Kids and Computers
California Girl and I are considering braving the early morning Black Friday sales and getting the kids laptop computers for Christmas but we have a couple of reservations. First, unlike their current computer which is in the study with the monitor facing the hallway, they would be able to use them in different locations where it wouldn’t be as easy to check up on them. Second, In addition to making it harder to supervise what they were doing, it would be more difficult to limit their computer time since they would not always be in a visible location. They are both in high school but we keep track of their on-line activities pretty carefully. They are well trained and we’re not worried about them becoming the victims of online predators. But, having their own computers increases the possibility of them spending too much time on-line and neglecting their other responsibilities. Do any of your kids have laptops? If so, how do you monitor them? Any thoughts would be appreciated. The systems we are considering are nothing elaborate, just something good enough for web browsing, word processing, etc. They won’t even run all of latest games.
Same as you…our boys only had the family computer while they were in HS. They always had a seperate game system for all the latest games. I didn’t think a computer was for games anyway. We got them laptops when they went to college. They seem to be fine and well adjusted as the kids who got everything they asked for. Enjoy Turkey Day.
We are pondering the same question. I worry about the unsupervised time on a laptop versus the better supervision I can provide on a desktop model…
We really haven’t decided yet… Let me know what you decide!
Happy Thanksgiving..
Rather easy, when you buy the new computer(s) make sure that you set it up with them. You will have the option of setting up multiple users or profiles on the computer when you first start it up. Set one up under your kids name and another under ADMINISTRATOR. you can password lock the admin profil and control the settings and ablities to your kids. this way you can set the internet settings as you like to block adult sites and they can not change it to show everything.
Our kids both have computers in their rooms but desktops, not laptops. I have three rules with their computers:
1) Neither of them know their XP login passwords, so if they are logged out they have to ask to be logged in again. This can be a pain sometimes but it’s worth it to restrict their access to the computer when necessary.
2) Both of them have Real VNC installed on their computers and they know that I can watch what they are doing any time I like. For my part I don’t abuse this and spy on them unless I have good cause to, but they have to realise that whatever they do on their computers they can be watched, just as they could if they were using the downstairs family computer. For this to work, though, they have to be connected to the wireless network in our house. It wouldn’t stop them from playing games or doing stuff if they’re not connected to the network. They can’t get internet access without being connected to the network though.
3) The wireless router we have has the ability to set up an Access list for computers that are allowed access to the internet. I can cut them off from the internet whenever I like. Again, it doesn’t stop them playing games or doing stuff that doesn’t need an internet connection (that’s where rule no 1 comes in).
Laptops would be more difficult to control than desktop PCs. For example, what if one of them took their laptop to a friend’s house and connected to the internet? Another problem is what if they take their laptops out of the house and drop them or lose them or have them stolen? You could make a rule that they must never take the laptop out of the house, but kids tend to be very resourceful in finding ways around rules like that. At least with a desktop you know it’s going to stay put.
By the way, my daughter bought her desktop computer with her own money, but she still has to keep to the house rules regarding the kids’ use of computers.
Same problem here with kids spending too much time on the computer. Found this wonderful program called watchdog, lets you control their access in a thousand different ways. After installing it I was accused for a week of being the most unreasonable person on earth, but now it seems to have been accepted – unless they figured out how to circumvent it.
SirMike: We’ve got more than one computer since California Girl and I are on this one so much. And, I wouldn’t want them using ours anyway since we use it to create blog posts and we wouldn’t there would be too much potential for them to inadvertently see something that they shouldn’t. One of my biggest reservations is the simple fact that there would be two more computers. I do a lot by remote control now but it would be MUCH harder to monitor to systems simultaneously. I trust them but I still like to keep an eye on things.
DisappearingJohn: I’m leaning toward getting the laptops. But I’m probably going to take Ed’s suggestion and install RealVNC or a similar monitoring tool. Their current computer is old/slow so most of he tools I tried put an unacceptable burden on the CPU and made their system almost unusable. That wouldn’t be a problem with a new system. And, since our main computer is wired, I can just turn off the wireless router at bedtime. Or better still set a schedule when there systems can connect. Technology can’t take the place of parental supervision, but it can make our jobs easier.
PJ: I tried that with their current system but it became too big of a nuisance. The Boy couldn’t even install an updated Java Virtual Machine which he needs for his programming class. It was hard to keep things locked down and not be bombarded with requests to install or fix things. Software manufactures need to do a better job of writing software which works well for uses with limited privileges. I’m more concerned with the potential for abuse of “approved” software packages than I am with things they might download. They’ve seen Norton AntiVirus in operation enough to be very suspicions of anything from the ‘net.
