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Ep. 18: Understanding what's happening online and trusting your teen anyway - with digital parenting expert Elizabeth Milovidov
167 Plays4 years ago
As our kids move towards the teenage years it can be difficult for parents to adjust . Starting secondary school is a huge deal for parents as well as kids, and in addition to the physical independence they’re going to need from you, it’s also likely that they’re going to start accessing areas of the online world that you might feel more than a bit twitchy about.
Elizabeth Milovidov is the founder of DigitalParentingCoach.com, a site dedicated to empowering parents to understand what their kids are doing online, so we can trust them to start doing it without constant supervision from us.
Elizabeth also provides support to governments, companies, schools, and parenting associations on digital parenting, and children and the internet. She’s a Board Trustee for the Diana Award, and an Advisor to e-Enfance, (the French Child Online Protection Association).
She’s also a mum - her boys are aged 10 and 13 so she GETS IT!
Talking points:
Listen to the podcast to find out
- Why you don't have to be a parental control guru to keep your kids safe online
- How (and why) to let them have some privacy with their online conversations (I was a snooper 🙈
- Why Snapchat really don't want kids under 13 using their app (it might surprise you)
- How to trust your teenager to know when something isn't right, and come to you with it
- What are some of the signs that they're in over their heads
- How to prompt conversations about their online interactions without interrogation
- What a gaming addiction looks like, and why your child probably isn't addicted - although if you need it, here's 75 ideas to get teenagers off their screens for a while!
- How to understand what is happening online, (Snapchat, TikTok, Instagram: pornography, drugs, sexting) and realising that your teen will be okay anyway
Great resources for parenting teens online:
- The Mix
- Actually Mummy (my blog, where you'll find lots more articles on parenting teens)
You can also find Elizabeth on Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
The risk assessment site Elizabeth mentions is https://www.wirelessriskassessment.org/
More teenage parenting tips:
There are lots more episodes of the Teenage Kicks podcast – do have a browse and see if I’ve covered anything else you might find useful. And if you have a suggestion of something you’d like to see talked about on the podcast please do email me on [email protected] I have loads more fabulous guests coming up to help families navigate some of the most complicated – but wonderful – teenage parenting years. I’ve also got some posts on the blog that might help parents with other teenage parenting dilemmas, so do pop over to
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Online Safety Concerns
00:00:00
Speaker
settings are not going to save you. Settings and parental controls are not going to save your child. And I mean this really with the best of intentions, saying that you can completely and totally lock down that iPad, even for your daughter, that example. Lock everything down. She never touches it. But what happens when she goes on a play date? What happens when she's in the schoolyard?
00:00:27
Speaker
Welcome to the Teenage Kicks podcast, where we take the fear out of parenting or becoming a teenager.
00:00:35
Speaker
If your child has just left year six, you might be feeling a bit nervous about the next stage for them. And you! Moving to secondary school is a huge deal for parents as well as kids, and in addition to the physical independence they're going to need from you, it's also likely that they're going to start accessing areas of the online world that you might feel more than a bit twitchy about. My guest today is going to sort all of that out for
Meet Elizabeth Milovidov, Digital Parenting Expert
00:01:03
Speaker
you.
00:01:03
Speaker
Elizabeth Milovidov is a lawyer from California, now living in Paris. She's the founder of digitalparentingcoach.com, a site dedicated to empowering parents to understand what their kids are doing online so that we can enable them to take advantage of all the opportunities the internet presents whilst knowing how to keep themselves safe.
00:01:28
Speaker
As a mum of teens myself, I get asked all the time how and sometimes even why I allowed my kids access to things like Snapchat and TikTok. And I get it. You've always known everything there is to know about your child's life. And suddenly, as they transition to secondary school, they want independence from you. They gain friends whose parents you may never get to meet. And there's this whole online world.
00:01:55
Speaker
that they want to navigate without you. It is scary. And yet we have to find a way to do it. Or our kids might never forgive us.
00:02:06
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As well as running her own business, Elizabeth provides support to governments, companies, schools and parenting associations on digital parenting and children on the internet.
Empowering Parents in the Digital Age
00:02:17
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She's a board trustee for the Diana Award and an advisor to Iain Fence, the French Child Online Protection Association.
00:02:26
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So she knows her stuff. She's also though, a mum. Her boys are aged 10 and 13 and so she gets it. She's the perfect person to listen to if you're at that stage where your kids are starting to get interested in social media apps and wanting more independence and privacy.
00:02:45
Speaker
Now I've listened to some interviews with Elizabeth and she even has the perfect voice for the job that she does. I promise that when you finish listening to this episode you're going to feel so much more reassured and completely empowered to help your child navigate their online future and to let them do some of it without you.
00:03:07
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As a parent, Elizabeth's Instagram bio tells me everything I want to know about her. She says I help families enjoy internet and technology safely and responsibly.
00:03:19
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That idea of enjoying the internet makes me so happy and I just know this is going to be an incredible conversation.
Fostering Online Resilience in Children
00:03:27
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Elizabeth, welcome to the podcast. I am so excited to be here. What an introduction. Wow. Fabulous. Well, I just love everything you say about
00:03:42
Speaker
internet safety for children and I know that my guests, because I'm asked so many times, are worried about that transition to children wanting more independence and doing it online and I know you're exactly the right person to speak to.
00:03:59
Speaker
Yeah, and it's funny because even right now you just said internet safety. And that is something, you know, lay people, everybody says that, online safety, e-safety, internet safety. And in fact, I wouldn't even say that. I would say internet responsibly. And the reason why is because, you know, children are going to do things online. Sometimes they're going to get into things that are unsafe. And what better way to create resilience than for them to do something that they shouldn't have done
00:04:28
Speaker
to learn that they shouldn't do that again or to have something happen that was unsafe and to be able to bounce back. And all of those are the ways that we can help and guide our children to using the internet responsibly as they go forward. So like I said, when people talk about being safe online, for sure, I am 100% into child online protection. In fact, that's what I do, but I want parents to understand
00:04:53
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comes a tiny tiny bit of risk and that parents can guide their children. They really can. See that is what I love about all the things you say. I will tell you about an incident we had when my daughter was probably
00:05:12
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11 or possibly 12 but probably 11, that was only avoidable had we completely blocked all her access to the internet. So I think probably most kids begin on YouTube.
