Pulling off an event like this week’s presentation on kids
& technology by Archibald Hart is not a small undertaking. Any time we put
on a parent program, it’s never one program, but usually three – one for
parents, one for young kids, and one for the older kids. That means a lot of
details to cover. And my main thought the morning of the event was: this is all
a distraction.
Not the presentation itself; it was informative, relevant,
and challenging. I mean the whole issue of kids and technology, specifically
the intrusive, ever-present personal computing devices most of us are attached
to a good part of each day. (This, written on my laptop after midnight on
Thursday.)
It’s all a distraction. By which I mean that ten years ago,
we were barely dealing with the stuff we are now: Internet addiction, texting,
sexting, easy access to streaming pornographic videos, and i-Devices which have
brought e-communication off of the desktop and into our palms, making the digital presence
all the more ubiquitous. And 20 years ago? Almost no one had even heard of the
Internet.
And yet, 10 and 20 years ago, we were not easily churning
out healthy, well-adjusted, spiritually strong kids and teenagers. There were
enormous challenges and barriers keeping kids from spiritual maturity even in
the pre-Internet age. Which makes all of these issues regarding technology –
and they are big issues – a distraction.
Because even if there was a magical cure that kept kids away from
porn and ended cyberbullying and cyberstalking and brought down people’s anxiety
levels and re-set our brains (which are being re-wired by the demands that
electronic communication place on them)…it still wouldn’t magically make kids
into spiritual rockstars. It would merely put us in a place like where we were
in 1994 – and we weren’t exactly a screaming success when it came to discipling
kids back then, either.
My point is, everyone talks
about technology as if it’s the biggest issue facing their families these days.
And it may be. But we are naïve to think that if somehow we could remove tech
from the equation or at least contain its negative effects, we’d pretty much
have no more issues dogging families. Poor communication, lack of empowerment, the
need to train kids to take on responsibility, high-risk behaviors, and dysfunction
are still a part of family life because, well, we’re screwed up and it’s work
to get along.
All of these issues with tech aren’t real issues. They’re irritants. And they’re factors which
complicate those five features of family life I listed above. Tech is (often) a
hindrance to effective communication, it detaches us from real life, it thrusts kids into an adult world
they’re not ready for, it is a playing field that encourages risk-taking, and
it promotes dysfunction.
Sometimes when we have a really big job to do, we chip away,
taking baby steps, rather than taking the radical steps needed to finish the
job. After all, if we aggressively conquer the biggest problem in our life,
what then will we have to obsess over, right? Yet tech is not the biggest problem families face. It may be the
foremost problem, but that just means it needs to be dealt with first so that
moms and dads and their kids can get to work on the real issues of family
living.
So let me encourage you to be decisive and to go after the
tech issues in your home – because there are, in reality, bigger fish to fry.
Need boundaries on tech use? Put them in place. Have a kid addicted to porn?
Get help. Have kids who repeatedly abuse online privileges? Wean them off. You
cannot afford to let these issues consume
your child’s adolescence. Believe it or not, there’s more to life than that
– theirs and yours.
If you aren’t looking for advice on containing the digital
storm in your home, stop reading here. (And thanks for reading.)
If you are,
here are my audacious suggestions of some things you might implement
immediately. These won’t “solve” the issue forever, but they’re steps in the
right direction.
1. Get a handle on
your own tech use. Because we don’t reproduce what we want, we reproduce
what we are. So to expect your kid not to text at dinner while you text at
dinner is an unrealistic double standard. And it will fail. If kids don’t get
to go online after a certain hour, adults don’t either. (And remember that kids
play games or use social media for fun and to prevent boredom; many adults
do work on their laptops or phones for the same
reason. So it’s not enough to say, “You can’t play games, but I can work.”
That, too, is a double standard.) The bottom line is, we cannot expect kids to
use digital devices any less than we use them. We adults have to get this under control. (And this, written on my laptop now
well after midnight.)
2. Kids under 13? No
social media. Period. Know why? It’s illegal. Yup, that’s right – the
Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) of 1998 makes it illegal to
collect someone’s personal information online if they are under 13 without
parental consent. And since most social networking sites and apps don’t want to
go to the trouble of verifying consent, they state that a person must be 13 or
older to use their services. In other words, kids who have Facebook and
Instagram accounts are lying about their ages in order to sign up.
Parents – hide behind this law! The online marketers and
social media people hate the law. And, given how much has changed since 1998
(the dinosaur days of the Internet), it probably is a little out of date. But
for now, it’s the law. So when your son or daughter asks if they can start an
Instagram account, you can say, “No. It’s against the law.” But all my friends have one! “It’s
against the law.” See how easy that one is?