Ed: You have given us a lot of good ideas. I think we’re going to use a combination of technology and increased oversight. But I will say I’m not telling them what type pf monitoring tools I’m installing. I’d rather not throw down the gauntlet. The Girl is very inventive and I’d rather her not take circumventing parental oversight as a challenge. The one problem I have with RealVNC or any of the other tools that I have investigated is that they don’t work well with full screen DirectX games. They either don’t work, or they raise a dialog which gives away the fact that they are installed. That’s something that I am still trying to figure out.
So far as taking them out of the house and getting an internet connection elsewhere, that problem is no bigger or smaller than it currently is. They can do whatever they want at a friend’s house right now so long as it doesn’t violate their friend’s parents rules. And, of course the most portable electronic device they have are their cell phones and thy have been doing OK with those. I’m chafing at not being able to supervise them as much as I want even though, intellectually I know that I can only do so much. All of today’s challenges make parenting much more difficult than when I was a kid. And, even though I am much more lenient than my parents, I still seem to be stricter than most of their friends parents.
Sometimes, I don’t know why I agonize over thing so much. My biggest worries are the age old worries of parents. The boys and girls (in the flesh) that they go to school with every day. Neither of them has a boyfriend/girlfriend which is probably why I still have a little bit of hair left.
John: Just like having good virus protection is essential in today’s interconnected world, I’m gong to use something. I’ll be sure to check into watchdog since you recommend it. I think the biggest problem is that I’m skeptical that software can take the place of my watchful eye. So even if it works exactly as advertised, I still feel like I’m giving up some control.
What do you think about a subscription service where female nannys would watch your kids’ computer activities remotely 24 hours per day.
A nanny would notify you if your child was in imminent danger.
The idea is to alleviate this burden on the parent to know what their child is doing online.
My daughter is 10 and really starting to love gaming.
I told her about perverts/predators online, men pretending to be kids, etc.
She sees me talking on Yahoo chat, and I have met several people from there, but not until I knew them a long long time, and she knows that too.
We have one computer, and we all share it. There are three of us.
We have some naughty pics too, but we have em stashed and shes not really interested in looking in our picture file anyway….
When she gets older, she will do her homework on our living room computer where the screen faces out so we can all see it, and I will make sure she does not discover all the naughty things online that I have found.
I noticed that when I tell her the facts, she weighs them, accepts them, and moves on.
I dont know alot about the techno things that you can add to your puter like your other commentors, but I think it is a good idea.
If I could tell you some of the naughty things ive done online, and I dont want my child doing the same!
I wanted to let you know I always look at your HNTS, but commenting is such a pain over here, LOL..with all this sign in stuff!
But, you two are so cool, and I think you are a wonderful couple!
Happy Thanksgiving and Happy HNT
Jon: That sounds like a good idea but I don’t think it would work for us. My wife and I like to have pretty fine-grained control over what the kids do. For example, some activities are acceptable on weekends, but not on school days. Or they could be banned from a particular activity as a punishment. I’d like to think that we do a pretty good job of controlling the things that they can’t do 100% of the time. It’s the soft rules like you can’t get on MySpace until your homework is finished or you can’t play The Sims until you’ve vacuumed that we’re struggling with. Unfortunately, a cyber-nanny would never know when their chores and other responsibilities were complete for the day.
Susie: The Girl is about a suspicious of online perverts as any 14-year old can be. She doesn’t use her real name or real location and only “talks” with people that she knows in real life. And the screen on their computer faces out so it’s easy to monitor. I don’t expect them to do something that I wouldn’t approve of when the instant they got more privacy. But, they would be harder to monitor. As children get older, you have to let go and let them make their own way. The issue is how much and how fast. I certainly don’t want for them to go off to college and be surrounded by things that they’ve never had to deal with. But I don’t want to expose them to things too soon. Nowadays, wherever they go, I am there. I’ll drop them and their friends off at a matinée but for most sporting events and the like I stay. I give them plenty of space but I generally keep them in my sight. (They have to know where I am anyway to beg money or refreshments.) So, like most parents, we just decide as we go along and hope that we are doing the right thing.
I know my question is somewhat odd given some of the things that California Girl and I post. But we are adults who have been married for many years. And there is a big difference between grown-ups having some fun in an otherwise stuffy world, and teenage children. It’s OK to be naughty as an adult when you fully understand the consequences of your actions. It’s a different thing altogether when you’re younger and don’t fully understand all the ramifications of things
Thanks for de-lurking, we appreciate you comment. If you ever comment in the future, it should be easier; the system should remember who you are and you won’t have to fill in anything but the comment box. One thing that is good about having a separate domain versus being on Blogger is that no one will stumble across our site by mistake. It’s a pain sometimes but no one will ever inadvertently com across our blog and be offended by pressing the “Next Blog” button.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family.