Yesterday, I attended a primary school parents evening, not to evaluate children’s progress in classes, but to learn and discuss the growing implications of raising kids in a digital world. I was there as a techie advisor on the panel and answered questions about blocking/monitoring content online, but not being a parent myself, it was a learning process for me too and thought I would comment here about some of the best practices I’ve picked up from the evening and various other places.

This video has been created for shock value but highlights why this is becoming a greater consideration …

I think the first thing to highlight is that it’s easy to be afraid of all the potential ‘dangers’ children are open to with access to the internet and other technologies, particularly if you don’t feel technically equipped to understand, but it’s important to remember that there are great opportunities as well.

• Greater access to information – When I was at school, all my homework was done using books and if I wanted to research, I cycled to the library at weekends. I started using the web at Uni in ‘93 but back then the content was not what it is now.
• Keeping in touch with long-distance relatives/friends – With social networking, internet messaging or Skype, it is easy and cheap to contact people thousands of miles away, and post photos etc.
• Meeting like-minded people and networking – As the web matures, new technologies have the power to change society and in particular, the workplace. I’m working on a project at the moment to implement a new collaborative platform within the company I work for, and it has the power to change the way we work and the culture of the organisation.
• Children can learn early to be intuitive with these tools – I’m grateful that my parents bought a family PC when I was at school and I had a chance to try my hand at basic programming (as well as games). It helped me understand computers and not develop a fear of them, which has undoubtedly helped me in my career. Today, the stakes are higher and technical literacy is increasingly important, not just to career success, but being able to engage with others. In fact, it’s not just important, it’s expected! Giving a child access to learning these tools is fundamental to their development.

As with most things, greater freedom requires greater responsibility, and the responsibility in raising children in this age of changing technology is to understand it and help guide them in it. Some of the following reflects conversations I had with parents last night.

• Blocking/monitoring content – this seemed to be the biggest concern raised by parents yesterday evening. Quite simply, greater access to information means greater access to inappropriate content, unless this is filtered in some way. Here are a few tips that I demonstrated yesterday:

1. On the Google home page, use the Preferences link on the right-hand side of the search box to enable ‘SafeSearch Filtering’ – ’strict filtering’ is the highest level. If multiple browsers are used, it will have to be done for each one. (Remember, it’s easy to enable so it’s easily disabled as well.)
2. You can monitor the browser history on most browsers using ‘Ctrl + H’ to see which sites have been visited. I know some parents agree with their children that if they find some of the history has been deleted, they will assume they have been up to no good.
3. Inappropriate content can also be delivered via spam mail. It’s relatively easy to set up an email forwarder so that you can monitor all email your child receives.
4. Of course, if they have a mobile phone, that is another access point as most mobiles are now capable of internet browsing. One option might be to agree that the mobile should only be used for calls and texts, and the internet usage can be monitored by checking the monthly bills.
5. There are various software packages that can be installed to block/monitor content on the PC. This seems to be a good comparison, but I was also recommended K9 as being easy to use (and free).
   

• Cyber-bullying – Keeping in touch with friends using mobiles, email, online chat, social networking is great, but they can also be used as points to bully an individual, and if it’s carried out online, the bullying can be done in front of a bigger audience, causing more embarrassment and upset to the child. The bullying can transfer between online and offline worlds and vice versa, and I heard last night that a frequent cause of bullying is around the possession of mobiles – which model, stealing phones, etc. What’s clear is that bullying is bullying, however it’s done – it’s against the law and should be tackled as such.
• Meeting strangers – We’ve all heard the horror stories – children getting ‘groomed’ by paedophiles in online chat-rooms and encouraged to meet up, or advertising house parties on Facebook only for hundreds of gatecrashers to turn up and trash the house. The point is that identification needs verification online – this is true for your internet banking and it’s true when teaching kids about who they’re communicating with. In the real world, ‘Charlie’ did a pretty good job of educating young people not to trust strangers, but it needs a bit of savvy on the web.
• Sliding scale – As with other areas of freedom, your approach in monitoring your children online will change as they grow older. This is partly because you learn to trust them more (hopefully) but also because, as they become more technically able, they will learn to get around various settings and blocking measures – it’s not as easy to restrict a 16yr old as it is a 9yr old.
• Parents not police – The key here is that whilst getting genned up on technology can only help in understanding what to block and monitor, this is much more about the parenting relationship you have with your kids. My wife, Jo, was also on the panel yesterday as a social worker who sees more of this subject coming up in families, and her advice to parents was to generate a family policy for internet use, as a family, just as you might do on other matters. It may include simply not allowing computers in bedrooms, but only in family rooms where the screen can be viewed by others.

There are some great resources for finding out more on this subject. The most informative site I’ve come across is www.thinkuknow.co.uk which is a project run by www.ceop.gov.uk.