3. Practice saying
no. As in, “Mom…really, I can’t
have an Instagram?” (Answer: “No. It’s against the law.”) You will be the
meanest, most unreasonable parents on the planet if your kid is the last one to
get an iPhone…according to your kid. You will be the dorkiest, most backward
family in the neighborhood…according to your kid. But you must say no – at some point. I can’t tell you where that
is. You will decide for yourself at what age your kid gets his or her first
phone (hopefully a dumb phone at first), at what age they graduate to a smart
phone, and when they get their own computer or tablet – but build in “no” somewhere. There has to be a limit to what you will buy or provide. Because the
other option is, there’s no limit, and that’s a terrible position to put
yourself in. And it’s a terrible thing to grant your kids, who will always ask
for more than you really want to grant them permission for (and believe it or
not, they don’t always expect you to say yes). Have some standards. What won’t you say yes to - when it comes to tech or otherwise? Because if the
answer is nothing – if you will not say “no” to anything your kid asks – well, then, that’s the answer: it’s never
no.
4. Seriously,
seriously rethink handheld Internet devices. I mean, seriously. Because
your son will use it to look at porn. Not exclusively. But it will happen. “It
will happen anyhow.” In all likelihood, you’re correct. Most teenage boys not
only have looked at porn, they do so regularly. Part of your job is to make
it not so easy.
5. Wi-fi must die
after a certain hour. This is one of the making-it-not-so-easy steps. (And
this, from me, posted to an online blog well
after midnight. Sheesh.) But really, it makes sense. If night is for
sleeping, and you turn the lights off, and the TV off, and the computer off,
why not the Wi-fi, too?
6. Install filtering
and/or accountability software. www.covenanteyes.com
is a good place to start if you know nothing about this. Filters are
frustrating. There are ways around them. Both true, but again, your job is to
make it not so easy for kids to encounter harmful things online. Trust your
kids, because you must. But also verify. I like accountability software for
kids who are older, because it puts them in a position of having to answer for
where they’re going online. Don’t install it as a “gotcha” maneuver; install it
with their full knowledge and participation.
7. Get kids prepaid
phones that charge by the minute and per text. These phones show a
declining balance on the home screen. Kids tend to think that minutes and data
transfer are “free”. Disabuse them of this, immediately. Put a fixed amount of
money on the phone each month and when it’s gone, it’s gone. (Caveat: Since I
often hear that the reason preteens have phones is so their parents can easily
get in touch with them, make it a rule that Mom and Dad’s calls must be
answered. If minutes expire, deduct $10 from the next month’s allotment. If
they don’t answer when you call – either because they’re out of minutes or
aren’t paying attention – take the phone away, because really, why then do they
have it at all? And really – they’ll be fine without one. They’ll be ok. So
will you. Just make sure they know how to call home – that they know your home
number and your and your spouse’s cell number.)
8. Become a student
of tech. You must do this. Even if you never use apps. Even if you wish
they were never invented. Even if your phone is still dumb (like mine is).
Whatever your reason for resisting and resenting the tech onslaught, you must
be familiar with what’s out there. Because your kids are. It’s second-nature to
them. Two sites I recommend: http://internet-safety.yoursphere.com/
and http://www.commonsensemedia.org/
9. Allow kids to be
bored; don’t allow tech devices to rush into the vacuum. Archibald Hart
closed with this, and I thought it was like gold: When he was a child, he was
often bored – and it made him creative. I thought about that and thought about
a kid I know who’s a really good artist. He was showing me a cool drawing once,
and told me he did it over a school break when – you guessed it – he was bored,
with nothing else to do.
Then I thought about my own work, and how one of the
things I so often lack is creative space. Though I dream of having whole days
and weeks to brainstorm ideas for KidsGames or summer camp or teaching series, it
never seems to happen. You know what else never seems to happen at work? That I
am bored. More often – nearly always – my schedule is packed to the gills, with
half a dozen things to do at once, five tabs open on my Internet browser, and
four messages I should have returned a week ago.
And you know what happens when I do hit a point where I feel
caught up? Facebook, that’s what.
10. Say no. (Now
that you’ve been practicing.) We must say no to some things so that we can say
yes to other things. As good as it feels to check the items off your electronic
to-do list, or clean out your e-mail inbox, or delete a bunch of files you no
longer use (all the organizationally challenged people are thinking, “Files?
What are files? I use the desktop.”) – it is fleeting. So fleeting. And so not
the point of our lives. Which is why I’m going to hit save and close this
laptop, right now. And why you should, too.
