Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#1

Post by kqr » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 5:57 AM UTC

Or, more generally, how to give children freedom and privacy, yet also be there to help them understand the lessons the world is about to teach them?

I have this preconceived notion that I don't want to violate my children's privacy. It's very tempting, of course, to passively monitor e.g. their spending or online habits, but I don't want to.

(As a concrete example, I know a some people get very detailed reports from the daycare about what their children have been up to. I'm not interested in that -- when I want to know what the daycare experience is like, I personally spend a day at the daycare.

This gives me much more nuance than a report ever would, but it also feels more respectful toward my child that they're allowed a part of their life outside of my supervision. But the reason I can do that is because there are other helpful adults at the daycare. That won't be the case everywhere, unfortunately.)

So I want them to have privacy, but I would also want to pick up on problems early -- either their own bad behaviour, or if they're victim's of someone else's bad behaviour.

Some more concrete questions in the same vein:

- What fraction of their online time should I sit with them?

- Do I play all video games with them or should they have some of "their own"?

- Do I give them the ability to do online purchases?

- Do I allow them to use up all of their money even as a mistake, or do I set up a limit?

- Do I limit their "screen time" (hate that term) or will that prevent them from interacting with their friends in the way they would want to?

This depends on maturity levels, of course, but I'm looking for generalisations. My children are 2 and 0.2 years old now, so this won't be relevant in a while but I like to be prepared and if you have thoughts regarding any maturity level, please share.

The reason I ask you HN folks is (a) that you are likely to understand my concern for privacy and personal integrity, and (b) that I've received very useful and thought-out child-related advice here before.

----

I'm also skipping a bunch of privilege-related questions like "who the hell can take a day off to spend it at the daycare?" Or, perhaps more importantly, "what determines how much time you spend online with your children may not be what's appropriate, but how much time you can spare for it?"

And yeah, both of those are problems for myself as well -- I'm interested in all creative solutions here, also that help work around such problems.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#2

Post by themodelplumber » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 6:30 AM UTC

Ah, those are good questions. It really strikes me as a search for nuance and forethought that you're sharing, too. If so, one natural blind spot here is going to be the dichotomy of 1) an abscence of clearly-drawn lines and 2) a tendency to draw lines too firmly, too late or in a poorly calibrated way. It can be helpful to be aware of that, so you can more easily avoid swingy behaviors and positions that feel less authentic or even less loving.

One of the transcendant superpowers of nuance is not just that it's deep and considerate of all sorts of factors and outcomes, but that it also helps people understand better where and how to draw lines in given situations. This is really cool and helpful, even if it has to be used kinda faster than people may be aware, and in little prospective doses.

So, perhaps one of the best nuanced things you could do to pass along this gift of yours is to share with your children why you draw a line at outright snooping, and ask them what they think about how they use the internet for example (or their money, or...). What you'll be doing here is passing on a subjective perceptual quality factor in your inquiries and personal development, not just a lesson on inappropriate behavior, or whatever. This is pretty huge by itself! Developmental vitamins for your kids, basically. (A lot of what's inappropriate on the internet also has a side that would then naturally feel jarring or somehow off to a kid raised with those vitamins, IMO.)

You'll also have a lot of other opportunities to take in relevant hints as your kids continue to develop, so this is more like a set of questions to revisit over time, and you'll likely observe changes to the set of questions. For that reason I would recommend organizing your own approach digitally or on paper, keeping your personoal philosophy and technique in this area working & developing.

A danger point in this kind of consideration is the dichotomy of thought: "Do I X, or don't I X," for example. These questions are always begging for some rephrasing or new vocabulary. Sometimes it helps to first define the terms and the problems in depth, and second (mentioned briefly above as well) to involve the children in what is effectively you educating yourself. Do they see it as a problem? How would they phrase it? What does that teach you about how they learn best? What insights might it give you about their gifts?

"Aww that's nuthin dad" vs. "That's really scary to think about" can indicate two completely different sets of cognitive gifts at work.

Personally I grew up with a parental dichotomy of sorts. I had one snoopy parent and another who was very lax. To me as someone with kind of ridiculously high personal ethical standards, even as a kid, the snoopy parent made things so much worse. I realized that I could be an absolute angel, and that parent would _still_ find something to pin on me anyway. For example when I was 9 years old, they found a trash bag full of very-adult magazines at a construction site a couple blocks from our house, brought the whole huge muddy bag home, and accused me of hiding my stash over there! (Makes me laugh to this day, but it was also extremely hurtful)

However, this same parent could spot some things that other people just couldn't see--they had an amazing general perceptual ability even if it was overused when it came to some guessing games close to home. And so they actually intervened in some pretty amazing moments, like when our family doctor was really struggling in life, this parent was one of the only one of his friends to notice the signs and intervened to help him out before things got really bad.

