healthier relationships online. Statistics show that kids want to use social media. It only makes sense that they learn how through you.

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Pediatric Safety Editor Addendum

Additional References for Concerned Parents:

• Article discussing the number of kids under 13 that use Facebook, often with parental consent:  “Facebook Users Who Are Under Age Raise Concerns “- NY Times, March 11, 2011
• Rules that parents of social networking tweens can establish to minimize safety concerns:     “Debate over underage tweens using Facebook” – Boston Globe, June 2, 2011
• “Facebook’s Commitment to Child Safety Online” presents Facebooks views on the Children’s Online Privacy and Protection Act – Facebook, May 26, 2011
• Computer monitoring software applications
  • “Know What Your Kids Do On Facebook This Summer With Computer Monitoring Software“
  • “AVG Family Safety Restricts and Reports on Kids’ Web Activities“

Is Your Kid Breaking Internet Safety Rules at School?

Back in the day, my biggest distractions in class were note-passing and idle doodling. But today, 66 percent of kids ages 8 to 18 use cell phones, and 76 percent have iPods or other MP3 players, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. On top of that, most schools offer some amount of Internet access. That’s why almost all schools today require kids and parents to sign a document that didn’t even exist for our generation: Internet Acceptable Use Policy.

The Internet Acceptable Use Policy explains the school’s philosophy on Internet use and the rules regarding online behavior. It also gives an overview of the consequences of violation and a list of students’ and staff members’ rights. An Acceptable Use Policy should both recognize students’ right to benefit from technology and protect them from harm.

Parents are an important part, says Doris Stephen, education programs assistant in the Education Technology Office of the California Department of Education:  “They need to know what their children are being taught in school and how they are going to use the Internet. They need to know that the children are doing it in a safe manner.”

Here’s what to do if your child’s school district doesn’t require your signature, or if you’re a little hazy about what you signed at the beginning of the year.

Get a copy of the policy

Check the school’s website. Many schools post their Acceptable Use Policies online so parents and kids can easily reference them. If it’s not there, call the school and request a copy or ask your child to bring one home.

Discuss it

Talk about the policy. Discuss scenarios that might seem innocuous but are actually prohibited. For example, does your child’s school prohibit using Internet resources to lobby for a political candidate? Can kids visit file-sharing sites and download music? Are there any penalties for using profanity in email sent via the school’s computers? Help your child read between the lines too: If the policy prohibits harassment, ask, “What constitutes harassment?” Talk about your child’s typical Internet use at home and ask whether these things are prohibited at school.

Most important, discuss the consequences of violating the policy. Most policies include penalties that range from warnings and account suspension to expulsion and legal action.

Be respectful

Because Acceptable Use Policies include a lot of language about what not to do, they can seem to imply that kids aren’t to be trusted. But a good policy is centered on the educational value of the Internet and keeps free speech in mind. So don’t just discuss the things your child shouldn’t do; talk about all the useful ways they can use the school’s technology to get more out of class.

Post it somewhere accessible

Whether it’s on the fridge or saved as a shared document in your Google Docs accounts, keep the policy on hand. If it’s top of mind, your child may be more likely to follow it and avoid getting into trouble that could affect his — or someone else’s — future.

YouTube – Adding Child Safety to the Menu

With millions of videos on YouTube, keeping your child safe from inappropriate videos has been a major challenge. There’s a significant amount of sexual content and violence…in fact, typing in the word “cartoon” on YouTube leads to over 300,000 hits and on the first page you find a video entitled “very creepy, disturbing children’s cartoon, banned from TV”. And we all know how enticing something that is banned can seem. Scott Rubin, YouTube’s head of child safety, cites that “YouTube was never intended to be used by children under age 13”.  Unfortunately the best of intentions do not always match the end result.  So what is a parent to do??? You could of course choose to block YouTube entirely or keep a constant eye on your child while they scanned through the vast amount of video streams available to them. Finally however, there is another option for parents, one that should make the task of keeping your child safe a little more manageable.

