Protecting your children online.

Digital technology is so much a part of everyday life, it isn't surprising that children would grab on to the newest trends and want to experience all that the Internet has to offer. While there are clearly benefits that children derive from Internet use, such as becoming more technologically savvy, learning to find information, being able to quickly share files with friends and having to read more because online communication is mostly written, there are also significant disadvantages to allowing children the freedom to use computers and access the Internet at will. As a proactive parent, there are many apps, as well as services and features within your computer's operating system that will allow you to monitor your child's Internet activity or take advantage of controls that will prevent them from accessing sites you deem unsuitable.

Microsoft

Households that use computers with Windows Vista or Windows 7 operating systems have built in parental controls that should be used. Microsoft enlisted the assistance of the American Academy of Pediatricians to develop age-based guidelines for Internet use, along with the parental controls. Their Age-Based Guidelines are divided into three age groups: one for children between the ages of two and 10, another for children between the ages of 11 and 14, and the last one for children between the ages of 15 and 18.

Children between the ages of two and 10 shouldn’t be allowed to use the Internet without supervision. Establish clear rules regarding their Internet use, such as how much time they can spend online, how often they can use the computer, sites that are age-appropriate for them to visit and revealing information. Make sure that they know that they should never reveal any personal information about themselves, their family members, where they live or anything that a resourceful person could use to find out more about them.

For children between the ages of 11 and 14, you need to be aware that they probably already know a lot about accessing the Internet, so although it may not be necessary for you to sit with them when they use the computer, they should know that you will monitor their activity, the sites they visit and what they do. Stress the importance to them of not sharing information or posting pictures that could allow anyone surfing the Internet to figure out where you live. If you intend to allow your tween to join any social networking sites, make sure he/she creates an online profile with you, and that they feel comfortable enough to talk to you about their online activities.

By age 15, children are even more familiar with things they can do on the Internet, and they are likely using it a lot for their schoolwork. One way to protect your teens and to ensure that you are able to monitor their online activity is by not allowing them to have a computer in their room. By having a computer in the common areas of the home, and requiring that they use it there, you are able to maintain a semblance of control over what they do and how they handle themselves in the scary world of cyberspace. Help them understand that you want them to feel free to come to you about anything that concerns them, bothers them, frightens them or confuses them. Make sure they know they won't be punished, regardless of what happens, as long as they communicate with you.

Create a Digital Toolbox

A digital toolbox generally consists of tools that are available in the form of protective software. One of the tools is a white list that parents can create after choosing websites that they think are appropriate for their children to see or use. As a parent, you can also create filters within those white lists to limit access your child has to certain sites, domains or programs when you aren't present.

Take advantage of warning tools that are designed to warn you when your child tries to access certain types of content. These warning tools may also allow you to tracks the history of your child's Internet activity so you can monitor their behavior more closely. The most extreme types of digital tools are software programs that allow parents to decide what websites and content they want to block so their child cannot access it at all.

Setting Limits

Parents need to set limits as to what their children can and cannot do on the Internet. If you're going to allow your child to join Facebook, make sure that they don't upload or publish their profile until you approve it. Monitor the way your child interacts with people when they are on Facebook. The Wall Street Journal warns parents about some of the very real problems that children may encounter while using the Internet.

As a parent, it’s important that children know, understand and accept that you have control over their Internet use. The same goes for their smartphone use. Use filters to prevent your children from accessing inappropriate and potentially dangerous sites. Talk to them about spam and phishing so they understand that there are people who try to take advantage of innocent, unsuspecting people. Make sure that your children understand that they should never give out personal information to anyone on the Internet, and they should be cautious about posting images as well.

Most importantly, however, despite all the rules, your children need to feel comfortable enough with you and trust you to come to you with their concerns. By monitoring their Internet activity, you ensure that they still get to enjoy their childhood because they have a loving family that cares for them.





