For 18 years, parents have the responsibility of taking care of their children. Through infancy and toddler years, middle school and high school, parents watch their students grow into healthy adults. After high school, many children choose to move out of the house or attend college. Although your child is now living on their own, there are still ways that you can ensure that they remain safe and secure as they learn to take care […]
computer monitoring software
Trust in traditional news sources like mainstream newspapers and cable news channels is currently on a downward trend, leading more and more people to seek information outside of mainstream sources – often from internet-based resources like podcasts, blogs, and social media sites. While this is often discussed in terms of adults, the trend is affecting teens too. One way that teenagers are consuming and discussing news, current events, and controversial topics is through Instagram accounts […]
15-year-old Natalie Hall didn’t expect to get much money from trading in her old, broken iPhone. She was satisfied with the $11 discount on the price of a new phone that she was offered by a mall kiosk offering trade-ins. Her focus was on her new phone, and as far as she was concerned, the old iPhone with the shattered screen was junk anyway. She didn’t think much about her old phone – until she […]
If you’re like many parents, you probably have some concerns about your teenager’s smartphone use. Smartphones can be helpful and useful in many situations, but they can also distract your teen from things like schoolwork and family time. And it may be more than a simple distraction. A preliminary study suggests that smartphones may be triggering ADHD in teenagers. Take a look at what you need to know about this potential problem. The Study Researchers […]
Bullying has always been a problem that children and teens have had to deal with. And parents who remember their own childhoods may remember that girls and boys often experienced typical bullying very differently. A teen boy who was being bullied might come home with a black eye or other evidence of physical violence. A teen girl who was being bullied might be deliberately shunned by her classmates or have her reputation damaged by malicious […]
Online challenges can take a number of different forms. There are innocuous challenges that involve harmless actions like changing one’s social media status to reflect a particular message. There are challenges that are intended to raise money or awareness for some cause, like the Ice Bucket Challenge that was associated with ALS research and went viral in 2014. Then there are the challenges that sound and look incredibly dangerous (and stupid) like snorting condoms or […]
While your smartphone may seem like an irreplaceable part of your life, it’s important to remember that they’re still relatively new technology – if you’re the parent of a teenager, it’s likely that you yourself didn’t have a smartphone, or even a cell phone, when you were your child’s age. If smartphones have become so ubiquitous and important to daily life that they’ve changed the way that you behave as an adult, what are they […]
Popularity is important to teens, and while most teens prefer popularity over unpopularity, it does come with its own pitfalls and hassles. This is especially true on the internet, where a teen could become popular not just with the limited number of kids in their own high school or community, but with thousands or millions of people around the world. And like many of the challenges of parenting in the internet age, parents are often […]
Video games get a bad rap, but they aren’t all bad. Some video games can actually help your child improve skills like problem solving and creativity, and they can be a healthy way for kids to engage in competition. They also provide opportunities for socialization – but online gaming communities can be more problematic than the games themselves. While gaming can be a fun way for kids to interact with their peers, it can also […]
As a parent, keeping up with your teen’s social media can be exhausting. Just when you get the hang of one new popular app, it’s replaced with another one that you now have to learn about and monitor. So when you hear buzz about Finsta, you might be wondering what new thing the app store has in store for you this time. But Finsta isn’t a new app, it’s one that you probably already know […]
You’ve probably heard the phrases “deep web” and “dark web”. But if you’re a casual internet user yourself, you may not really know what these phrases mean. For many internet users, the ability to use popular search engines, visit social media sites, use email and messaging apps, and stream videos or music is more than enough. However, if you’re a parent, it’s important that you familiarize yourself with some of the parts of the internet […]
Parents know that the world can be a dangerous place sometimes and that children need to be guided and taught to make good decisions so that they can protect themselves from those dangers. The online world is no different from the rest of the world – among all the advantages and benefits it offers, it also has dangers that children need to be protected from or taught how to handle. However, you can’t protect your […]
It’s a nasty shock when you open up your credit card bill and find that it’s much higher than you anticipated it would be, and it’s frustrating to discover that the reason the bill is so high is that your teen spent a lot of money on in-app purchases. Teenagers are old enough to know that their in-app purchases are costing you real money, but they may not always stop to think of the consequences […]
Hopefully, when you talk to your kids about online safety, you talk about the importance of not revealing sensitive identifying information online, like their home address, the name of their school, or their phone number. But there are other types of information that may seem innocent to you and your kids, but can actually be very revealing. Take a look at some of the seemingly innocuous information that your kids shouldn’t share online. Geotagged Photos […]
Anonymous apps have been around for a while. Over the years, apps like Formspring, Whisper, Yik Yak, and Ask.fm have experienced periods of trendiness among teens. Currently, an app called Sarahah is rising in the ranks of popularity. What do teens do on these anonymous apps? Why are teens attracted to them, and are they safe? Take a look at what you need to know about anonymous apps. What Are Anonymous Apps For? Most anonymous […]