Teaching Kids to Be Digital Citizens

By Claire Podulka

For kids and their parents, the online world can sometimes feel like a game of cat and mouse. Mom friends daughter on Facebook, so daughter abandons that account and creates a new, "real" account for her friends. Dad takes away the home laptop, so son uses social media on his phone instead. Parents need to figure out the right balance between keeping their kids safe and giving themautonomy.

On the far end of that balance is New Jersey father of two Dan Sherman. He comes home from a job in computer security to use some of the tools of his work on his kids. There are all kinds of options available for parents who want help monitoring their kids online, including software like Net Nanny and Qustodio. Sherman decided to put parental controls on his older daughter Alexis's iPhone, preventing her from downloading apps, and he tracks her Facebook account with a software called MinorMonitor, which reads her posts and checks for references to issues like underage drinking or bullying.

Sherman says that his daughters need to learn the lesson early that they will always be watched and tracked. "It's not any different from any employer," he says.

Education journalist John Merrow agrees with Sherman. Some parents might be intimidated because they feel less comfortable with the online world than their kids. But while he acknowledges that kids aredigital natives, he also believes, "Being a `digital native' is not the same as being a `digital citizen.' Young people have always neededethicalguidance and the security of rules and boundaries." And that's what parents are there for.

Alexis says she does not mind and actually feels good knowing her dad is looking out for her. She also says that knowing he's watching makes her think twice about what she posts online. In a recent example, she almost got into a fight on Facebook with a friend who had been spreading rumors about her. But she thought better of it, because she knew she was being watched. "Having your parents monitor makes you think twice about what you put," she says. Which is, of course, one of the reasons her dad is watching her in the first place.

Even though the desire of parents to keep their kids safe is a reasonable one, kids still, online as well as in the real world, want their privacy and independence. The Pew Research Center conducted a study in 2013 of 800 kids aged 12-17 about their social media habits and privacy. One of the subjects, a 17-year-old boy, told the researchers, "It sucks... Because then they [my parents] start asking me questions like why are you doing this, why are you doing that. It's like it's my Facebook. If I don't get privacy at home, at least, I think, I should get privacy on a social network."

If kids aren't given this kind of privacy willingly, some will decide to take it for themselves. Because kids tend to be more tech-savvy and up on the latest trends in social media than their parents, they can out maneuver their parents online. So some kids will, as a 15-year-old girl interviewed by the Pew Center said, create two Facebook profiles: "One for my family, one for my friends." Other kids might keep their posts on Facebooktameand safe for family and keep pictures of partying or other things their parents might not approve of to texts orSnapchat.

But the fact is, in most cases, kids and parents seem to coexist pretty well online. The Pew study revealed that 70% of kids said they were Facebook friends with their parents, and 85% of them said that their parents see the same content that their friends do.

And many researchers support the idea that parents should allow kids some level of privacy and independence online. "Parents can and should moderate sites, but they have to give kids the opportunities to figure out what it means to be digital citizens, and allow kids to be empowered," said Carrie James, who studies kids and social networks at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. His point is that online, as in other aspects of life, teenagers are growing up, learning to be adults, and taking more responsibility for themselves. In order to do this, they have to be given the chance to prove themselves as smart and trustworthy.

Another girl interviewed by the Pew Center, age 18, agreed that she and hercohortcan and should take responsibility for themselves online. She said that she and her friends understand that there are dangers online, even before their parents warn them. "I think it is common knowledge that our parents tell us not to post anything because then someone else can look at it. There are creepers that might want to do something with you. And so they [parents] tell us that. But it is like we already know that, because we want to be safe."

That's what it comes down to: everyone, parents and kids alike, wants to be safe online. It's just a matter of negotiating who's in charge.