The Essential Digital Parenting Checklist

Parenting.

If it was a job – it would be a full-time, 24/7 role.

Your responsibilities would include a lot of “tech”, whether you want it or not…

Now the big question is, how do you go about being a digital parenting pro?

1. It starts with you

If there’s anything you don’t understand – research. Talk to other parents, your child’s teachers, colleagues, neighbors and everyone in your network to educate yourself. The next step for you is to always check a PC resource yourself before even letting your child view it.

2. You’re your little one’s role model

You are their first superhero. Whatever you do, sets an example. If you ignore your child while staring at the screen or spend too much time on tech – your child will think it’s fine to do the same. Whereas, if your child sees that you strike the right balance and maintain the right posture, your child will follow in your footsteps.

3. Parental controls exist to help

Start from setting a different user profile for your child on the PC and then slowly navigate each website. Google and YouTube are the major ones, once you set those controls you can breathe a sigh of relief.

4. Make rules great again

Who doesn’t love to in control? If you get your child to make their own rules – breaking them will be out of the question. Sit together and write them down. Ground rules such as setting strong passwords and sharing them with you, only accessing bookmarked websites and not using the PC for more than an hour or two a day will be welcomed by your child once you explain your reasoning to them.

5. It’s good to be social

In fact, it’s great!

But this is somewhere you need to be very mindful. Do make sure your child doesn’t have any secret accounts.

On the flip side, you need to give your kids their own space – avoid over-analyzing their content and commenting on posts.

You and your little one should learn from each other. Share your experiences and encourage your little one to communicate with you too. Ultimately, it is about growing with the help of technology and having fun along the way, together!