The Importance of Communication
00:05:27
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Right? Or Xbox. So she was using YouTube, she was watching makeup tutorials and that's another thing that I'm often asked, should I worry that my daughter's using makeup at 11 and I always say no because it's just the 11 year old version of colouring in if you're a girl or if you were experimenting with makeup.
00:05:47
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She so totally doesn't bother with makeup anymore. She's 15 now. But anyway, she'd been on YouTube. She had clicked a link thinking it was going to take her to another video appropriate and of interest to her. And it froze her screen. And she got that message that as adults we've seen and we avoid,
00:06:09
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The police will be outside your house if you don't give us your credit card number right now. Your mum and dad are in trouble. They even knew that she was a child and she was scared for her life. She sensibly knew to come to us and we sorted it out.
00:06:28
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like you know some kind of malware on her phone we sorted it all out there was no issue and she learned a valuable lesson from that and we talked about not following random links on YouTube videos unless you know exactly where it's going well there you go I was gonna say that the interview is over she did exactly what she was supposed to do
00:06:47
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She came and she shared this problem with you so that way you could figure it out. It's just that simple. I mean, parents and children, they have to be in communication all the time because no one knows what's happening. There are so many new things and technology is exploding so quickly that we have to stay in communication so that we can help each other. Yeah, exactly. Actually, I was going to come onto that. I, as a parent, feel completely overwhelmed.
00:07:15
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by the, and I don't want to say internet safety now, but by all the settings and the tools available that constantly change, that I could install, that I could guide, that I need to know about, that I need to stay on top of. And I feel like parents of tweens who are just coming into that, as I described, that independence that need to be online, that wish to be online,
00:07:45
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feel like they have to get their heads around all of that stuff before they can even let their child venture there.
00:07:52
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Would you disagree with that? I completely and totally disagree. I believe that parents do not have to be tech savvy at all to understand how to parent a child in the digital age. It's like saying that parents have to understand how to strip a motor and to rebuild an engine in order to drive a car. You do not. And it's the same thing with what's happening online. And in fact, even going back to your example with your daughter,
00:08:19
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with her putting makeup on.
Reevaluating Screen Time and Tech Use
00:08:22
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If you think back, if we take out the tech aspect of these things and we think back to when we were younger, of course we were trying on makeup, of course we were putting makeup on Barbies and all of those things. It's just that right now the added thing is putting things out online and that's where parents have to come in and talk to their children about the permanence of internet and about putting things online responsibly.
00:08:45
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I also think you mentioned YouTube. And of course, I have to say, you know, YouTube, even YouTube kids has a disclaimer for parents because they cannot control everything that's on their YouTube. YouTube itself is not created for children. So if your child is going to go on YouTube, realize that they may see some things that they cannot unsee. But if they come to you and talk to you about it, then you can walk them through it. This has happened to me with my boys where they saw things that I wish they hadn't.
00:09:14
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They came and immediately told me and I said, well, how do you think that young woman feels? Gosh, what would happen if her mother saw that photo? And you know, what if she's, you know, the sister of one of your friends at school?
00:09:26
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understood that seeing images of women like that was probably not the best thing. A third thing that you had just mentioned was about settings. Oh my goodness. If I had one pound for every time somebody asked me if I would help them with their settings on a phone or on an Xbox or something, I really would be rich.
00:09:48
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But the idea here is that settings are not going to save you. Settings and parental controls are not going to save your child. And I mean this really with the best of intentions, saying that you can completely and totally lock down that iPad
00:10:05
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Even for your daughter, that example, you lock everything down. She never touches it. But what happens when she goes on a play date? What happens when she's in the schoolyard when she gets back to the schoolyard and she's hanging out with other kids and they show her things on the smartphone? We have to be able to teach our children strategies so that way they can bounce back. They can show that sort of resilience and they know how to respond because
00:10:27
Speaker
I promise you, someone's going to show them that photo that we don't want them to see. Someone's going to show them a video that we don't want them to see. Someone's going to reach out and try to chat to them, and we don't want them to chat with that person. And so parents can do this, and we don't have to be tech savvy to do it. It's just thinking ahead a little bit and communicating with your child all the time.
00:10:49
Speaker
And letting them know, oh my goodness, how could I forget? Parents, parents, please do not punish them. Do not punish them horribly by taking all of their tech away just because they made a mistake. You know, help them, show them what they did wrong so that way they can do it right next time. And realize that when you cut them off from all of their technology, especially the teens, oh my goodness, you're cutting them off from their social life. You might as well just put them in a room and you know, blacken the windows and let them sit there for a couple weeks.
00:11:19
Speaker
Well, you know, some teenagers are thinking about the room above me right now. I might love a blackened room and just stay there for 24 hours a day. I do force her out eventually for an hour later in there, but yeah. She does love that. But actually, that is a really good point. And I think it's become a massive thing for parents in lockdown is this
00:11:45
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fear of screen time you know we've always had the the whole issue of um
00:11:51
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the World Health Organization said that two hours is appropriate and any more than that is damaging. And then they said the opposite. And then a scientist said, you know, it's constantly changing. And I think, and I was guilty of it too. At the beginning of lockdown, I really tried to force my son off his Xbox to watch something more meaningful on TV with me, to kick a ball in the garden, to train the dog a new trick.
00:12:20
Speaker
I wasn't really intent on getting him off his Xbox and engage in something else and he was really intent on staying on his Xbox and the reason wasn't the gaming, the reason was that's where his friends were chatting and to take him away from that when his friends were there is to take him away from the social plans, the gossip, the stuff that's going on and even teen life.
00:12:46
Speaker
Yeah, teen life. Yeah, exactly that. And my daughter once said to me, it's pretty astute, I don't know where she gets that from. It was a long time ago, she said to me, Mum, will you stop going on at me about how much time I spend on the phone? Did you not ever get shouted at by grandma for spending hours and hours on the phone? And I said, oh my God, yeah, I did.
