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Submitted by: Darrell Ritchie
Yes, we were all teenagers once, and yes we all tested our individual boundaries, and yes we all did things that make us look back now and cringe. We had alcohol, drugs, and illicit sexual activity, and only the most ignorant among us would claim that the previous generations were somehow more innocent or wholesome.
With today s technology however, teenage antics are not only questionable, and still dangerous, but they can have long lasting consequences if not dealt with swiftly. The internet has not only given sex offenders easier access to your children, but it has made it possible for teenagers to engage in activities far beyond the influence of parents.
The end result is that spying on your teenager has become a necessity. It does not matter if you have a good kid or a bad one, all of them will make unwise choices, and with today s technology, one wrong choice can haunt you for a lifetime.
The first step is common sense .take the time to know your kid s friends. Know who they hang out with and if possible, know their parents. The most ideal scenario is to provide a place in your home where your child and their friends feel comfortable coming. Keeping them close to you, or at least under your roof, is always a good thing.
One of the quickest ways for teens to get in trouble is with the computer, either through visiting sites that they have no business visiting, or through clandestine chats or message boards. We have all seen news reports of teenagers sending risqu or even nude shots of themselves through e-mail, and then wondering how those photos proliferated so quickly across the internet, with no hope of ever being able to stop them from spreading.
Your computer or your teen s laptop should always be in the open, preferably in the family room, where it can be seen by anybody and everybody. This dramatically cuts down on the chance that your child will go somewhere he or she shouldn t. You can purchase software that will allow you to either monitor your kids online activities, block access to certain websites, or a combination of the two. Programs such as NetNanny or CyberPatrol have been popular in recent years, while the more recent WebWatcher is gaining ground. WebWatcher is popular because it allows the parent to remain undetected while monitoring chat conversations, e-mail keystrokes, every webpage visited, and can even take screenshots of their online activity.
Monitor cell phone activity. Text messages can be powerful evidence as to whether or not your teen is talking to someone they shouldn t be or engaging in inappropriate conversation.
When your kids go out, know who they are with and where they are going, as well as establishing an understood time for them to be home. You can also install GPS tracking technology on their cell phones, which allows you to instantly determine if they were where they said they would be.
If it is determined that your teen has been participating in questionable behavior, don t be afraid to take away cell phones, computers, or restrict their extracurricular activities. Make sure they understand that there are consequences for bad decisions, and the consequence of your punishment, while it may seem harsh, is infinitely preferable to what might have happened had you not intervened.
Case in point, I recently became aware of my 14 year old daughter s Skype discussions with her boyfriend. He was trying to coax her into sending him a topless photo (which she declined, but she also failed to immediately terminate the conversation). As a result, she lost all cell phone and computer rights indefinitely. She wasn t pleased, but I told her that this was much better than having done the picture which could have conceivably gone viral, circulating the internet forever. Internet photos have no shelf life .nothing should be put online that you are not prepared to see out there from this moment forward.
Make sure your kids know that they should never expect full privacy, that you are going to have full and complete access to cell phones, Ipads, and laptops, and you will have passwords for all of them.
About the Author: Darrell is the Director Of Content for Leadsbyfone LLC, a lead generation company servicing the
water mitigation
industry.
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