Anyway, just some examples of how a parenting gift can also be a huge liability, especially when it turns things into this dichotomy, like "did you or didn't you" vs "hey look, what do you think of this situation, here's why I struggle". Everything we think is so great about ourselves, as parents, our kids have ways of demonstrating is just a fail in other ways. Even or especially if they have the diversity of mind to disagree with us, chances are they have a different set of natural tools, approaches, thought patterns, or other solutions that could also be really effective.

I'm assuming you feel like you have adequate access to swaths of professionals who can help you out along the road as well. Good luck.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#3

Post by FrenchDevRemote » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 7:11 AM UTC

>What fraction of their online time should I sit with them?

Unless they're 5 year old and learning the ropes or asking for it, then none

>Do I play all video games with them or should they have some of "their own"?

If they want to play with you: as much as you want, otherwise none.(I kinda wish I played with my parents honestly, but they never cared)

>Do I give them the ability to do online purchases?

Physical products? Probably yes, but it should go through you to check that the site is not a scam or shady. Virtual items, crappy lootboxes and predatory subscriptions? Absolutely not.

>Do I allow them to use up all of their money even as a mistake, or do I set up a limit?

Depends on how much money you have.

>Do I limit their "screen time" (hate that term) or will that prevent them from interacting with their friends in the way they would want to?

No, I don't see the point. I spent hours doing programming exercises in freaking notebooks because my parents were soo keen on limiting my screen time. Dozens of arguments because they would take away my consoles. Not worth it.

Also I'm not really in favor of trying to control what your children do, but block TikTok if it still exists in 5 years, some social medias aren't social medias, they're psychological warfare.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#4

Post by chupasaurus » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 8:05 AM UTC

FrenchDevRemote wrote: post #3

>What fraction of their online time should I sit with them? Unless they're 5 year old and learning the ropes or asking for it, then none >Do I play all video games with them or should they have some of "their own"? If they want to play with you: as much as you want, otherwise none.(I kinda wish I played with my parents honestly, but they never cared) >Do I give them the ability to do online purchases? Physical produc…

Completely agree on all points, but wanna add my thoughts:

About sitting with kids: they'd come to you or at least mention if they found out something interesting anyway.

About budgeting: that's a whole course of it's own to be taught.

I know only 2 good solutions about screen time: you have to set the upper limit with mandatory things to do and can virtually lower it by presenting activities that would be genuinely more interesting than the online ones.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#5

Post by intothemild » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 8:05 AM UTC

Here's my thoughts.

> - What fraction of their online time should I sit with them?

I try to spend any time I'm not doing something like housework or whatever with my kid. But ultimately (and you're going to hear this repeated) I ask her if I can join. I will state "ok I've finished my chores can I come and hang out with you?" She usually says yes. But I make sure to emphasize that I was doing chores as to give context and to also normalise the idea that when you do chores there's no tv or anything else. (music is fine)

> - Do I play all video games with them or should they have some of "their own"?

I let my daughter drive this... Almost always she wants me to play a multiplayer game with me. But about 20% or more she wants to play something by herself. So I give her that space.

> - Do I give them the ability to do online purchases?

Yes and No... We have a calendar on the wall, and every night before bed we do a ritual.. if she was a good girl she gets to color in the day green, if she wasn't good, then she colors it in red. If there's less than 5 red days then she can chose something to have... Last month was a pokemon game for her switch.

That said... I have setup our online consoles so if she wants to buy something it sends me a message, and I approve it. This never happens, as I do the purchasing. But it's an option you can consider.

Finally on our Xbox, Game pass is amazing.. she knows if she sees something in game pass she's free to download it and play..

> - Do I allow them to use up all of their money even as a mistake, or do I set up a limit?

Depends on the age of the kid. If they understand the idea of money, you should probably setup goal oriented systems.. so do X and get $Y, it's important for them to learn how to earn money, and the value of money.

If they are too young to understand money.. then a behaviour based system such as my red day green day calendar system.

> - Do I limit their "screen time" (hate that term) or will that prevent them from interacting with their friends in the way they would want to?

No, screen time is a stupid fear a bunch of people have. It's just the next dumb panic. Our grandparents had it when our parents were put in front of the TV. I'm guessing if you go back far enough there was probably panics about kids sitting in front of the radio.

Screen time is dumb. However the real issue is what they are doing..

There should be some educational component.... BUT remember that everyone needs downtime.. you cannot expect your kid to go 100% education all the time....think about us at work, we need to browse the web or table tennis or whatever to have a mental break. So do kids.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#6

Post by guidedlight » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 9:59 AM UTC

I have some pre-teen children that have access to an iPad, Xbox, and an Apple TV.

My #1 recommendation is NO YOUTUBE, unless it's for education purposes. I don't have the App installed on any of my kids devices (they can access it via the website, but they don't do that). It's just a cesspool of garbage for kids. Even YouTube Kids is bad. Occasionally, they will complain about not having the YouTube app... but I never took it away, so they aren't missing it.

I've loaded up the iPad with fun age appropriate games and activities, that don't require any In-App purchases. If my kids want more apps, then Apple will ask my permission on my iPhone.

I use an Ubiquiti Dream Machine as my home router, so I have some basic content filtering and I have some categorisation of the traffic available, but nothing detailed.