00:13:08
Speaker
You've spent all day with Janice, why are you, what can you possibly have to talk to her about for three hours now? And I had to step back after that and thought, she's just connecting with the people who are really important to her world right now. Yeah, but what's fabulous is your daughter is brilliant, hats off to her.
00:13:28
Speaker
is that she made it something that's relatable to you. And that's one of the things that I try to do for digital parents is to make some of these examples relatable to what we did when we were younger. And so her being on her smartphone is like, me too, I had a little princess streamline phone. Do you remember those? They were the little long ones and you go... I'll say how young then me.
00:13:49
Speaker
No, no, no, no. We have the same reference. Different countries. Different countries. I'm sure that's what it is. But we just had these great little phones that were pretty much marketed for teen girls to just sit there with the long cords so you could twirl them around your hands as you were talking about this boy and that boy. So of course it
Understanding Digital Fears and Opportunities
00:14:06
Speaker
was the same thing. I was on the phone for hours myself.
00:14:08
Speaker
But you just mentioned something that is crazy for me, and that is this whole thing with screen time and screen limits. And the reason why it is so crazy is just, rightly so, all of the confusion with the experts, the scientific community, even for myself. So also take what I'm about to say with a grain of salt, if you will.
00:14:26
Speaker
But it's very true that the American Academy of Pediatrics, they came out with no screen time for children under two. This was a few years ago. And then they revised it. And I actually happened to be in London at a meeting at the London School of Economics with the EU kids online as they brought in BBC, Disney, The Parent Zone, Internet Matters. We were all sitting there trying to figure out
00:14:52
Speaker
you know, what are some screen limits? What are some guidelines we can give children and families? And basically at the end of it, we came up with really nothing that was as far as, you know, two hours a day for three to six year olds, one hour. I mean, that's just not possible. But we came up with some different guidelines. Before I tell you what we came up with, I think it was the Royal College of Pediatrics, pediatricians, they came out within with their guidelines in the UK and they really didn't have
00:15:21
Speaker
There wasn't any substance in there. They just said, you know, kind of, you know, do what's appropriate. I'm like, oh my God, but parents need something, right? So what that something was, was a bit of what we came up with, which was the idea of looking at what your children are doing online. Look at the content. Just because they're sitting there in front of a screen does not mean they're playing Call of Duty for 18 hours. They could be chatting with grandma. They could be writing a note. They could be doing their English homework.
00:15:48
Speaker
So, you know, we have to really look at what they're doing. And then, if we're talking about some of the more problematic uses, before parents immediately say, as I myself have said and I've heard my husband say, you're addicted, you know, get off the iPad, get off the gaming console, you're addicted, you're addicted. Okay, let me tell you, okay.
00:16:08
Speaker
You can stop saying that now, Helen. Your children are not addicted. I know you're saying that I could feel that. I could feel that laughter. No, they're not addicted. They're not addicted. True addiction. And that's what the World Health Organization came out with. At the end of 2018, I believe, or the beginning of 2019, was gaming disorder addiction. And this was true gaming addiction where it's prolonged, talking over 12 months of people not eating, not sleeping.
00:16:36
Speaker
keeping, only thinking about gaming, not having any pleasure with friends and family. School, the work is just gone. Homework, going to your office, regular work, all of that is gone. True addiction. Not what we again in lay persons might term coffee addiction or sugar addiction. That's kind of the lighter way that we're using it here.
00:16:58
Speaker
Basically, that is the advice that I would tell parents before they get really crazy wondering about problematic use in their own children is to sit there and look at them. Are they sleeping well? Are they eating well? Are they engaging with you? Are they engaging with their friends? Are they getting good grades? If the answer to most of that is yes, your child is probably not addicted to anything. They're just using technology in ways that you don't like, but that's something that you can work on together as a family.
00:17:26
Speaker
Yeah. And when you say in ways that you don't like, I also hear ways that you don't understand because that's something that is not, I did not spend my teenage years gaming and chatting to people online. And I want to ask you actually. But did you go to the mall? Did you go to the mall? Did you go to an arcade? Yeah. That was gaming. We did.
00:17:50
Speaker
We did take the text. Come on, Helen, I'm going to get you. Because I know I did too. I went to the arcade. I played Space Invaders and Pac-Man. Yeah. You know, we were in the arcades. We were in the malls. And wanted to stay there well past my bedtime and needed to get dragged away from it. You and me both. You and me both. Look at me. I'm okay. I'm successful. Don't kill me.
00:18:16
Speaker
But actually one of the things that I wanted to ask you is, and I'm going to just refer to my notes, is when parents who have previously managed their child's online access through barriers and controls and physical barriers by not allowing them to have social media apps or particular gaming devices because they are in inverted commas dangerous in their mind,
00:18:46
Speaker
When they do eventually step into that world, because let's face it, we all have to, our kids will take us there and if we don't go with them, they will go alone, which is worse. There is this enormous fear
00:19:05
Speaker
And it's built on hyped up media rather than actual fact. And I know that is actual fact, and you will probably tell us a little bit about how much of that fact is reality. They have this enormous fear that as soon as their child is allowed on Snapchat, they will be groomed. They might be abducted. They will see porn that is damaging to them for life.
00:19:31
Speaker
And I feel like those parents, and I don't blame them for locking everything down, but I feel like those parents will dive deep into a pool of fear. Yeah. And I'd like to know what your advice to... Well, I'd like to know your advice to people generally, and I think, you know, you've said it already, it's take them on that journey from a young age, don't block it. But if you have got parents who've done that, and I know lots of them... Yeah, yeah.
00:20:01
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. One of the things that I tell all parents is that it's your house, your rules, right? So, you know, I'm going to sit here and say some of the things that I think and I believe and, you know, feel free to tweak them, to use what you can, you know, take what you can from what everybody is doing and the people in your community and do what is right for your family. So there are parents who have things completely, you know, locked down and forbidden.
00:20:27
Speaker
For those parents, I talk to them very, very gently and calmly because I can understand the fear. I get it 100% more so even me because I'm in this area. So I see all the cray cray and I'm like, oh my goodness. But I also know that this idea of making everything forbidden, number one, it makes it all the more enticing to our children where they're really going to want to go get it after that.
