Protecting Children Online

My county has long had several people who have done exhaustive research before approving the use of websites requiring logins. Indeed during all 6000+ posts of mine I do not think I have done more than a handful of them talking about this topic. But two weeks ago my wife and I decided to finally give smartphones to our 8th grade daughters. While we are still not allowing them to use social media, we also know that we will soon have to use an app to monitor their online presence - be it on a smartphone, their Chromebook, Kindle or their much less used iTouch.

So here is my first, I am sure, of many posts discussing protecting our students as told from the parents side of the equation. First off a new blog I am just starting to follow is TechSavvyMamma written by a DC area mom who was an educator and technology expert. She posts every two to three days.

Secondly, here is an amazing overview of so much of what parents need to know. It starts with best practices (setting guidelines), goes through many of the most popular social media apps (Snapchat, Kik, Instagram, etc.). It then shows how you can go to settings and set up parental controls as well as mention some of the best parental apps out there to protect kids.

Speaking of what apps to use for student protection, this site and this one are a start.

While school systems can certainly not promote one site over another, giving parents information about how to best deal with online predators, not to mention deviants from doing homework and being better prepared for school is an issue that many schools are now grappling with and so I will be posting on it from time to time.

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