This is a guest post from Cameron Tyler, a regular contributor to yousendit.com and big proponent of technology and internet security. 


"Growing up with younger siblings, I've always felt the need to protect the ones that I care about. I wanted to be able to combine my love of technology and security to help parents protect their children online. I hope parents can take this information and apply it to their own lives to help monitor their child's digital life."

Winning the war in the kitchen: 3 tips to help busy parents cook more from scratch!

This is a guest post from Rachel at Well Worn Whisk: simple recipes and food writing.

My blog is about easy home cooking, featuring mainly recipes and the occasional food article. I'm an ex digital marketing communications person, now full-time mum to a toddler with another one on the way. I want to spread the joy of simple home cooking and even, maybe, inspire busy people to cook from scratch more! 

It has to be said, I have everything on my side when it comes to cooking: I’ve got time as I’m currently at home with my son and expecting another baby soon; I have experience as I’ve been cooking since I was about 10; I like to think I have knowledge, from years of reading cookbooks; and most of all I have a passion for the subject. The only thing I am sometimes lacking right now, being 7 months’ pregnant with a toddler, is energy. But aside from being tired I have no excuse not to cook from scratch most days. Yet I don’t. I sometimes order a takeaway. Or I eat cake for dinner, sometimes a bowl of cereal! Personally I don’t tend to eat ready meals, unless baked beans count, preferring to go for toast or something basic rather than processed. The point I am trying to make is that, if people like me who really love to cook can’t manage to do it from scratch every day, what chance do people who work full-time, have more than one child, and don’t even like (or know much about) cooking have?

I understand why people don’t cook from scratch, I really do get it; however, I still don’t see that as an excuse for never (ever) doing it, especially as a parent. It’s not OK, in my opinion, to give your family processed meals every single day, even if you are the worst cook in the world. Anyone with half a brain knows that there are benefits to home cooking: it’s likelier to be healthier, probably containing less salt and ‘bad’ fats. At the very least, when you cook from scratch you know what’s going into a dish. But aside from health benefits, you are setting a good example to your kids when you cook, so that hopefully they will feel inspired to cook too. And if you include them in the cooking process then you are spending quality time with them as well. There really is no argument that I can think of not to cook more - we all know we should do it, but that knowledge alone might not be enough to make us get the pans out and actually start cooking.

Cooking from scratch is easy, I firmly believe this. For most people the reason they don’t cook is down to a busy schedule and a lack of knowledge. I think you can overcome these problems by choosing the right recipes - but to do that you must have some decent ingredients in your cupboards, ready to be utilised when you need them. If you give yourself achievable ‘cook more’ targets you are more likely to be successful. For example, if you don’t cook at all from scratch at the moment, then aim to do it once a week. If you’d just like to cook a bit more, then why not aim to increase your repertoire by learning three simple and nourishing new recipes?

Here are 3 simple rules that might help in your efforts to cook more from scratch. They may seem obvious, but I really think they work!

            1 -   Do some batch cooking (your freezer is your friend)

Your time is a precious commodity and you need to use it wisely. It’s just as easy to make two lasagnes as one, so try doubling up when you’re cooking and freeze one lot of whatever you’re making (if it’s suitable). It’s so gratifying knowing that your freezer has a few standby dinners and desserts (as well as the odd packet of fish fingers) for occasions when you’re too tired or busy to cook. All you have to remember to do is take it out the day before!

Batch cooking recipe suggestions:

>> Easy, healthy and freezes well (spice it up or down depending on who’s eating): Hearty bean chilli

>> Almost foolproof dessert (freeze before cooking): Rhubarb and blueberry crumble

            2 - Put time aside at the weekend for some family cooking and eating

With parents coming home late from work and the priority being to eat something – anything - as quickly as possible the minute you get through the door, I totally get that weeknights might not be the best time to think about getting stuck into a new recipe. Making time at the weekend is a no brainer. There’s not many people who don’t have an hour or two to spare, whether that means getting up earlier or sacrificing another activity: what’s more important than your family’s health and happiness? I think the two best times for a spot of family cooking are a Saturday breakfast / brunch or a late Sunday lunch. I’ve suggested two recipes here.