In terms of video games, my recommendation is have a games console in the living room. They have access to video games, but they can play them where everyone can observe. They can have their own video games, this isn't a problem. Microsoft sends me a family report every week about what games were played, but I don't pay much attention to it. Purchases require parent approval on Xbox too.

With a 0.2 and 2 year old, you are somewhat lucky. The ages are close enough that they will play with each other a lot... and screen time won't be too much of an issue until they hit teenage years.

Good luck.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#7

Post by kaoD » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 10:04 AM UTC

Other replies already addressed the screen time/hanging out together aspect, so I will comment on being unsupervised.

I was a kid on the early-ish internet and I was free to "surf the interwebs" unsupervised. The internet is not the same anymore but I think the general rules still apply. This was a very valuable learning experience for me.

Based on my own experience (anecdata, I know) what I found really helped me is grownups around me explaining things clearly and hammering a few facts into my brain:

1. Don't put anything about your real self on the internet (this is increasingly harder due to social media, I'm glad I was just on IRC back in the day).

1a. What goes in the internet will stay in the internet forever. Mind the info you get out there, even if it's supposed to be a private message. Leaks happen.

1b. Encourage them not to use their real name and address, to be pseudonymous at the least (or better, completely anonymous). Help them set up accounts that don't link to their identity (specially email which is the center of your online identity nowadays).

2. Not everyone on the internet is who they say they are. On the internet nobody knows you're a dog.

2a. Be clear on what grooming and pedos are and that they're out there to catch you off-guard.

2b. Show them what spam, scams, malicious sites, phishing, etc. look like and how to prevent damage.

3. No matter what happens or how deep in shit they are they can come to you for help. You won't approve the ugly things they do, but you will forgive them and help them clean up the mess. If in doubt, come get help. The earlier you ask for help, the faster the cleanup.

Make all of this real by showing them what could happen. Show them real cases (there's plenty on the news) and the consequences. Show them how easy it is to trick the other side of the conversation. E.g. it was eye-opening for me to watch a friend of my brother pretend he was an MD from a completely different city on the IRC. He was just a horny teen looking to meet women. He often joked about how we were probably chatting with other men lying about their identity too.

Once your kids are old enough to understand this then they can go on the internet 100% unsupervised (it was around 8-9 y/o for me but everyone is different).

This will take a while given your kids' age, but we all know time flies. Better get them ready before the time comes!

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#8

Post by senectus1 » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 10:26 AM UTC

a few pro tips from me with two kids now 12F and 14M.

Subscribe to youtube premium. you do NOT want those adverts on your kids devices. get them an account each (lie about what their ages are), periodically log in to your kids accounts and look at their watch history and deal with as desired. But more importantly subscribe to the channels you feel they should be seeing and unsubscribe what they should not. You can do this quietly for years and they wont have any idea... its helpful to guide their viewing.

one issue here is youtube shorts.. its viral trash like tiktok and gods dammit I wish I could ban my daughter from it. there is just no way to block it.

Keep computers in the "family area" not in their bedrooms.

keep phones and tablets etc in the family area not in bedrooms

put a pihole in your home network, its free, and very simple to setup on a rPi or synology nas or pretty much anything.

Setup a minecraft server for kids old enough for it. host it yourself and if you can let their friends play on it.

Teach them to lie on the internet. they should not be using their real names and addresses.

teach them to use a PW manager.

Dont allow consoles. Consoles are zombie inducing machines. They want to play games then its computers all the way because computers are multifaceted tools not just dedicated gaming machines. you never know what they will self educate themselves on a computer. on a console they only have one choice... play games.

My son has taught himself C# programing in Unity just by watching youtube videos and self exploration. its a marvel to see him accelerate his learning way past what the school can teach him at the moment. He and his sister are also teaching themselves modelling in blender

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#9

Post by feet » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 10:42 AM UTC

kaoD wrote: post #7

Other replies already addressed the screen time/hanging out together aspect, so I will comment on being unsupervised. I was a kid on the early-ish internet and I was free to "surf the interwebs" unsupervised. The internet is not the same anymore but I think the general rules still apply. This was a very valuable learning experience for me. Based on my own experience (anecdata, I know) what I found really helped me is…

I think this is some great advice. Educate rather than restrict

I also grew up on the early internet and my sentiments are the same, education and awareness is required but once you know how to interact, things are safer

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with children's online habits?

#10

Post by fleddr » Sun, Jul 17, 2022, 10:45 AM UTC

I have friends with children in the age of 12-14, one of which excessively monitors his son's online behavior.

He's shown me results of his monitoring and it pretty much ended the debate. Weird old guys contacting his son, excessive cyberbullying, swearing (fine by me, but still), being drawn to the wrong kind of "friends", hate speech, general addiction and obsession with games and in-game items, the list goes on.

Doesn't mean one should intervene all the time, but you should know. I'm not a parent so I don't know at what age you should back off, but I'd say don't do it too early. Your trust is misplaced.