Age-Appropriate Online Access and Rules
00:20:52
Speaker
But the other thing is think back, and even when we're talking younger kids, right, seven, eight, nine years old, think about the kids and you know who they are. When you go to a birthday party, you can figure out which kids are the ones who are not allowed to drink Coca-Cola, which kids are the ones who are not allowed to have sweets, and because those are the kids that are just guzzling the Coca-Cola more, you know, shoveling all the candy in their mouths, right? Yeah. So for me, I think that
00:21:18
Speaker
You know, just a better approach is, you know, again, to decide what works with your family, your expectations, your values, and then to realize that, you know, age appropriate, and when we start talking about some of the different ages on these apps and games, they're there for a reason. And it's not always the reason that you think. So, for example, you mentioned Snapchat.
00:21:37
Speaker
The age is 13, but it's not because they think that 13 is magical maturity age. It's because in the United States where most of these social media companies are based, 13 was the age because we do not want people to advertise to children under 13. It's only an advertising concern. They don't want to take the data and violate their privacy. Wow. It is not because we think that they're so mature because really for a lot of things, we could go up to 23.
00:22:06
Speaker
which is something that has been talked about in some circles when the brain gets really set and we know that young people are fully developed and they're able to make these decisions. I'm going to interrupt you but imagine saying to your child, you can't have Snapchat until you're 23 because you won't be ready for it.
00:22:24
Speaker
It would be a total boycott I could just see it now. It's not happening at all. That's so interesting. Yeah, but by the same token, parents also say to me about, well, everybody else has Snapchat and everybody else has this. And I also say that driving a car in the United States, you have to be 16.
00:22:43
Speaker
But just because everybody else is driving a car when they're 11 doesn't mean that you have to let your child drive a car. So if you don't want to, you know, prepare your child, give them the strategies to explain why everybody else is driving a car at 16 and why they can't. Because you have to help them out a bit. One of the ways I personally find that parents can help is, you know,
00:23:02
Speaker
If you look at Snapchat yourself, if you look at TikTok yourself, you will be able to see. And if you can guide your children, then once again, it's like the person who's out on a farm who has a 10 year old driving a tractor, right? Because you know where the dangers are. And so if you're able to guide your children with this, and I don't mean you have to go in and actually know how to put filters on and do all the fun stuff that Snapchat can do.
00:23:26
Speaker
but that you're sitting with them and you're looking and you're saying, okay, and you're checking the accounts, et cetera. Those are some of the best ways just to really support them in the digital age because I think the biggest, actually it's not even a disadvantage, but it could be, is just this idea that we keep them away from all technology, all of this future that is happening, and then we expect them at 21 to be able to just pop
Navigating Online Risks and Opportunities
00:23:53
Speaker
up
00:23:53
Speaker
you know understand how intuitively how these things work and and that's not that's not that's not the way it happens no that's such a good point it is a lifelong learning now isn't it even kids in primary schools are using tech and accessing the internet to do their work and it's
00:24:12
Speaker
I like how you couch the internet as an opportunity, as well as somewhere where you need to behave responsibly. And I'm choosing my words really carefully. I'm going on a learning curve myself and I thought I had it sorted, having been through all the bits and pieces. But it also helps people think about it differently too, because we really are teaching them responsible use. And that's it.
00:24:38
Speaker
Yeah and I love that. The school that my kids go to is very tech savvy and controversially for some insist that all kids in year seven start by bringing their own device, an iPad or a tablet of some sort because they use them in all lessons.
00:24:57
Speaker
And actually the benefit in lockdown to that has been that since week two of schools being closed, they've had a full curriculum online taught by teachers because it doesn't phase them. They are used to using those devices, those apps, that technology, those meeting rooms, and they've been taught how to use them safely and responsibly. And so we're very, very lucky.
00:25:20
Speaker
I was going to say that's a huge thing right there, Helen, that we have children who have access because there are lots of kids who do not have internet, who do not have tablets. And so for them, this pandemic and remote learning has just been a nightmare. But going back to that positive side, sure. But I also do not believe that the 12-year-old who's had no tech, that if you introduce him to an iPad, that he's going to freeze up. Of course not. I think that they are bright. They're going to get it.
00:25:47
Speaker
but it's so much easier if we've already shown them how to use things responsibly. So I think it's great. And the whole idea with bring your own devices, the BYOD, and having schools that are taking their responsibilities with digital citizenship and with teaching your children media literacy and understanding what is fake news and misinformation. I mean, it's just brilliant. There's so many things that can be done in a positive way to point out some of the icky stuff that's online.
00:26:15
Speaker
Yeah, and it's creating young people who have, I'm going off track here, but young people who have the most incredible outlook on the world. My kids now know so much more about the world than I ever knew at their age. All I had was news round on TV in the UK when I was growing up, a kind of 15 minute daily catch up on the headlines that I wasn't really interested in because it was about politics and I was bored.
00:26:43
Speaker
My kids access so much news via, and they know, they do use BuzzFeed and my daughter does quite like Uganda at the Daily Mail, which is just the most dreadful newspaper, but she does understand that it's just fun and she understands how to read between the lines of what's real and what's not real.
00:27:04
Speaker
excellent but that's it that's the whole idea right and she wouldn't know that if she wasn't exposed to the Daily Mail to know that that part yeah she might be like you know some people in my country who think it's all real yeah i'll read that on the BBC as well and just try and compare and see what's actually real but they have such a great outlook on the world because of the internet
00:27:24
Speaker
and so it's not something to fear but going back to the moving from junior school where it's all nicely maintained and controlled and you feel in control and then secondary school for us which is when kids turn 12 and start to make their own friendship groups that you have no knowledge of and start to ask to go out without you to places that you're not at
Managing Social Pressures and Privacy Concerns
00:27:49
Speaker
It's the same thing as the internet and I find that there is a huge chasm as parents step into that world between the parents who
00:28:04
Speaker
know all the risks and are mostly looking to just lock it down and delay it as long as possible and prevent it as much as they can. And parents who actually have stuck their head in the sand and decided that what they don't know won't hurt them and they have no idea what their kids are doing on the internet.
