Hey Parents! I hate to tell you, but there is no such thing as “useful instant messaging”. Your crafty child might try to take advantage of your lack of “Techie” know how when they say in that whiney voice... “But Mom I’m IMing my friends about homework.” Don’t buy it! They are simply playing up
school is important bit so they can get you off their back.To be fair, yes kids might spend a couple minutes discussing their school assignments. But for every 30 seconds of actual work, another 30 minutes are lost in useless chatter with hundred or so “friends” on their buddy list! And if your child consistently pulls “I didn’t know assignment” excuse, then bigger school problems than instant messaging are on horizon.
You can easily stop hours upon hours of instant messaging with one simple gesture… PULL THE PLUG! Now, I don’t really mean to literally pull plug out of computer on your child. The last thing we want to do is get into a power struggle with your child, or break your $1500 computer.
No, what I mean is simply lay down law. Allocate a specific period of instant messaging time per day. One hour of IMing is not going to kill anyone or their social life. And in that one hour time slot they will have plenty of time to discuss homework, their teacher, new kid in class, or whatever.
Right now you might be saying, “That sounds great Chris, but what happens when my kid refuses to adhere to allotted time?” When your child disregards your house rules it simply means they have too much free time on their hands. We all know that idleness is devil’s playground. It might be time to up their chore responsibilities. Or sign them up for an after school art class or even a sport or karate. Sometimes best answer is to simply spend some quality time with them. Set up a time each day to play scrabble, take a walk or cook something together. It really doesn’t matter what it is, just play to your kids interests and keep them busy.
