It is said that parenting has been made more difficult with the rapid advancements in technology and the effects of social media on our children. Certainly that can be the case.
For those of us who are parents of teens, it is nearly impossible to keep up with what is new, what is hip, what our kids are in to.
There is nothing more eye opening for me, as a parent, of how much more quickly the world is changing now, compared to when I was a kid, than explaining to my three kids (ages thirteen, fifteen and twenty):
- ‘dial up’ … that was the norm only about ten years ago.
- life without laptops and cell phones … hubby had his first of each about the year our fifteen year old was born (according to Reuters, May 2012, nearly one quarter of American homes have ditched landlines for cell phones)
- life without i Pods or MP3 players … none of which existed until after our fifteen year old was born (over 300 million i Pods sold)
- Google was an infant when our thirteen year old was born … it was launched just a month before his birth (it receives almost 1 billion views each month)
- life without YouTube … it did not appear until 2005 (it’s most watched video, “Charlie Bit My Finger” received almost 500 million views alone)
- Facebook has only been around since 2006 … my children were seven, nine and fourteen when it became available to all with an email address (now about 955 million users)
The world certainly has changed, and it is not stopping. We have a choice, as parents, we can either bury our graying heads in the sand and pretend that it doesn’t affect us OR we can do our best to understand the world which our children are immersed in.
For me, it was an easy choice, because if I turn my back on the language of my children today, how will we communicate tomorrow? My children have grown up with talk of gigabytes, tweeting and social media. It is, in all practicality, their first language. And if I have hope of continuing in communication, I feel it is easier for me to climb the learning curve, and learn enough that I can walk them through this technological road.
I have not only three children, but also two ‘friends’ on Facebook (one is not yet thirteen, and, since it is the Facebook policy that you need to be thirteen to have an account, he is still waiting). It is here that I can be familiar with who their friends are, how they are conversing, and the ups and downs of their circles. This is not information that I am ‘sneaking’ as my kids know that I am interested in their lives, and in the lives of their friends (many of whom are also my ‘friends’). They do tell me not to ‘like’ every picture they post, because that’s “just creepy,” so I am learning how to navigate this new world from them too!
I am not saying I always agree with all that is new, or the intrusions that technology creates in our lives. I most certainly see foundational flaws to social media as a main use of communication in our world. I see the need for a Miss. Manners in the form of a Wii character, to watch over and instruct the users of the world wide web. I have struggled through terminology that is new (most of which are acronyms) and foreign to my ears. I sometimes wonder if in the future the acronyms we now use in texting will become the words of Webster’s Dictionary. Or that Webster’s will be replaced by Urban Dictionary. I have also found sites visited by my kids that, in the words of my grandmother, make my eyeballs curl.
But, each setback is also an opportunity to teach and to learn, and for me and my kids, we are doing it together, bumps and bruises alike.
For those of us of a more archaic age, the video below might put a smile on your faces, like it did my kids and I:
In our house, it has happened that all five of us are home, even in the same room, having a conversation by texting. It may sound rather ridiculous, but hubby and I figure it is good for a laugh, and helps us maintain uniqueness as a family. We have even been talking about having a dinner where we all communicate via text through the entire meal. We are all about memory making, and hey, the family that texts together, stays together 😉 !
Since it is still the first week of January, I figure it is not too late to talk New Years resolutions.
itsawonderfilledlife 