The Issues That Children Face With Technology

The Internet has allowed our children to have access to more information than I ever thought possible when I was a child. There is no limit to the information that they can fill their developing minds with. Unfortunately, their searches might lead them to sites that are misinterpreting the qualifying tags. They are accidentally exposed to unsuitable content. They might be led to blogs, photos, and chats where inappropriate material is shared.
The responsibilities of parents and the adult community have increased. In the past it was easy to tell our children to beware or to stay away from strangers. Now, almost everyone they might come in contact with on the Internet is a stranger. Even on sites like Club Penguin our children meet a collection of strangers. The kids have been taught "stranger danger" and love to shout it out when a new penguin is introduced to their virtual world. They sometimes become falsely complacent that the 100 buddies they are allowed to have are represented by people that are their true friends. Therefore, it becomes our responsibility to not only teach our children that their comrades may be their enemies, but also how to respond to potentially dangerous situations.
According to Missingkids.com in their publication Blog Beware the number of visitors to My Space went from 4.9 million in 2005 to currently over 67 million. There are many implications of this social networking. Our children can be exposed to other peers with many of the same goals and interests. However, their blog posts are usually intended to reach these compatible people and end up reaching a far bigger population than the youngster has intended. The blogger should use extra caution on the content of their personal sites to prevent the unintended visitors access to personal data.
Special attention should also be given to appropriate cell phone usage of our teens. They are more likely to have unsupervised cell phone time than when sitting in front of the keyboard at home. Parents need to be cautious of the technology that can be accessed from their cell phones. The web, text messaging, and picture taking capabilities are the perfect environment for a predator to gain incites into the child's where-abouts and habits. They might upload photos or videos of themselves that may contain more than just a record of their visual appearance. Innocently they may have included backgrounds that might inform a stranger of their exact location. The teens need to be reminded and instructed that they should not post their cell phone number to strangers. The also need to be aware of what they should do when they receive unwanted or threatening texts or calls.
These are just a few of the areas that parents need to take an active role in providing their children with facts and limitations to insure their safety. I will be posting more informative in depth insights into them later.