The Do’s and Don’ts of Social Media for Kids
Spy Phone at Jun 19 2020 8:15PM
The Do’s and Don’ts of Social Media for Kids
Parents can try their best to keep their children off social media, but there are very less chances that they will succeed. Kids will find a way to get on to social media networks and use them. A better approach for parents then, is to chalk out social media etiquette and rules that they’d like their kids to abide by. Develop a few do’s and don’ts for your child’s online behavior that protects them and also enables them to participate in life offline just as much. You can refer to the following rules as a model.
Do’s
• Ask them to keep private information such as DOB, address and phone number confidential at all times.
• Warn your child against accepting friend requests from strangers online.
• Inform them about Internet crimes and how they can keep themselves safe and protected from these.
• Tell them to be careful about the photos they post online.
• Advise them against expressing defamatory sentiments with respect to any organizations that they belong to, such as their school or college.
Don’ts
• Restrict their social media usage time. They can be allowed to spend time on social media, but they should not be using their time online to escape from spending time having offline interactions with people in person. Also allowing your child to spend too much time online can lead to them developing an addiction to social media.
• Do not allow smart phone or tablet usage in the bedroom.
Draw Up Social Media Usage Guidelines for Your Children
It is not possible for you to effectively prevent your child from having an online presence in today’s day and age. However, what you can do, to help protect their online safety and security is to devise certain guidelines for them to follow, when it comes to social media usage. The line between real-world communication and social media communication is blurring each day. Yet, at the same time, let your child know that they shouldn’t believe all that they read or come across on social media.
People’s social media personas and their real personas do not always meet seamlessly as they ought to – there’s an Imposter Syndrome at work. For this reason, your child should not be quick to react on any emotions that they register when browsing their social media. Customize a list of Do’s and Don’ts for your child and introduce these to them for them to follow as they navigate through the complexity i.e. life online. They may not be appreciative right away but they will thank you for it later.