Weekend cooking recipe suggestions:

>> A fun breakfast / brunch recipe (add bacon or blueberries for brunch): Healthy American style pancakes

>> A simple Sunday lunch recipe: Fast roast chicken with oregano andlemon with Warm new potato and green bean salad

            3.  Perfect an adaptable store cupboard recipe (or three)

There are some ingredients that you will almost always find in my cupboard: a tin of anchovies, tinned tomatoes, a bottle of capers, some extra virgin olive oil, and pasta of some sort, plus a head or two garlic. If I don’t have these in, I feel slightly panicked as it means I can’t make quite a few variations of my own go-to store cupboard dinners, which are mainly pasta. If you can master an easy recipe that you normally have the ingredients in for, then once every week or so (not so much that everyone gets sick of it!) you know you can knock up something good from scratch as the mood takes you. It might be a simple omelette with eggs and cheese and perhaps the addition of a vegetable like peppers or courgettes. This is the essence of good store cupboard cooking: you can make it with or without one or two of the ingredients. Here are two deceptively simple, adaptable store cupboard recipes that could be made even without the main vegetable ingredient.

Adaptable store cupboard recipe suggestions:

>> Surprisingly easy store cupboard supper (don’t let the word soufflé put you off!): Leek, cheddar and penne soufflé(eggy bake)

>> Sounds posh but very simple: Tortiglioni (or penne) withbroccoli, anchovy, garlic and chilli

A quick note about fussy kids, as this can be a problem when trying new recipes (we’ve all been there). If you’re worried that your kids won’t eat new foods then my advice is to take it slowly. Start with foods that all kids like: fluffy pancakes with blueberries; homemade fish fingers; homemade chips and dips (search out simple recipes). Get them involved in the cooking, standing on stools breaking eggs, whisking batters, even slicing vegetables with your help - and then encourage them to watch their dinner come to life in the oven. Give lots of praise when eating it: “You’re so clever for making fish fingers with me, this is the best lunch I’ve had all week!” As they start to get more adventurous, try new more interesting recipes with them – you might be surprised. We should stop assuming that kids will only eat bland and uninteresting food – they have palettes too! Kids imitate their parents, so if you show enthusiasm for what you’re cooking and eating, they probably will do too.  

#MedalMonday - May 2012

Fall in, troops!! 


Welcome to another Medal Monday, that day of the month where we celebrate our parenting victories, no matter how small. 


Whether you've produced a meal your child has actually eaten, won a battle with your child's school, or done the most awesome-ist ever craft activity, we want to hear about it. Link it up below and share your glory with us.


You can grab the victory badge from the sidebar if you want, and tweet us your blog post url @ParentFrontLine so we can pass it on. But most importantly, link it up below so we can read and learn from the best. 

AT EASE.

Everyone failed!!

This is an anonymous guest post


We went on holiday recently with my husband’s family including his nephew who is an only child. I knew from the time that we started organising it that it was a bad idea! Our 4yo nephew doesn’t like our 2yo daughter at all and has an antipathy towards our 5mth old son. I knew in my gut that I should have put my foot down and I expressed these concerns to my father in law when he began organising the holiday. I was told not worry about it because by then 2yo would be talking properly and it wouldn’t be an issue. Yeah right!


Everything was sweetness and light when we got there (mostly because the children were too tired!) but on the Sunday, it started Big Time! 4yo’s mother lets him listen to really heavy metal music and it makes him really aggressive! It didn’t help that Sunday was a miserable day and we were all too tired from the 5 hour journey the day before to do anything, but that didn’t excuse 4yo’s behaviour! He decided that he really didn’t like 2yo doing anything!


