Living in a digital world offers our children millions of ways to spend their time.
Millions of apps, games, and websites filled with fun and creative content exist, but there are also platforms that children should avoid.
In this article, you will read how to choose appropriate apps for your children.
Digital Challenges in Parenting
Struggling with our daily chores, chasing time, and living in the tech revolution, we face the need to control how our kids use their tech devices.
Our main goal as parents is to create responsible children, ready to face all life problems. So let’s see what parents should do when introducing children to technology.
Buy and Control
We often make the same mistake: happily giving our two-year-old kid a tablet as a birthday present. But we often don’t provide control.
And the strange behavior of our kids makes us analyze and detect the problem. Often, the content our toddlers watch makes them change their attitude, be aggressive, fight, and much more.
So be careful when buying your children tech. Make sure to check on them once in a while.
Prevent Content Mimicking
We can see that our children often imitate some content creators they watch.
It is more than crucial to pay attention to all digital content our children access. Inappropriate content changes children’s behavior, no matter how old they are.
Every Generation has its Own Apps
Searching for a solution to our problem, we’ve also found some age-related issues regarding our children’s digital presence.
Age-ranked apps are recommended and offer strict guidance in choosing the correct digital content.
Every downloading app, like App Store or Play Store, has its own age recommendations for games and apps.
Besides, Google can always tell you if an app or game is suitable for your child. So, research before letting your children install or watch things on their phones.
Follow Age Restriction Rules
Most apps and websites offer age restrictions on their content if it’s unsuitable for kids. Also, all kinds of parental controls are incorporated into devices and their operating system (we’ll expand the topic about parental controls later on in the article).
That allows parents to know and restrict what children watch and do on the Internet. Turn your child’s device off if you find warnings about non-child-friendly content (violence, nudity, swearing, etc.)
But we’ve always had those moments when we ignore warnings because of our child’s crying and tantrums. Don’t forget, you’re the boss, so act like it. Make children know that NO is NO.
We mustn’t neglect these warnings for our kids’ safety. Instead, we should take them seriously and act responsibly.
Read Before Downloading
The only way to protect our kids is to do research instead of them. It is always better to lose half an hour searching than letting your kids do anything they want.
As we mentioned before, downloading some game or app, we must read the warnings or typical guidance literacy that is usually provided.
- Parental Sense
Google reviews are good but aren’t better than your sense as a parent.
Check the game or app your child wants to download yourself. Often pretty reviews and colorful themes can trick us into thinking that the game or app is suitable for children, when in reality it isn’t.
Educational Content
A great way to improve our kids’ knowledge is by using different kinds of digital content. It’s fun and also encourages us to learn and play together.
So, when you give your child a digital device, introduce them to educational games.
Those are always harmless and often really creative (even though people don’t appreciate them much).
Also, when your child starts watching YouTube, carefully choose the channels they watch. Many channels are seemingly child friends but have weird content.
Also, you can make watching educational videos or playing fun games with your children a family bonding activity.
It’s OK to be Protective
We all love and cherish our children. So it’s not wrong that we are protective when it comes to them.
There are ways to be protective of your kids in a non-pushy but still “parenty” way. (they should make parenty a real word)
So let’s quickly go over them and see what they offer!
- Parental Control
When giving a smartphone to our children, it’s smart to put parental control. That’s how you can control and restrict the content they reach.
You can add parental control through the setting of your device. Also, websites often offer parental control too.
- Reviews From Other Parents
When we’re researching some app or game and thinking about whether to approve it, besides age ranking, we should read parents’ reviews.
They are based on experience, and we can even start a conversation and get more valuable info.
- Checking our Children’s Devices
Ever wanted to be James Bond? Well, have a kid! Children tend to hide things even with all the restrictions and parental controls they receive.
So manually check your child’s phone from time to time. But I’m not saying that you should invade their privacy. Just check what they’re watching or playing (especially when they’re younger).
You must also be careful around teenagers. They can get mad if they discover you’ve seen through their phone.
Besides, they are old enough to know what’s OK and what’s not. So do the manual checking when they’re younger.
Communication
I often leave communication at the end of articles, although it is most important.
Without proper communication, your children can’t understand the importance of watching content suitable for their age.
It’s always good to start them off at a young age and educate them about what they can and can’t watch or play.
Conclusion
Since technology fills out every second, minute, and hour of our life, we must teach our children the importance of choosing the right content.
Exposing our children to content non-suitable to their age might lead to negative changes in their behavior.
So be sure to check out age ratings on apps, consult other parents, do independent research, talk with your children, and make the right decisions.
After all, our children’s safety and well-being is the most precious thing in the world and we always feel obliged to keep our children safe and secure, even in the dangerous digital world that changes every day.
