[elacacciola]

Are any of your children on social networks? What do you do to make sure they arent being solicited by adults?

[mcmama]

The computer is in a public area of the house, not in the bedroom behind a closed door. Nothing is private. Period.

Totally surprised him when I checked the history and told him not to go where he had been because it was file sharing virus city.

[QueenAngie]

No puters in the bedrooms at our home either.
Freely able to be monitored in the family room and the dining room at our home.
Plus, that history button is all-telling.

Plus, being on myspace and facebook, I am friends w/ my children on their sites, so that is another way to monitor.

[JayTucker]

I am a youth minister and use both facebook and myspace to keep parents and teens informed about news for our group. I agree totally with the posters that have said computers should not be in the bedrooms. I also would add that as a prerequisite for giving your child permission to be on those sites that they give you all of the passwords and email addresses used so that you can monitor the site from the computer. It may sound intrusive, but we live in a world that warrants it.

Jay Tucker
Author of The Whole Youth Worker, Advice on Professional, Personal, and Physical Wellness from the Trenches.
www.betteryouthministry.com

[mcmama]

Jay that is a good idea. I had that arrangement with my children until they were around 16 and we had a better understanding of what each other expected. At that point, they were too busy to spend much time online.

Please put the link for your ministry in your sig - you can create one in the user CP tab at the top of the page. We're happy to have you join our discussions and add your perspective, and the link will then show on every post. Please don't make posts promoting your book or your ministry specifically - I am sure that those who are interested will find you from your sig when they read what you have to say.

[kidprotect]

Parents and kids need to be educated on the threats presented by social networking sites. In general kids just use them to communicate with their friends, but there are definitely threats out there and they should be taken seriously.
Parental controls, keeping the computer in an public part of the house with the screen facing so everyone can see it, and education are all important here.
Nick
www.kidprotect.org

[letschildproofdotcom]

I monitor my nieces and nephews comments and myspace/facebook mail. If they don't like it then they can't use it.