The Internet and parenting

[Guest ldsashley]

There was a comment last general conference about the internet being an avalanche of information that invades our homes. I LOVEd the comment. I shared it on facebook, and some of my friends disagreed, saying "how could information ever be a bad thing?" and "it's an avalanche that only comes in when you open the door". I think they're right in a way, but I also think when it comes to parenting, using the internet for guidance can lead to bad just as much as it can lead to good if we're not careful. There is a lot of misinformation out there, and there are extremists that can distort our perspective on what parenting is all about.

I wrote a blog post about how the internet has affected my parenting experience in a negative way, and how I want to use it in a positive way now. If you want you can read it at I am the expert | Thoughts of an everyday mom just to see where I'm coming from.

I just wanted to start the discussion here though - do you use the internet as a resource in parenting decisions? How do you make sure it stays a positive thing in your life?

[Wingnut]

I often use it for information gathering, but take most of what I find with a grain of salt. More than simple information, though, I use Facebook and LDS.net for experience-seeking. So many people have already been where I am, and it helps to learn from them.

My brother is 20 and serving a mission right now. I remember when I was 12 years old and he was blessed in Sacrament meeting. My parents are both converts, and the only members of their families, but my grandparents and great-grandparents often came to church with us for special occasions like baby blessings and primary programs. I remember the Sunday that my brother was blessed. On the way to church, my dad was prompted to ask a friend of his to perform the blessing (odd, I know). My dad got up later in testimony meeting, though, and the only thing I clearly remember from that day was some words he addressed to his grandmother (he had a really close relationship with both of his grandmothers). He told her that he frequently asked her for advice, and while he didn't always follow it, he wanted her to know that he always listened to, considered, and greatly appreciated the advice she gave him.

I think that's how I try to approach my Internet information-gathering, specifically as related to parenting. I don't always follow what I read, but I do listen to, consider, and appreciate that it's there for me.

[Anddenex]

I just wanted to start the discussion here though - do you use the internet as a resource in parenting decisions? How do you make sure it stays a positive thing in your life?

Yes, there is plenty of good advice, different perspectives, which enhance our understanding as parents. My wife is consistently researching different parenting styles and new research ideas regarding parenting. She also recently checked out a couple of books from the library.

Teach children correct principles and let them govern themselves. You are with them on the internet in the beginning, a parent teaches them that there is good and bad on the internet. A parent teaches them what is good and what is bad. At home, then you govern.

The internet is no different, in many aspects as our libraries. There are plenty of good books at the library and there are plenty of bad books also. Teach them to pick out good books, teach them to recognize bad books.

sheltering our children from the wonderful opportunities the internet provides would handicap them in the future.

[rayhale]

Having too much information and not knowing how to filter it is a bad thing, especially these days of 24 hour news programs, where they ‘make’ news, and not just report news. The Daily Show showed a clip of a respected national news reporter talking about a mass shooter whose name was just released. What was the research like, to find out who this person was? Well it seemed like all it was, was an Internet search, since in the same program, the reporter had to detract his earlier statement, saying that there was (at least) two people with the same name living in the same town.

The head of Wikipedia has said several times that Wikipedia shouldn’t be the only place people should get information from.

Did you know that there is a history for every article on Wikipedia, showing ALL edits and additions? This will help you to know how recent something has been added, or if the information is debatable. You can always compare information of Wikipedia to the Encyclopedia Britannica, but since they are not in print anymore, and they charge for use of their website, I don’t see many people doing that. On an old Law & Order Special Victims Unit episode, a school principal pointed out that the school needed the internet without any filter, he pointed out that children needed to look up biological information using the real terms, like breast, and that they had got into trouble when one of the students tried to look for information on homosexuality and got blocked. My point is, even in the real world, some parents are naive when it comes to what is on the internet in general, and what is available on their children schools’ internet, which is everything EVEN if they have a filter. (there are easy work-arounds that you, or a website, can do to avoid being filtered.)

With the wealth of information around, the art, and science, of research shouldn’t be dying out, it should intensify instead, since the ‘business’ of information has opened up to involve anyone, and everyone, and not to just the ‘experts’.

[Mahone]

Did you know that there is a history for every article on Wikipedia, showing ALL edits and additions? This will help you to know how recent something has been added, or if the information is debatable.

More importantly, every claim on wikipedia needs to have a good source - exactly like when producing an assignment for university. If the source isn't listed, or it doesn't appear to be trust worthy, don't believe the claim until you find a source that you do trust.

There is nothing wrong at all with using wikipedia as a starting point for research, just check the sources.

[dahlia]

When I was doing my masters in info science, in the late '90's, I was all for unrestricted access. At the time,. most people used something like AOL to access the internet and it was hard to get into a lot of trouble unless you really went looking for it. I'm also against censorship and wanted my son to learn how to discern the good from the bad.

If my son was school-aged now, I'd have the internet so locked up he'd need a crowbar to get in. I'm still anti-censorship, but what's available now is so different, and so all over, that I think you need to control what children are able to access. Personally, I could care less about the random picture of a naked person, what concerns me is the type of people kids can meet online. There are too many instances of teens who've run off to be with someone they met, parents who've been killed to clear the way for some teen internet romance, online bullying, etc. And we haven't even gotten to the perverts yet.

So as much as it pains me politically to say it, I'd have a 'net nanny' system hooked up and my son would know that I have the right to access everything he does on line. It doesn't mean that I would do it all the time, but he'd need to know that I could look at anything he did online.

I teach info policy every year. Every year there's new stuff that just blows my mind.

[ZionsRodeVos]

I've used the Internet for many many years to get help I needed to parent better. This started soon after my separation and intensified once I was granted custody of my four children, the youngest of which was my daughter of 5 years old. I had planned to rely on her mom to teach her all the girl things and so hadn't given any thought to any of that and once I was granted custody I knew I needed help and a lot of it.

I joined a parenting forum and found many mothers with daughters willing to help me. One helped me via posts while I was shopping for nail polish to get nail polish that was suitable for a little girl. One taught me with words how to braid hair so that Sharleen didn't have to always go to school with brushed hair or have it in pig tails. And the list goes on of all the things I have learned to be able to help my daughter and of course my sons too by getting the opinions of parents about how they handled problems and then I used those to help me decide what I would try to solve problems I had. I am currently a super moderator on a parenting forum that I've been a part of for years.

Since it is not the easiest thing for me to have time/make time and to even make friends with people I meet and associate with, using the Internet has been crucial for me to learn about many things that I had no clue about before and which knowledge I believe has helped me become a better parent.

Of course there are many things I don't like about the Internet and I do use parental controls to block content.

[Guest]

As a computer programmer, I just have to point this out:

You don't use the Internet for guidance in parenting just like you don't use the American freeway system for guidance in parenting. The Internet is MERELY a highway that connects two or more people together. Therefore, the guidance you seek is from the person on the other end of that highway. And just like you don't just follow the advice of every person you meet at the mall, you don't just follow the advice of anybody you "meet" (either via blog, anonymous written article, social media, etc. etc.) on the Internet.

When you think of the Internet in such a manner, you start to look for the face on the other end of the highway. At the same time, you start to realize that it is wise not to do things on the Internet that you wouldn't do when your face is exposed to the other person on the other end of the highway. And in addition, you start to protect yourself from the "underirable road off the highway". So that, just like you wouldn't want to drive by the street where gang-related killings happen a lot or that street that has prostitutes selling their wares, you also avoid places in the Internet highway that has those types of undesirable people.

Edited April 10, 2013 by anatess