When they went into the garden, he pushed her over and she slipped on the grass and hurt herself. When it started raining, they came inside and it carried on. He didn’t even like her playing with her own toys because he couldn’t hear his music! She was sat on the floor singing to herself and he shouted at her to shut up! If she went anywhere near him, he’d shout at her and push her away because she was ‘taking his stuff’! If she was colouring in next to him at the table and she went to pick up one of her crayons, he’d yell at her to leave his pens alone when she was nowhere near them! At one point, I went over and put my hand on the table so that I could bend over and pick up one of 2yo’s crayons and he shouted at me because my hand was touching one of his numerous colouring books that he wasn’t even using. My 2yo had one, he had about ten! He wanted to use my laptop to access the internet and lost his temper when I said ‘no.’ The internet didn’t exist when we were children! This went on all day and nothing was done to stop him, apart from the odd, ‘oh stop being silly!’ In the end, I took my children out to protect them from the constant abuse they were getting!


I will fully and freely admit that my 2yo worked out really quickly that her 4yo cousin was really easy to wind up and took every opportunity to do so and I disciplined her for that, but I did mention to my father in law on more than one occasion that I felt that his grandson’s behaviour was totally inappropriate and that I was concerned about the fact that his mother was doing nothing about it. The response I got was that it was 2yo’s fault for deliberately winding him up! I told him that he’d better say something or I would and he refused. ‘Oh it’s just kids!’ 4yo was bullying my daughter and that’s all you have to say?!? I held my tongue until Tuesday and again spoke to him about my concerns. Again he refused to say anything to his daughter about her son’s behaviour and neither would my husband! They all agreed with me, but refused to do anything about it!


On Wednesday, I finally cracked and told my husband that if something wasn’t done about it that day, I’d be going home first thing in the morning. ‘Don’t go home. It’s not fair on everyone else.’ What about my children? Was the bullying and abuse they were receiving fair to them? I replied that I would be going home as I’d had enough! 4yo’s mother heard it and said that it was all 2yo’s fault for not leaving her son alone. What about the constant barrage of abuse that he was levying at my 2yo even when she was playing with her own toys?


Wednesday afternoon, 4yo’s mum went out for an hour by herself because she felt that she ‘needed time alone’. The whole time she was out, 4yo was constantly shouting at 2yo to shut up (she was singing one of her dolls to sleep) and then he started on my 5month old. A baby! He told me to stop him crying because he wanted to hear his metal music. He had ear phones on!


Just as his mother was coming up the drive, we had sat our 2yo in the high chair and given her dinner and she was shouting. I had left the room for two seconds to get some wet wipes and could hear him again shouting at her to shut up. Their uncle turned around and also started shouting at her to shut up. I have to admit, I really lost it then and went into the room and really laid into him for punishing my daughter for her cousin’s attitude. He threw his iPod at me and stormed out. 4yo’s mother came into the room at this point and told me that telling 2yo to be quiet was not punishing her. By then my blood was boiling so I responded in kind! ‘If you disciplined your son effectively then we wouldn’t have a problem! The fact is: he’s a spoilt little bully!’


Her response, ‘How dare you call MY SON a bully!’


‘Well it’s true!’ You can imagine what ensued!


I picked up my son, who was crying, and went to leave the room. My husband went to take him off me because he thought I was going to leave the house with him. 4yo’s mother came along and tried to take him off the two of us. I couldn’t help thinking, ‘why don’t you concentrate on telling your son that this argument is his fault!?’ which verbalised as ‘Get off my son, you bitch!’ I surrendered the baby to my husband and went to sort 2yo out 4yo’s mum was taking him upstairs because he was in hysterics.


My mother in law started having a go at me, justifying what her daughter had done, saying that she was having a bad time at the moment. What about me? There are THREE, count them THREE, social workers on my case! I have a husband who’s incapable of work and a son with a potentially life threatening illness and you think she’s got it hard! All of her problems are self-inflicted! While I was telling her this and helping 2yo eat her dinner, my husband came into the room and took me by the arms and in front of my own child, dragged me out of the room!


