It’s true. I caved. My 10year old now has her own Facebook page. I always swore I wouldn’t be “one of those” parents. You know, breaking the rules for my kid. Just cause “everyone else is doing it”
But that was the problem…Everyone else WAS doing it. So at first I just let her use my Facebook page to communicate with her friends. That worked well. At First. Then they were all playing the games together.
You know the ones? With the super annoying game requests? Yeah those…
Wasn’t so bad until she started requesting from people on my friends list that she didn’t know.
Even that didn’t sway me…
It was when she started commenting on her friends pictures and postings that got to me.
It just came off as kinda creepy that a 40-something woman is commenting on kids pictures and how cute certain boys were etc.
To the casual observer, it just looked wrong.
So, after a lot of internal debate and discussions with other parents, I caved.
I allowed my 10 year old to have her own Facebook page. But with some HUGE stipulations.
- no friending anyone she isn’t either related to or personally knows. That includes friends of friends etc
- I MUST have access to everything . Passwords on down to deciding what she can post
- all privacy settings are to be maintained at the highest level.
- Report anything that she feels is inappropriate to me immediately.
So far, it seems to be working out a lot better for her to have her own account, but only time will tell.
But I will not. absolutely not. get her an iphone (yet)…
Be ever vigilant – they have to stay your friend. But watch their emails too. Setting up new undercover fb’s is not unheard of.
I know, kids are sneaky these days. (as if WE weren’t LOL) They will create accounts in the name of a favorite pet or character thinking parents won’t know. I am very fortunate that my kids are very open and honest with me. I know many kids that don’t talk to their parents..