Well, we’ve come to the final developmental stage in this series on access to and use of social media and the internet. Much of the heavy lifting in parenting should have been occurring in the years before your teenager reaches the 11th and 12th grade. By staying on top of things, building in important values, requiring self-restraint and repeatedly addressing (and catching) their attempts to stray from the path of righteousness you will have saved you and your kid a lot of trouble. As was discussed in earlier developmental stages, it was important for your kid to mess up and be corrected. This process helps them develop the skills necessary to think through consequences, avoid unhealthy (and unconscious) ways of thinking and acting and minimizes the consideration of self-destructive lifestyles. They should be using these skills on a consistent basis by now.
Levels of Parental Monitoring
During this stage, parental monitoring should be shifting from Occasional monitoring to Monitoring with Cause. Through consistently responsible and appropriate use of social media, your kid has earned the right to use their own judgment regarding electronic devices or accessing various electronic media. Monitoring will only need to be done now and again in a casual way; more out of curiosity than concern on your part. This should give way to only monitoring when there is a specific reason or concern.
11th and 12th Graders
Teens this age should be using the internet and social media in trustworthy and appropriate ways. They should no longer be susceptible to naïve and impulsive mistakes or misuse. Because of your monitoring and limit setting during earlier, formative years, they should be relatively invulnerable to the ways in which the use of these electronic media can manipulate their interests and desires. By this stage, the internet and social media should be used in the service of a range of interests and activities rather than as the primary source of interests and activities. Even kids who are interested in the internet or social media as a potential career path are using it—not being used by it, so to speak.
Internet
Internet safety. Occasional monitoring should be all you are doing, at most. Your kid should not have to be educated about the potential problems with internet use and safety concerns.
Computers with internet access. Don’t worry about requiring them to only access the internet in public spaces anymore. If you have to be concerned at this age about what your kid is doing on the internet in the privacy of their own room something is wrong. You may not have been as proactive about this during earlier stages. Your kid may be a slow learner and by this I don’t mean intellectually limited. Kids with attention disorders, bull-headedness, developmental delays or a history of trauma can make the same mistakes over and over, despite the consequences. They require more extended structuring, guidance and even psychological intervention. Below is a discussion of ways to address the need for continued monitoring for kids this age. Occasional Monitoring during the 11th grade year is warranted but move to Monitoring Only with Cause as soon as seems reasonable.
Content filters on all computers. Give your kid the passwords to the content filters. All your computers should continue to have content filters if there are younger kids in the house. Make sure they understand that they are now responsible, along with you, for protecting their siblings from unauthorized and inappropriate use of the internet. They are not just a role model for their siblings but also someone who must assume some of the responsibility for guiding and protecting them. They are not to share the password nor are they to make decisions as to when their sibling should be able to surf the net unmonitored. If they are not mature enough to handle the responsibility of being an adult rather than acting like a peer to their siblings then revoke their security clearance. They have to earn it back by a period of mature and responsible behavior in relationship to their siblings.
Time on the internet. Don’t worry about it unless it is truly excessive. But, with all the training, guidance and consequences you have imposed across development to this point, it is very unlikely that your kid will now, suddenly, be consumed by internet use. They will have developed a range of activities and relationships (because you didn’t let them spend every waking hour on the internet) that will be a natural antidote to internet “addiction.” If, on the other hand, they seem to have developed an exclusive relationship with the internet above and beyond other important aspects of life, it is time for a serious talk with them. This time, though, the conversation will focus on what THEY think is a reasonable amount of time online given their other priorities. THEY will identify (reasonable) personal limits that you will then hold them accountable for. The parenting shift is in identifying problematic areas but having your kid begin to regulate themselves (rather than you regulating them). It is time for them to regulate their behavior through an internalized set of values (i.e., integrity) rather than through fear of punishment. You are their source of external accountability (and enforcement if they violate their own standards or limits).
Continued problems. If you are coming late to the game in monitoring and regulating your kid’s use of the internet (and you are concerned about their use), there are some unique components to getting them turned around at this age. When your kid is younger, as can be seen from the earlier suggestions about monitoring and regulating the internet, you would just educate, limit and punish. For kids this age, especially if they are used to setting their own rules about internet use, trying to ground and punish them can generate quite a bit of conflict. So, think in terms of what they would need to do to maintain this luxury if they were on their own. Namely, they would have to pay for it after covering all their other living expenses. (Suggestions for creating a budget with these and other important categories can be found a number of places including the chapter in my book on Allowance and Money.) This prepares them for self-sufficiency. And makes a point about what you are and are not willing to support.
If your kid has other challenges that interfere with learning and regulating their own behavior (e.g., developmental delays, ADD, unnaturally strong willed, trauma history, etc.), the “drop back to previous levels of monitoring” strategy needs to be modified somewhat. Namely, you will have to repeat it more often than is necessary for other kinds of kids. And, it will be important to reduce the length of time they are punished. Instead of keeping them back on a previous level of use with monitoring for weeks, make it one week. If they show appropriate use, go back to Occasional Monitoring. Some kids need lots of repeated lessons rather than one big lesson. You will make up in repetition what you lose in length of suffering. The main thing is don’t give up and don’t get mad. And consider consulting with a mental health professional to double check that there aren’t larger issues to address other than their internet use.
originally posted on www.brentwoodhomepage.com