00:28:27
Speaker
How do we pick out the bits that are important? So you, when we first spoke, talked about how to support parents to allow their kids to go off into the digital age safely and let them do it. I can't remember how you said it, but it was brilliant. Hang on.
00:28:49
Speaker
This is, you know, this is real life. I'm going back to my emails. I know exactly what I said. I said that we have to figure out, yes, we have to help parents understand what their children are doing online and to trust them anyway. Yes. Yes. Now.
00:29:05
Speaker
Right, so here's me, and I think I'm fairly common, maybe a little bit on the neurotic side, but here's me when my first child started secondary school. I understood the need for her to be on apps that her friends were on from a social perspective. That's where social arrangements were made, and I do remember the
00:29:31
Speaker
a get-together was organised via Snapchat. On one occasion she missed it and that was devastating for her and so she got Snapchat before I was ready. But actually is there ever a time when a parent is ready? No.
00:29:50
Speaker
I don't think so. Really? No, because I mean just with just YouTube. Again, let's go back to some of the, you know, Snapchat, TikTok. Let me just take you away for a small parentheses. If parents could understand that your child can have sexting conversations just using Google documents, right? Just using, you know, regular word documents, right? You can just go off on these things. There's cyberbullying that's happening on Google documents. If parents understood that, you know, these things can happen anywhere,
00:30:20
Speaker
Yes. That they need to just chill out. They really do. And understand that sure, yeah, some of these apps may have, there may be more problems or maybe more consequences, but that's all the more reason for them to increase those conversations. Yeah, totally. And so going back on to what I did, I secretly policed my daughter's phone when she was asleep in bed.
00:30:48
Speaker
And I'm not ashamed to admit that, but I do feel embarrassed that I went to that extent. Now, I didn't want to do the, you know, people recommend sit down with your child and ask them to show you what they've been doing on their chats.
00:31:09
Speaker
There was no way she was going to do that. She was going to delete her chat history, of course, before we sat down, of course. So I didn't want to alert her to the fact that I might want to know what she was saying. And so I did go and look at some of her private chats for my own selfish reasons. And it was basically, it was in her first year of secondary school so that I could, and this is how I justified it.
00:31:34
Speaker
It was my need to reassure myself that she was A, safe and B, behaving responsibly.
00:31:41
Speaker
And did you feel reassured? I did because there was nothing in there. Nothing. Nothing. Exactly. That really worried me. And if there had been, how would I have broached that with her without confessing to the fact that I was policing her phone and losing her trust forever? Exactly. But I hear you and I agree with you, but it is very, very difficult. So again, my own son is 13. And it was started secondary school. And my whole thing was, I bought the phone. It's mine.
00:32:09
Speaker
I'm renting it to you. So this means I can like, you know, check it out. Yeah, I can check it out. It's my house, you know, if you don't like it.
00:32:20
Speaker
But it's very true that I talked to him and I did ask him. I remember once I picked it up and I said, okay, let's go. And he came over and he was showing me, but kind of like, and I realized then, there are some things that are just personal. And it's personal just because they don't want us to know that they have a crush on someone or something like that. And for me, the biggest success that both you and I have with this is that our children still trust us.
00:32:49
Speaker
because that's the biggest problem I think for a lot of parents who do some of the parental spying is that if your child finds out and they don't and you lose trust and then they will not come to talk to you. The other thing too is you were talking about her you know with this Snapchat account and
00:33:07
Speaker
other things and what the other kids might be doing online. And even erasing the chat history, that's what it was, is that even if you were to sit there and say, let's sit and show me what you're doing, you know, they have all sorts of fake apps now. So for example, even with Instagram, they even call it Finsta, which is fake Instagram account. So let's say you say, I want to see your Instagram account. She can show you a beautiful Finsta account and you know, there's, you'll say, oh, that's so lovely. Look at the unicorns and the flowers. You're just such a
00:33:36
Speaker
wonderful daughter taking pictures and sharing the beauty with everyone and then if you were to see her real account you would say oh my gosh and you know again that's when I think it's really important as a community you know when we're talking about
00:33:54
Speaker
uh parents you know all going into to this secondary school for example. I think that if parents get together and talk and if you guys can decide when to buy a gift for a teacher for the end of the year or what have you or you can decide to you want to celebrate another child's birthday in the classroom why can't we all decide okay listen no more um sex messages
Effective Communication Strategies with Teens
00:34:17
Speaker
No more text messaging after, you know, 7 p.m., for example. Or, you know, if we're going to all have smartphones or all have cell phones, you know, what are some of the rules that we're going to have? Just so that way everybody's on the same board and we have kids who are, you know, not off doing, you know, all sorts of other crazy things and other kids who don't even have a phone and it creates this whole, you know, the haves and the have nots in a classroom where already they're trying to adjust
00:34:47
Speaker
to what it's like to be in middle school and they're trying to figure their way around without having to add the tech in. But I know that's not always possible, so when that's not possible, I just think that parents have to keep talking to each other about what is happening out there, what is going on online. You mentioned earlier about the parents with that fear.
00:35:06
Speaker
And I think that the fear, we have to get rid of that, but parents do have to be informed and just aware of what could possibly happen. So that way again, they can create some strategies and they can parent. That's what this is all about. This is about parenting and you can't be crippled just because it is about tech comes in here and you just don't want to move or to do anything. We have to be able to take it forward.
00:35:31
Speaker
Do you think, is it a good idea, and I'm thinking about parents who are not tech savvy, who are maybe my age but not a blogger, and therefore not on Instagram themselves, who don't get it and don't really want to get it? That'd be fine then. Is the best idea just to sit down with your child and get them to explain Instagram and Snapchat to you? Of course. Yeah, have them ask, yeah.
00:35:55
Speaker
I think that for all of these things if you talk with your children and I don't mean interrogation mode, I mean when it's like you know you're washing up or you're out on a walk or a drive and I know that we're talking about teens too so you may not always have those great moments to go and talk with them. I get it but I'm just saying that when you do you know just ask them and you know and if they don't want to share you know let it go but you know I heard someone a couple weeks ago I did a talk with asked the pediatrician his name is Michael Rich and he's a Harvard professor
00:36:24
Speaker
and runs the Center of Child and Media Health in Boston. And he had this wonderful expression. He's talked about, you know, how we're parenting tweens and teens and how you may sit there and feel like you have to talk to them, you know, give them this big, long, lengthy lecture for like a hundred minutes. And he said, stop doing one lecture for a hundred minutes and do a hundred conversations for one minute. Just keep going. Just keep going.
