I recently had the pleasure to speak with the parents association at my sons school about the connected society our children are growing up in and what all of this means. The topic has come to be a hot one with stories like Teen Twits Gone Wild where teenagers were sending inappropriate photos from teen parties to a tweeter that was maintaining a twitter account exposing the crazy things these kids were doing at high school parties. This naturally created a public outcry that was directed in many directions including the schools these children attend, the person running the twitter account to the parents.
I would like to share the presentation that I gave to the parents at my sons school as well as explain some of the points that I raise.
Why are kids so connected?
Because they can be. It is so easy to create accounts on social networks and many children are doing so without their parents knowledge.
FOMO – fear of missing out! What is happening on social networks often becomes part of the face to face discussion our kids are having during their school day. It’s only natural that they want to become a part of the online discussion.
Social Credibility – much of the outrageous content kids are posting on social are posted to gain likes, shares, comments and other reactions that seem to make the posts popular or credible.