I screamed as he knocked my knees against the door post. He opened the front door and tried to push me out of the house. I grabbed hold of the banister. He ripped my arms away and tried again. He screamed in my face, ‘Get out! I don’t ever want to see you again!’ I refused and again he shouted, ‘Get out! Just go!’ I gave in and walked out into the rain in my socks and with no coat on.


I texted him: ‘I’m not coming back. If you can be bothered to call the police, tell them they’ll find my body in the lake!’ and I meant it! I really meant to go off and end it all because everything was being forced onto me. I was being made responsible for everything and no one was thinking about me. No one cared about me! It took him half an hour to reply and instead of coming to look for me, he sent me a text asking where I was. A text! In the meantime, I tweeted my opinion on only children. (Spoilt bullies!)


When, he finally came to get me, I was frozen to the bone and soaked through, He accused me of emotional blackmail. When I got back to the house, 5 month old was screaming for a feed (I breastfeed) and I instantly knew that this was the only reason they wanted to find me. I was forced to sit in the living room in my wet clothes and listen to everyone telling me how stupid I was and how it was all my fault! At no point did anyone suggest that I go for a bath and bed.


4yo’s mum was doing her best to drive a wedge between us all evening by commenting on my faults and failings. And commenting on our children’s behaviour!


That night, I blogged about my feelings about social services and spent most of the evening begging my husband to let me go home. ‘It’s not fair on the children.’ Was his response. So it was fair that 4yo was subjecting them to verbal, emotional and physical abuse whether he knew it or not! It wasn’t the fact that he was doing it that was bothering me, it was the sheer volume of abuse!


Next day, 4yo’s mum noticed my tweet and without taking my mood at the time into consideration, she blocked me on Twitter and Facebook. My husband dragged me upstairs and told me off about it. ‘Why did you have to do that?’


‘Because that’s how I felt at the time!’


‘Well, it’s not nice!’


‘And her behaviour is?’ He confiscated my phone and laptop and deleted all of my social networking apps from my phone. I felt like a child.


Ten minutes later, I went downstairs to find 4yo’s mum holding 5month old. How dare she touch my child? So I took him off her and put his coat on and put him in his car seat and picked my keys up. Hubby shouted, ‘Where are you going?’


‘Out! No one wants me here so I’m going!’


‘Are you coming back?’


‘You don’t care!’


‘Yes I do! Are you coming back?’


‘No one wants me here because I’m ruining everything for everyone!’


‘Are you coming back?’


‘Let me go home!’ I walked out. I had to leave 2yo there because he wouldn’t let me take her. I drove off vowing never to return and to fight to have 2yo returned to me! I don’t know where I drove or where I went but I ended up in a car park crying my eyes out! No one knew or understood or cared about how I felt! They were too wrapped up in their own self-loathing from their self-inflicted problems to even think about what I was going through! Why should I go back? What was the point? The thought of 2yo and the abuse she was enduring with no one to stick up for her made me return. The trouble was: I’d started to believe that it was all her fault and that I was wrong because everyone had told me that so many times!


4yo’s mother had read my post by the time I returned and was crying about it and how she felt that she couldn’t even begin to imagine how I was feeling and that she was so sorry! She still hasn’t unblocked me from Facebook or Twitter yet so she can’t be that sorry. My father in law told my husband that it was probably better for us to go home a day early because he didn’t want any more arguments. Well, if he’d spoken to his daughter there wouldn’t have been any in the first place!


We came home the next day and I have to say, I was never so glad to come home from holiday in my life! Everyone’s blaming me for ruining the holiday, but I think in our own little way, we all did. We all failed all three children that week not just me and I wish the others would admit to it!


So next time someone expresses their concerns to you, do something about it!