00:36:50
Speaker
And he said that even though, you know, 80% of the time they may just be hearing you and 20% they're listening. So keep going, keep going. And I just thought that was really powerful because I do think that, you know, not nagging, but just, you know, how are you doing? How are you doing? And that's one of the things that I also tell parents is, you know, we're so easy, easily we say, how was your day today? How was school today? Well, how was your online day?
00:37:14
Speaker
What did you do today? What do you think will happen in social media? What about gaming? What's the new game? What's happening out there? What are the new filters? What's the new camera? I don't know, but just to be involved in their online world. And again, if we take it back to when we were kids, I suppose this would be like our moms popping up and asking us, what did we do at the arcade? What did we do at the mall? Nothing.
00:37:36
Speaker
enough. Exactly. I walked in, I packed me out in 20 minutes. Exactly. But still, just keeping it going means that your mom was interested. I would have loved it if my mom had asked me all the time, you know, hey, how did it go? And I'm like, oh yeah, Jimmy didn't look at me, but I know. Yeah. And it's the only way you're going to get to know anything about the people who your child's hanging out with. And I know that's a really scary thing for parents because
00:38:01
Speaker
I remember the first time my daughter went to a party at someone's house and had organised her own lift there and back with other parents who I didn't know of children who I'd never met. And I had to get with the programme and realise that that was going to happen. And the online version of that happens too. I love what you're just saying about kind of getting involved in your parents' online life.
00:38:26
Speaker
Oh my god, my parents on that. That's a whole other podcast. What are they up to? How much?
00:38:35
Speaker
Oh my goodness. No, your children's online life.
Connecting Through Gaming and Online Interests
00:38:39
Speaker
So my son, he's mostly, his online life's mostly Xbox and he plays FIFA and I'm not interested in football or gaming. But if I am interested in him and so if I take my coffee in the morning and just sit next to him while he's gaming and chatting to his friends,
00:38:58
Speaker
he'll then chat to me whilst he, and then he'll say something, I'll say, what? And he'll say, oh no, no, I was just saying that to Fabio. He'll say, oh, what's Fabio doing today? And that's how it goes. And I still know nothing about FIFA. But- That is wonderful. That really makes me happy, because that's the way it's supposed to be. Yeah, that's how I find out what's going on in his world. Because actually, if he's unhappy and I get him across the table and say, what is it that's making you unhappy? He'll say, nothing.
00:39:26
Speaker
But if I get it anecdotally in little bits and pieces, like you say, I'm in it here and there.
00:39:32
Speaker
It adds up. Right. And she's sitting there playing with Fabio. If Fabio responds with some sort of snarky remark, you can be like, oh gosh, what's going on with Fabio lately? He seems a bit off. And there you go. He's going to tell you. And as adults, we do. We hear these things. And this is where I think maturity and experience and the fact that we're parents, we get these things. And we don't have to be tech savvy. You don't have to know about FIFA. I don't know about FIFA.
00:39:56
Speaker
My boys do play. And the same thing with Xbox, I don't have an Xbox, but it's like, okay, I do know about Fortnite, I do know about Minecraft. And that's a challenge, I think, that I would say to parents, is that even if they think that their children are not learning or not doing anything collaborative or creative or whatever,
00:40:15
Speaker
I asked them, you know, talk to them. So for example, I had somebody who was complaining about their child being on Minecraft all the time. And I said, do you realize that Minecraft can be quite educational? And they're like, no, no, no. And I said, ask your son about one of the different types of trees. They didn't believe me and they went and they came back and they're like, oh my goodness, because when you're building in Minecraft, you need to cut down trees and different trees can help you make different things.
00:40:38
Speaker
I mean, it's just, there's a whole world out there and they are doing things differently than we did. And just as our parents eventually learned to trust us, and as you said, we came out not so bad. I think that we eventually have to be able to trust them too. Yeah. And that brings us back to the initial, the initial goal of this is to allow your kids to use the internet for what it can bring them.
00:41:04
Speaker
and trust them to do it even though we fear it. Yeah, even though we fear it, because we know that, I mean, let's face it, that's really, frankly, truthfully, we know that there are, you know, there's pornography, there is all sorts of things that we do not want our children to see or experience, it's there. The internet has become, you know, just
00:41:24
Speaker
In some spots, in some spaces, it's accessible. Let's call it as it is. But it's just like being in a city. There are some places, too, that we do not want our children to go. But they need to know that that's over there, so that way they don't inadvertently get lost walking down that street. And we show them the way that we want them to go.
00:41:41
Speaker
And so I think that it's really important that parents realize that our children, they do, they get a lot of these things. They know when somebody starts speaking to them in a chat. And I also tell the children when I talk to little kids, you know, if you get that funny feeling in your stomach and you, you know, you feel like something's wrong, they know into YouTube. They do, sometimes they, sometimes not all children obviously, but they get it.
00:42:03
Speaker
They can. And I always say, you know, if you can't talk to your parents, then talk to the mommy or the daddy of one of your friends or your teacher or even, you know, an older cousin, big brother, big sister, and I said, but talk to someone.
00:42:15
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. It's that whole thing about the online world not being separate from the real world. The online world is just the real world for them as well as eating their dinner with us and going for walks in the park and going actually physically to school is their real world. It's a whole, and you cannot extricate it. You have to have it all together. And so all the same rules apply. If you get an instinct that says it's wrong, then it's wrong when you walk away from it. And that's it.
