My beast is a freshman in high school. High school (if you haven’t had the pleasure of experiencing YOUR child in high school yet, just you wait), is a whole. new. ball. game. She is fiercely independent (which she comes by naturally), but is unable to grasp that I am still the conduit to all the things in her life. She doesn’t yet know all that she doesn’t know. Part of the growth process, I am sure. Each grade level, each stage of this educational ladder that she climbs up, is designed to take her one rung closer to independence, to college, to real life… right?
The problem is, there isn’t a “how to be a grown up” class. There are opportunities for her to learn from missteps. (But it sure helps when someone points them out to her!) There are opportunities to reflect and correct. (But it sure helps if she has someone who models that!) There are opportunities to learn about time management when you’re juggling sports, clubs, friends, and oh, and an all Pre- AP and AP course load. (But it sure helps when you have parent privy to all those calendars providing reminders and nudges.) This is a path I am walking with her. I don’t care that the police club sponsor awarded her with the “Most Likely to Have a Helicopter Momma” award at her police club banquet (side eye at officer Stewart). I am involved in her world. I am her chauffeur and her bank account. I am the questioner and the friend picker upper. This is what I do.
The beast has zero forms of social media. (Caveat: no allowed accounts that I know of, anyway!) I am an involved parent. I am the parent who still signs up for snacks at the high school during teacher appreciation week. I am the mom who texts the other moms confirming plans, times, and expectations. I am the one who rolls the window down every. single. time, and yells “Don’t forget you love Jesus, make good choices!” (I think she likes it.) We make sure she checks her grades regularly and has conversations when she needs to concerning a reteach or make up. We make sure SHE is responsible for all of the follow ups she needs to be successful. Is that helicoptering? Or parenting?
If I hadn’t connected with her school on Facebook, or her church group in Instagram, or her HS principal on twitter (Virdie Montgomery, a good follow!) there are so many things I wouldn’t be aware of or have the chance to talk to her about. Thankfully, it’s 2017. There are no paper flyers that come home from the high school that I have to hunt down. Through our LMS we are able to access them all digitally, and of course, I am able to keep up that way. Don’t know if your school has/offers a LMS? itslearning is a great place to start! It’s a way for parents to stay connected with their campus, and as a leader, I make sure I push out all that I can so that again, parents NEED to stay connected with your student and oh my lizard, you have to start somewhere!
Be involved with your children. As an educator, I see the value in what it looks like when parents are more connected and involved with our campus. Parental involvement is an important factor in a successful school community. We can’t do it alone! It also helps for students to see that parents and educators are on the same team. We all want our students (your children!) to be successful… and the best way for educators to know what that looks like is for you to be involved. Help us help you! A trusting two-way relationship ensures that neither side will have to make assumptions on the other. Don’t know where to begin? Knowing the way communication is usually handled and through what channels is a great way to start.
There is such outrage circling the interwebs right now about the young adult series on Netflix “13 Reasons Why”. I made my teen read the book several years ago, and we watched the series together. If parents were more involved, genuinely, truly involved, that series actually might not rank at the top of your “to be concerned about” list. The amount of inappropriateness that cycles through SnapChat, or IG, or Quiz Up would astound you. There are conversations that need to be had. If you think your child “isn’t ready” for those kinds of convos, all the more reasons to have them! I preach that social media should be taught to the younger kids ALL the time. By the time they’re old enough to actually handle it, they’ve been all trained up by their peers and are uninterested in what you have to share.
Your children need you. They may not want you…but they NEED your wisdom, your experience, your voice. Don’t be scared of the things that go viral on Facebook, friends, be more scared of the stuff we know nothing about.
Communication is key, and parental involvement is important. Utilizing an LMS is just one part of the parent-student experience. If your school doesn’t already use an LMS, check out itslearning today!
This piece is sponsored by itslearning.
Side note…if my calling my teen “the beast” puzzles you, read this. 🙂
Parenting puzzleR,
Amber
Just wondering why the beast has zero forms of social media (that you’re aware of)? Was this her choice or yours? If it is your decision, how do you teach your own child about social media? You mentioned that you advocate for teaching about social media for younger children all the time. How would you go about teaching about social media to children if they’re not allowed to engage in the practice of owning a social media account?
Hi John! I talked a little about my decision here: https://technicallyteamann.com/a-digital-footprint-for-the-beast/
Even as she has gotten older, we are raising our girls in a Christian home and are as protective as possible to what she is exposed to in her “free time”. From shows to movies to music, we are pretty conservative…she also has a pretty active world with basketball, classes, and clubs, plus church. While I advocate tech use for engagement, professional growth and as a vehicle for communication and relationship building…I haven’t yet seen a need for my kid to use it for her social purposes. At first she was too young, now she is too busy. There is so much stress and drama in being a teenage girl, an additional facet of whatever form is popular hasn’t been needed.
Now, has she been busted with an unapproved snapchat account? Yes. Did we scroll through it with her and discuss ALL THE THINGS that weren’t ok about what we saw? Yes. She actually just got her first actual phone last Christmas…and I have no remorse in doling out these responsibilities slooooooowly.
Now in our classrooms, we cultivate a classroom of honesty, protection, and appropriateness. If a kinder kid thinks instagram is a place to show off her art work or how she problem solves to her parents, maybe just maybe she won’t think its just a tool to garner attention and get as many likes as she can. My daughter never had that kind of experience. Her early years were spent having it all banned in her classrooms. We have classrooms that tweet authors, or celebrate classmates. What we do is closely monitored and protected which is appropriate for my elementary friends. When I say that I advocate for teaching it to younger children, I mean as an instructional support tool, to help garner engagement and model what being a good digital citizen, what being a good, responsible person on social media looks like. Does that make sense? I also fully disclose, to all my audiences, that I am very protective of my beast. Not b/c I think I can maintain her innocence forever, but b/c as her mom, I don’t want that to be what defines her high school years, especially this freshman year. I get to make that call.
I completely understand the conservatism. I don’t have children, yet (so my opinions may change down the road). When/if I do have children, I plan to inculcate them with some conservative ideals. That being said, I was recently at a workshop regarding technology usage in our schools today. I met many parents who expressed similar ideas regarding the restriction of social media for today’s children (whether if it’s to keep them safe or to refrain from having a social media identity/presence be what defines them). One of my concerns is that because of the plethora of applications that allow children to hide their social media activity, I believe that teaching them about using social media appropriately (digital citizenship, digital footprint, etc.) and allowing them to have social media accounts may be more effective than attempting to simply restrict their social media usage (kind of like the “preacher’s daughter” or “Catholic school girl going off to college” stereotypes).
As another experience from this workshop, we talked about the social interactions that students have face-to-face with children who are allowed to have social media accounts/activity. We talked about how we can’t regulate the usage of social media for other children, specifically friends and classmates. I recall a story from the workshop where this parent wouldn’t let her daughter sleep at a friend’s house because those parents wouldn’t take all the girls’ devices away at a certain time at night, allowing them to continue their social media usage for the evening. I thought, it would be extremely difficult to regulate the no social media stance when you consider all the people a young person may befriend in high school. In addition, I thought the parent restricting her child’s social interactions in this way was somewhat overbearing, especially for a 15/16 year old.
As a mom, do you not allow any of the beast’s friends to use social media at your house? Would you allow the beast to sleep/hang out at a friend’s house where social media is used regularly by the children in the home?