As of last Thursday, YouTube’s parental controls will now be displayed on the bottom of every YouTube screen. You can also create a blocking filter to limit what YouTube will display. According to NY Times reporter Warren Buckleitner, here’s how to turn it on:

1. Scroll to the bottom of any YouTube page.
2. Click on the words “Safety Mode is Off.”
3. Adjust the settings, click Save and start searching. To permanently lock on Safety Mode, you must log on to your YouTube account.

So how does Safety Mode work? CNET Senior Editor Natalie Del Conte describes Safety Mode as accomplishing three things: it “limits content on videos containing nudity, pornography, narcotics, graphic violence, and news events containing graphic violence; collapses all comments on videos automatically (you can choose to view comments, but comments with profanity will be filtered out); locks Safety Mode for all users, even if a user is logged out, so kids can’t turn off Safety Mode if they try to.”

Keep in mind, Safety Mode is both browser specific and account specific, so you must turn it on for every browser (i.e. Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc) and every account you want to filter. And make sure private browsing is disengaged since Safety Mode will not function if that is turned on. Still nothing is failsafe, so monitoring your child’s internet use remains the best policy. Knowing however that a child’s search for “naked” brings up a message that says “the word “naked” has been filtered from the search because Safety Mode is enabled” should provide concerned parents the ability to breathe a little easier

Little Red Hoodie

Internet predators are a pressing concern for parents. Youths are becoming increasingly more tech-savvy, and forms of online communication are growing at an alarming rate. All too often we hear tales of horrific tragedies involving social networking sites, and know that many of these could have been prevented with parental monitoring and discussions about internet safety.

Until recently, I thought that such monitoring and discussions were something that I did not need to worry about for quite some time since my child is still very young and I teach at an elementary school. My thinking drastically changed after overhearing a conversation among second grade girls at my school about an upcoming sleepover. When I think of young girls’ slumber parties, I picture snacks, games and movies, but instead, the girls were planning to log on to their sisters’ social networking sites. From this moment, I knew that I needed to take responsibility for educating this demographic about internet safety, and wanted to encourage others to do the same.

After this incident, I began researching young children and internet use and found some disturbing information. For example, in 2008 according to the Rochester Institute of Technology:

• Approximately 48% of students from kindergarten to first grade interact with others on the internet.
• Of these 48%, nearly half of the students had already been exposed to something online that made them feel uncomfortable.
• To make matters worse, one in four of these children did not report his or her experience to an adult.

Given these findings, I was more convinced than ever that children are never too young to be introduced to the concept of being safe on the internet.

After exploring countless books, videos and the like, I found that there were many products, websites, and resources that helped educate parents and older children. However, I found no such internet safety resources and materials that were specifically geared toward introducing the subject to younger children. Then it hit me: there is a parallel between the Big Bad Wolf in the Little Red Riding Hood story and internet predators, and this would be a perfect way to introduce the concept to this age group. Pulling from this idea and what I have learned about quality children’s literature from my years of experience as a teacher, I wrote Little Red Hoodie. This children’s picture book is a modernized version of the classic tale in which the Big Bad Wolf plays the role of an internet predator posing as Granny online in an attempt to lure Little Red into his trap. I spent countless hours working to make the book child-friendly and humorous, so that the topic could be introduced in a nonthreatening way. My hope is that the book will initiate a critical conversation among families and perhaps even help prevent future tragedies.

HEALTHFUL HINTS:

• Educate yourself and your children about internet safety. Local police departments often offer various materials and programs to the community. There is also a wide variety of organizations and website that provide such resources including the following:
  • http://enough.org
  • http://ncmec.org
• Be mindful of the growing number of ways that your child can utilize the internet to interact with others. For example, many video games now allow children to go online and interact with other users.
• If you choose to use Little Red Hoodie as a tool for teaching your family about internet safety, here are some suggestions:
  • Read the book at least once for enjoyment before using it to get into a serious discussion.
  • After reading the book, help lead an open-ended discussion by asking questions such as the following: “How did the Wolf trick Little Red Hoodie?”, “Why do you think that the Wolf used the computer to try to trick Little Red Hoodie?”, “How do you think that the story would have been different if Little Red Hoodie would have asked her mother before leaving the apartment?”, “What do you think Little Red Hoodie should have done?”
  • Post “Little Red Hoodie’s Rules to SAFE Internet Use” near your computer (found on the last page of the book).