Letting Kids Be Kids… on the Internet
We always hear people say, “oooh just let kids be kids.” In other words, kids need to learn things on their own, as if it is a natural learning process. But not only that, kids just need a place to go be themselves. When I was a kid I had this cool fort I built up back of my house. I put a lot of time and effort into that thing and from time to time I would just go up back in the woods and sit in my fort and spend time being by myself.
I sometimes think how hard it would be as a parent today to allow my kid to be unsupervised in a fort up behind the house. Though it is a natural part of growing up, I don’t ever want to take my eyes off of my kids.
But kids are spending less time in forts and clubhouses these days and more time on the Internet. A Newsweek article written by Michael Thompson, touches on this exact same issue. Parents are running into issues with monitoring their children while online. Mr Thompson shares the same view I have:
Kids today spend almost no time “in the woods,” and their moments spent away from their parents’ watchful gaze are precious and few. In our middle and upper-middle-class neighborhoods, children are largely indoors, taking lessons doing homework and getting ready to go to town sports. They are endlessly supervised and monitored. How many parents today are willing to do what our parents did: shovel us out the door at noon, saying “Don’t come back until 6 o’clock?”
Again, as a parent today I just can’t fathom kicking my kids out the door and letting them run rampant through the neighborhood until dinner time. Things have definitely changed in the last 25 years. But the repercussions are Internet hideouts and virtual clubhouses:
We cannot bear the anxiety of not knowing everything about our children’s whereabouts in the physical world. So our children wander off into cyberspace, killing zombies, talking to strangers and visiting all kinds of Web sites, weird and stupid and sexy. And they know we don’t have the time, attention or expertise to follow them there. The Internet is often the only private place for a child today.
Mr Thompson offers up a little advice near the end on how he feels parents should best deal with this. Go read more.
Tags: children, clubhouses, computers, cyberspace, internet, kids, michael-thompson, newsweek, Parenting, parents, virtual, web
2 opinions for Letting Kids Be Kids… on the Internet
Phil
Jun 30, 2007 at 1:41 am
There is exactly one kid in our neighborhood whose parents kick her out the door in the morning and she’s basically on her own until dinner. She’s 8 years old. And it’s very annoying to have her constantly hanging around in front of our house hoping we’ll entertain her. It’s very strange… She’s the only person around here who knows the names of everyone else who lives here.
My own kids, I let them do their thing in the house, in the backyard, at the park. I’m close at hand, but I try not to hover. My kids have almost total freedom at home this summer to play, create, read, whatever. We do have daily activities, like going to the lake, or the store, or on a hike. They seem quite content with the way things are.
Bill James-Wallace
Jul 5, 2007 at 8:16 pm
Good post and a common dilemma for many parents these days.
But it’s really a matter of balance, I think. For example, my son is 17, I allow him to go off into town, see movies and hang with friends most of the time. The balance is each morning he comes into our room (with a short macchiato!) and we talk. We talk about heaps of things including his hopes and fears, his friends and what they all do together. I wouldn’t say we “supervise” him but are are involved in his life. He wants us around.
I had a dinner with business colleagues the other night which conflicted with his hockey game. He asked if I could postpone the dinner, so I did. He got a stick in the face in the first 10 minutes and we spent 4 hours in hospital getting him stitched up!! But we were there! :)
Through all of this, regarding the Net, we have a lot of openness around his activities online. There’s no (and I mean NO) conflict at all.
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