There are great resources available to assist in making informed decisions on how best to work with your child on managing their digital engagement. The Australian government ESafety Commissioner’s website is a great starting point with specific information for parents; https://www.esafety.gov.au/parents.
As trying to wind back what children are allowed to use their devices for can be challenging, setting up for success while your child is younger is a great strategy. Some ideas are below:
- Treat digital media as you would any other environment in your child's life. The same parenting guidelines apply in both real and digital environments.
- Set limits; kids need and expect them. For example:
- turn off Wi-Fi at night
- don’t allow devices in bedrooms
- use software to be able to control when your child can use their device and control what they can access
- Know your children's friends, both online and off.
- Know what sites, platforms, software, and apps your children are using.
- Screen time shouldn't always be alone time. Engage with your children when they are using screens
- Play a video game with your kids. It's a good way to demonstrate good sportsmanship and gaming etiquette.
- Don't just monitor them online—interact with them, so you can understand what they are doing and be a part of it.
- Be a good role model.
- Show sensible boundaries with your own media use
- Teach and model kindness and good manners online.
- Create tech-free zones.
- Keep family mealtimes, other family and social gatherings screen free.
- Turn off televisions that you aren't watching,
- Recharge devices overnight—outside your child's bedroom to help him or her avoid the temptation to use them when they should be sleeping.
- Don't use technology as an emotional pacifier.
- Media can be very effective in keeping kids calm and quiet, but it should not be the only way they learn to calm down.
- Children should to be able to come up with activities to manage boredom or calm themselves down.
- Don’t assume educational apps are all good. Do your homework.
- More than 80,000 apps are labelled as educational, but little research has demonstrated their actual quality.
- Educate kids on the potential privacy risks and how to mitigate them.
- Help kids understand the available privacy settings on social media platforms they are using.
- Teens need to know that once content is shared with others, they will not be able to delete or remove it completely.