00:42:44
Speaker
Exactly, but I was going to say one other thing because you'd said about the real world that the only difference is that this is 24-7. This online world is literally available 24-7 and you can get into trouble all the time. That's the big distinction I would make and just that kind of unknown factor too. But yeah, we have to guide our children
00:43:08
Speaker
online the same way that we do offline. And that's one of the another thing that I always tell parents is to bring those same parenting skills into the online world, you know, those same concerns and, you know, the same way that you talk to them and you want them to evolve and to grow and to be healthy, happy, resilient people. You want that on the online world as well. Yeah, totally. I love it. Perfect. And I do have one more question and that is you brought it you brought me to it very, very nicely.
00:43:36
Speaker
The whole 24-7 thing, do you have recommendations for how you get your kids to appreciate that stepping away can be sometimes a good thing? It's a bit like the screen time addiction thing, but
Health and Well-being Concerns with Tech Use
00:43:56
Speaker
kids, teenagers all want to take their mobile phones to bed with them and all their friends are up until 1am in the morning and their parents don't restrict their phone usage and they're allowed on Snapchat until every hour of the night.
00:44:13
Speaker
I know this isn't true. I know this isn't true because I've done as you said and spoken to other parents. But that is what your kids will tell you just like so-and-so is allowed to wear. Everyone wears a shorter skirt than me at school. It's exactly the same case. How do you, bearing in mind that you cannot police your kids, you cannot be
00:44:33
Speaker
It's too stressful to constantly be checking that they have left their phone downstairs in the kitchen and they haven't sneaked it upstairs behind your back every single night. You can't remember that every single night or if you can you're better than me. How do you tell parents to help their kids navigate that one?
00:44:52
Speaker
Yeah, and that is a really, really tricky one. You got me on a good question because it does depend on the age, right? And again, when I always say things depend on the age, it also depends on the child because when we're talking about vulnerable children or complex kids, I mean, there are other issues and I would never want to tell parents some general information that they're going to apply when they know that perhaps their child has additional needs. But I think that when we're talking about younger children, that we can really
00:45:21
Speaker
You shut it down. It goes off. It goes into technology, you know, stays in that place and that's it. And that there are consequences. Of course, when we're talking about teenagers, it does become difficult. One of the things that I really believe is that if more parents knew about some of the harmful effects of sleeping with a phone, then they would really, you know, just use it from that physical angle and not think about, oh, I'm depriving my child from a nighttime connection.
00:45:49
Speaker
But there are real physical consequences. We're not sure. Again, sometimes this is like a social experiment that we're doing with our children. And there are so many health concerns when we talk about screens, you know, where we have seen it. Here in France, for example, we have seen an increase in young children going to see the chiropractor because their necks are bent over on iPads.
00:46:09
Speaker
I was at a conference in London and there was someone from the University of Leeds who was talking about children becoming more nearsighted because of iPads. So we know that there are real physical issues and there is somebody, I think she's in England, it's called Wireless Risk Assessment for anybody who wants to look it up, WirelessRiskAssessment.com and they have been doing studies on what's happening with Wi-Fi.
00:46:37
Speaker
And the risks to our children's fertility, to their brains, yes. We've already heard that about don't put a phone in your pockets. We've already heard things like that. And even when you're on your phone to use these types of headphones, the earphones, instead of holding the phone up to your ear. My whole point, Helen, for that, for these physical things, there are so many things that we don't know. And I find that that is an easier strategy, an easier win
00:47:04
Speaker
for parents to take and feel like, okay, I'm doing this for the health of my child. You need to get some good sleep. I'm taking the phone away. And as far as the policing, my goodness, there are also ways of having parental controls, of having
00:47:20
Speaker
even just the wifi in your house to set the different times. But once you start going down that road, it is never ending. And it's just so much easier. I was like, yes, I know, I know. It's just so much easier to try to establish that trust and just, this is it, this is no, and these are the consequences.
00:47:39
Speaker
because you do not want to have to call up your net service provider and have them blacklist everything and then to find out that your teen is getting the Wi-Fi signal from the neighbors or across the street or what have you because they will happen, they won't happen. It's almost the same and it's a bit of an extreme example but I had visions. My daughter is a strong-willed girl
00:48:02
Speaker
And around the age of seven, I remember saying to my husband, oh my God, I cannot control her. She's going to be that girl who at 14 climbs out of the window to go to the local nightclub.
00:48:14
Speaker
in the middle of the night and you know if I can reassure parents and this is totally going off track but if I can reassure parents of one thing the child you have at seven is not necessarily the child you're going to have at 14 because it has not happened she's still strong-willed though and so we still have to talk and we still both disagree and we fall out
00:48:37
Speaker
but we navigate a compromise that works you know and i allow her i said this to her yesterday you have some liberties your friends don't have and you have others that they do and that is just our house that's the way it is yeah but doesn't that work for your online world though too for you know the certain acts because you allow some and not others yeah and i but i do think that she bends the rules and that is what i think parents need to remember that if you
00:49:06
Speaker
Control, lockdown, block. Your child at some point is going to break that rule.
Evolving Parental Roles in the Digital Era
00:49:11
Speaker
It's like the equivalent of me when I was 15 taking stilettos to school to change into because my mum wanted me to wear flat shoes with laces. You know, they will do it online and I would much rather be involved in difficult conversations with them and allow them to do things that I'm not comfortable with. Right. With my knowledge.
00:49:31
Speaker
Right. Right, right, right. No, I'm right there with you. And I was also the one who I remember. This has nothing to do with digital but stuff. I remember being a teenager and wanting to put some color in my hair and my mother had already said no, and I think it was punk rock, you know? And so I put some
00:49:47
Speaker
blue uh like chalk to have like you know blue and all in my hair and my father was the one driving me to school well lo and behold Helen I start hearing this honking honking honking my mother was in the car behind and she saw all of my blue hair let me tell you
00:50:02
Speaker
I was a showdown, but I went to school happy that day, and I knew when I came home that I was in big trouble. But it's just those types of things. Of course we did all that, and lots of it our parents did know, and they trusted us. They trusted us. So I think that is the name of the game. What I really like is that you added a C. You said compromise, and usually I'm always talking about communication and have confidence in your parenting, all of my C's, right?
00:50:27
Speaker
And then critical thinking, telling parents to think about what you're giving your children or look to see if that game, Call of Duty, if it's 18 plus that you can give that to a six year old, right? I say continue those conversations, but you just added another C that I think is super important, which is that compromise. It really is that, it's a trade off. And I don't think that parents have to say, oh, but I'm the parent, you're the child, listen to me. That's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about the digital age.
