As a parent your child’s safety is very important especially when your child is online.
The online world of social media can be a fun and friendly place for everyone to share and connect over their favourite things, however it can also be unsafe. Luckily, there are certain things you can to do ensure your child is safe on social media.
Staying safe
Here are some tips for you to take into consideration so your child is safe online.
Pay attention to the social medias age rating and see if your child is old enough to use that social media.
Teach your child about the dangers of talking to strangers online such as they could be online predators or bots that could send dangerous links to them that may lead to dangerous websites.
Tell them only to accept friend requests from trusted and known people.
Ensure they feel comfortable with telling you if anyone is bully them and make sure they know what to do in that situation. In most cases of bullying it is good to report and block the bully as this warns the social media site that the user has been bullying others while also keeping the bully away from the user as you cannot contact those who block you. Cyberbullying is the term used for bullying online and can be very stressful for the person being bullied however there are many companies that can help such as ChildLine and others. [1]
Taking into consideration what is written above it is also important to let your child be free on the internet as well as they make think it as an invasion of privacy if you are constantly monitoring them what they do on social media. It is important to take a step back and let your child have some freedom with what that post or share.
With some safety now discussed we move onto the positive sections of social media and how it can help your child and the effects of social media on your child. If you want to know more on safety in social media, please check out the post on safety for more tips and a more details on safety.
The effects of social media on your child
Social media can help your child develop social skills and can stay connected with their friends and family. A quote from an article states “As technology grows and expands our range of communication, social media is becoming a vital tool for daily social interaction. It creates opportunity for people to interact with each other in a way that is both helpful and essential to socially motivate people.” [2]
As the quote states, Social media “creates opportunity for people to interact with each other” [2] this means children can stay connected with friends far away and near to them.
“Social media sites allow teens to accomplish online many of the tasks that are important to them offline: staying connected with friends and family” [3] This quote from another article states that they can use social media to stay connected to family as well as friends.
The same article also says “Middle and high school students are using social media to connect with one another on homework and group projects. For example, Facebook and similar social media programs allow students to gather outside of class to collaborate and exchange ideas about assignments.” [3] This means that social media can be used to educate as well as stay connected.
References
[1]
A. . Görzig and L. A. Frumkin, "Cyberbullying experiences on-the-go: When social media can become distressing," Journal of psychosocial research, vol. 7, no. 1, p. , 2013.
[2]
C. R. Bhamare, "Effects of Social media on communication skills," KnowledgeReview, 2021. [Online]. Available: https://theknowledgereview.com/effects-social-media-communication-skills/. [Accessed 5 March 2021].
[3]
G. S. O'Keeffe and K. . Clarke-Pearson, "Clinical Report—The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents, and Families," Pediatrics, vol. 127, no. 4, pp. 800-804, 2011.
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