As part of my efforts to search for a birthday present for one of my nieces (in “collusion” with the mom of course), the new Nokia 3310 came to mind as perhaps a great option, quite simply because it takes me back to the days when we were still in school. Everybody who had a mobile phone had the original Nokia 3310, so much so that we referred to it as a “student card” — a phrase for it which I believe originated in South Africa of all places. and we all know monitoring your kids online can be hard but is necessary.
So anyway, I had no idea it hasn’t been released yet (to be released later this year), so when I searched for it online all I came across was the classic version. Needless to say I was surprised to find that new versions of the old classic are still available for sale, which actually got me thinking about just what kids potentially get exposed to when they’re gifted with the Smartphones of this day and age so make sure you keep an eye on your kids activity online and all the connectivity and ready access to the world’s information those devices subsequently come with.
The idea that kids should perhaps still make use of those classic feature phones we had to make-do with probably won’t fly, so we have to make sure to tweak and tailor their use of these new feature rich devices for their own protection. There are all manner of potential threats to have to fend off, including potentially damaging material such as pornography, fake news which has been seeing quite the spike in recent years and even the likes of the pitfalls associated with the mere use of social networks (cyber-bullying, depression, etc).
So I think it’s safe to say that you cannot simply purchase your child a Smartphone and then just hand it to them as is. It’ll have to come with the condition that its use is subject to use along with some child monitoring and tracking solutions installed on it, such as the likes of KidGuard.
There’s no need to be sneaky about it — it’s best if the child knows that their whereabouts can be kept an eye on by what is nothing more than a concerned parent. Your aim is not to police their every move but to make sure their movements are safe and this also provides a measure of protection for the device itself as well, against theft.
In addition to the safety benefits that come with making use of a child mobile phone tracking service, engage with your child about the dangers of the wired world and make them feel comfortable in the knowledge that they can always come to you should they experience something like cyber-bullying, or even just to ask you how to handle certain situations their use of the device might cause some sort of difficulty in.
Never make your child feel like if they confide in you with regards to the difficultly caused by their use of their device that that would in any way result in you taking it away from them as this will make them shy away from reporting to you what could be some serious issues.