00:50:58
Speaker
This is a whole other thing. Yeah. Yeah. And the whole other thing of moving from the place where you did have full control of your child's life and what they did to a place where you're gradually handing over control to them to the point where you have no control over what they do at all. All you have is influence. Right. It's like when you like sending them off to college or uni as you say.
00:51:22
Speaker
You know, all that we can do is we can just raise our little people to be the best human beings that we can because they're gonna have to leave the nest and they're gonna have to go out and so this is what's happening with the digital. Parents have to do that. Yeah. Elizabeth, thank you for all of that invaluable advice. Is there anything else that you would say to parents before we finish?
00:51:47
Speaker
Yes, I think it goes back to the title of this podcast, which is understanding what is happening online and trusting your teen anyway. And I think that parents do need to understand that there is so much happening, whether we're talking pornography or being able to
00:52:05
Speaker
for example, purchase connected tampons. Those things exist, right? Wow. Connected minstrel cups. There's even things like long distance sex toys that can be hacked. You can go onto Amazon and purchase, you know, sex dolls, sex robots. All of these things are online and available and they're not locked down. So as I said, this is out there. And so parents need to understand. I'm sorry. I have never
00:52:35
Speaker
ever going to be able to get my head around that enough to be able to control what my kids do with it. Yeah exactly and your daughter might decide that you know connected tampons are perfect for her and I'm just gonna say talk to her about data protection and privacy please.
00:52:52
Speaker
And so many of these things, we have to keep thinking that. And I think that parents, we're never going to get it all. We're never going to understand it all. And just to realize by this same token, if we take all the tech out and we think about our children, I don't know, walking along the street in Amsterdam, going on a summer Europe hike, what are they going to see? What are they going to be exposed to? It's the same thing online.
00:53:16
Speaker
So go back to the basics about how you are raising them so that way they will be able to use this technology responsibly. They'll come to you when something happens and they'll just know what's the right thing to do. Thank that. I mean, oh God, thank God. Thank you. Thank you for that. And it's probably exactly the same as our parents felt. They did not understand the clubs we were going to, the music we were interested, the drinks that we were finding.
00:53:45
Speaker
the drugs that were arriving and becoming normal kind of, well I'm using inverted commas, it's normal. As soon as you said drinks, as soon as you said drinks, think about our parents listening to us say we wanted to have a drink, a sex on the beach, or we want a screaming orgasm drink. You know these were drinks and you know our parents could have been like what the hell are they talking about? Why aren't they just giving a G&T? You know?
00:54:12
Speaker
Sherry. Exactly Sherry. But that's the way it is and I think that we're okay. We've got it. Yeah. So you're saying we can't possibly control everything and understand everything our kids are doing, but we can raise them so that they know how to make good decisions for themselves. Exactly. The same thing that you do in the real world. Just do that online. Yeah. Love it. Thank you so much. Elizabeth.
00:54:39
Speaker
I know that lots of people listening to this are going to want to find you and connect.
Resources and Final Thoughts from Elizabeth Milovidov
00:54:45
Speaker
Where can they find you? They can find me on my website which is digitalparentingcoach.com and that's where they can see, you know, just fun things like books and conversation starters. Like if they want to figure out a way to have a conversation about safe sex and safe tech, you know, they can, you know, buy these little card decks or books and that way they're not the ones asking the question. I'm the one asking the question.
00:55:09
Speaker
You know, things like that. I love that. Yeah, fun things like that. But if they really want to just hang out and have some free support, I have a Facebook group that's called the Digital Parenting Community. And we have parents and grandparents and child online protection experts and cybersecurity specialists and even gaming addiction experts. And we're all in there just helping parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles and just helping. It's just a community. Oh, perfect. I'm joining. Yes, please do. Please do. The Digital Parenting Community on Facebook. I'm looking for you.
00:55:40
Speaker
Cool. I'm coming. I'll be there in a minute. Okay. Anything else? Twitter. You're on Twitter as well. Oh gosh. Yeah, of course. Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, even Snapchat, TikTok. All the same handle at Digi Parent Coach yet. No, you're not going to find me doing any dances. I have to go in to see what the kids are doing so I need to know so I can report back. You know, for example, on Snapchat, you can find some of the top porn stars there.
00:56:04
Speaker
Yeah. And yeah, they've got their accounts. You can put the hashtag. I'm going to follow you so I know who you're following. I'm not following anyone. I just know where they are. That's the best way. Top tip. Fantastic. Thank you so much. Thank you for today. It's my pleasure. Wow. Settings are not going to save you. I think that says it all.
00:56:31
Speaker
Elizabeth's take on how fun and wonderful for learning the internet is just makes me so happy and the fact that I don't now have to dance around all the internet controls figuring out what's the best way to keep my kids safe
00:56:50
Speaker
I don't know. I think Elizabeth just gives me a sense of freedom that it's OK for me not to do that. But what it's crucial for me to do is talk to them all the time and find out what they're doing and get involved without being invasive or over the top about it. The other thing I love that she said is they're not addicted.
00:57:11
Speaker
lockdown and now school holidays has had me feeling really quite stressed and anxious about the amount of time my kids are spending on screens. The fact that she's completely
00:57:25
Speaker
dispelled the myth in my head that they're addicted to tech and gaming is just another big win for me. And that whole thing about the age restriction of 13 on Snapchat being not because some expert has deemed it dangerous for kids under 13 to be on there, but because it's not okay for them to be advertised to legally at that age. 13 is only about the advertising.
00:57:53
Speaker
I mean, you'll never be ready to let your child go it alone, but you have to, we have to. And I think Elizabeth's just speaking so much common sense there that we can all take something from.
Podcast Closing and Listener Engagement
00:58:05
Speaker
Thank you so much for listening. If you've liked the Teenage Kicks podcast, can I ask you to pop over to iTunes and give it a rating? Share this episode if you think it will be useful to someone else and come back next week for another brilliant guest.
00:58:21
Speaker
on life with tinnitus.