Kylie Orr
Our computers are like members of the family.
My husband runs an I.T. business and we are blessed with the hum of computers 24/7. Small, bitten fruit appear on the back of our technology, as a tribute to the only worthwhile brand that exists, according to the husband-guru.
The iHusband’s new iPad has been fondled more times than his wife over the past couple of weeks. He will profusely deny this, of course, but I’m sure there’s some app that counts fingerprints and the iPad is winning by a gigaflop. The excitement on his face when the courier arrived to deliver his new toy was akin to my children spotting a Wii at a friend’s house (they are not lucky enough to own one).
My not-quite-two-year-old can work the slider on an iPhone so competently, he was ringing half my family in the time it took for me to visit the toilet. I promptly worked out how to apply a PIN to the phone.
Clearly in a household where computers almost have their own seat at the dining table, the children are going to be exposed to technology daily. This can be a great gift in a world of wires but it can also become a source of immense anxiety for the parents. Well, for me anyway.
I have trouble setting boundaries when it comes to computers. A movie? Easy. You agree to what they can watch, when they can watch it, and naturally there is an end. Open up the world of the Internet and find yourself swimming with sharks. Wearing a bikini.
Thankfully, my husband has a better grasp and quite strict ideas about how our children will use technology, the Internet specifically.
Our rules are pretty basic:
• They must use the computer in a public space – i.e. the kitchen or dining table.
• We must have viewed whatever they are playing or looking at before they start.
• They have a time limit.
My children were recently introduced to a popular online game involving penguins. Sounds innocent, looks innocent, in fact it looks pretty boring to the eye of a 35-year-old woman, but my husband was not happy with the site. There is a forum where kids can chat and an option for paid membership, which opens up their worlds to much more exciting penguin games. Meh. I was more than content for them to play the free games, and had no qualms about the forum side. Really, what six-year-old is spending his computer time tapping out conversations on a keyboard when he can be karate chopping a penguin in half? My husband wasn’t so sure. Further investigation revealed there was a protected forum and parental supervision overcame any concern. We decided to keep him as a guest player and drew no attention to the forum. Sweet.
It is apparent that my husband knows considerably more about the Internet than I do. I’m not sure if that is from years of late night “surfing” before we met, or just because he is one savvy geek.
I have some vague Internet standards. I don’t like my children’s photos anywhere on the net that can be publicly accessed. I deactivated my account on a popular social networking site because I was unconvinced about their commitment to privacy. I don’t understand small birds that send messages. In fact, the whole online networking phenomenon is incomprehensible to me. Why would I be interested in reading someone’s commentary on how boring their life is? “Gee I hate doing dishes”. So glad I logged in to find that out. In return, onlookers, (sorry “friends”) simply play voyeurs. No thanks.
I have friends that are real people. Some of them I don’t see much or can’t see much because they live a million miles away but that’s OK, I have email and I have a phone.
I concede that as a parent, particularly of teenagers, being hooked into this world of technology means you are keeping up with (and track of) your kids. Viewing their social accounts when they have carelessly made you a friend is a means of keeping the parental finger on the pulse.
But I don’t have teenagers. Yet. I can’t quite reconcile a penguin game aimed at under-10’s so how on earth am I going to manage the plethora of opportunities for teens to liaise, and be potentially misdirected on the world wide web? Am I just an old fogey who hasn’t caught up with the times? Without sitting next to our children and overseeing what sites they are accessing, how do we keep them in the boundaries? Is it up to governments to apply filters or is that a violation of human rights?
I know we have to teach our children responsible and safe Internet and related technology use. We need to guide by example, and also allow them some freedom to use their time wisely and independently. I just haven’t quite figured out how. Luckily, I married an iMan.
How do you manage the way your children (and your partner!) use computers and the Internet? Do you apply rules? Comment on Kylie's Blog.
