Spying vs. Monitoring a childs use of the internet.
Should parents and guardians spy on their children’s internet use?
It should be of no mystery to us that the internet is a potential breeding ground for many types of predators. Pedophiles, stalkers, serial killers and whatever other form of depraved individual (or group) that one can imagine.
Our young children are very susceptible to the manipulation of other adults. I for one do NOT want my daughter seeking important advice from somebody I do not know over the internet; would you?
What is the line between spying on our children’s internet activity and doing ones job as a parent by protecting our children from predators or meddling adults over the internet?
Some people may argue that a younger child should not have access to the internet. However, I disagree. Why limit an extremely valuable learning resource, and a practical end-user experience to older kids and adults exclusively? The extra knowledge and practical skills will come in very handy later on in life, and the head start perhaps invaluable.
I decided it was time for my 11-year-old daughter (at the time) to have her own PC with access to the internet. I told her straight off what kinds of “bad” things she may run across while surfing. I told her what she was allowed to do, and what she was not allowed to do. Basically, I explained much of what I know could possibly cause her harm as a result of dealing with certain people online.
I explained she was a big girl now, and I felt she was responsible enough to surf the internet, and use a computer of her own. I made it very clear that I would be making sure she kept up to my expectations, and would monitor her PC usage regularly. When she asked me why, I told her, “because I love you kiddo, and I don’t want anything harmful coming your way”.
I showed her what she could and could not do on her PC. I set up an email account and an IM for her, and then showed her how to use them. I enabled some parental controls to help keep off the porn. I also told her I had set up monitoring software that allows me to see exactly what she does while online. I told her if she abused any part of what I told her, she would begin losing PC privileges until she could show me she was responsible enough to have them back.
I then took her to my PC and showed her that I could in fact see EVERYTHING she did. I made it very clear that should she step outside our agreement, I would strap her PC so tight she may as well not use it. She agreed. I was quite impressed with her.
To date, she being now 14-years-old, I have not really needed to restrict Shelby’s internet use very often, and I rarely even have a look at what she does. I was pretty amazed that she never even once asked me to uninstall the monitoring software. That’s my GREAT kid 
Would you do something similar with your children as I did with my daughter Shelby?
Do you feel an 11-year-old is to young to operate her own PC and have access to the internet?
What would you do differently?