- Image via Wikipedia
We teach our kids at a very young age to watch out for strangers, don’t talk to strangers and don’t go places where you are unfamiliar or uncomfortable. Even when they’re out with friends, having a sleepover or just walking along in the neighborhood, they know what the rules are concerning dangerous situations and how to stay away from it. We have taught that very well, and can see it every day when we interact with our children. While we review their day at school or at football practice, we commend them for doing a good job and for making good decisions.
But what about another area that we should warn against that’s not quite as visual as the stranger on the street or in the mall? What should we do when see questionable activity on our children’s computers and look at the sites that they’ve visited?
The Internet is another area of predator and often bad activity that we must also protect our children from. Although we know that the Internet is a great place to learn, explore and a great source of information, there are some places on there that we would not like for our kids to go, much like we wouldn’t want them to in the offline world. But how do you protect them?
In older children, it helps to talk to them and thoroughly explain the bad behavior that can sometimes take place on the Internet. Children often benefit more by seeing things in action or the results of them, so take them to the authoritative warning sites that give statistics and stories on Internet predators.
Installing firewalls on your computers at home are very successful in blocking unsavory sites from your child. You can control which sites they’re able to access, and block pop-up windows and other sites from accessing your computer’s information.