Teaching Kids To Use The Internet Responsibly.

In January of 2012, Wikipedia shut itself down for 24 hours as a way of protesting an Internet bill before Congress.

Don’t remember that? College students do.

The shutdown created utter panic among students everywhere. Kids threatened to drop research writing courses. They took to Twitter and spoke of impending failure. They didn’t know where to go for other sources of reliable information. An entire generation was incapacitated.

I wrote a humorous letter to these exasperated students in a post I called Wikipedia Down. (The gist: go to the library already, kids!) But my humor was rooted in a legitimate concern: how do we find our way in the world when (or if) technology isn’t there to help us?

My own family is completely dependent on technology for information.

When my 8 year-old daughter wants to know how find Hero Brine in Minecraft, she watches a Youtube tutorial.

I followed the manhunt in the Boston bombings via a Twitter hashtag, and learn about celebrity babies and deaths in my Facebook feed.

My husband’s response to any question he can’t answer? Google it, kids.

Our children have learned that an answer to any and every question is available on demand. They can watch a video, search a wiki, hit up Google. And that information is served up to them instantaneously, and in easy-to-digest, “snackable” bites – there’s no time for long encyclopedia articles.

The challenge is that my kids get information so quickly and easily that they don’t have a chance to stop and ask themselves:

Does this seem accurate?

Is the author credible?

Should I take this as fact, or keep researching?

To them, all information is created equal. At least once a week, my kids tell me, “Google says so – it must be true.” If only they had the same faith in me!

Technology has turned information into fast food: quick, simple and cheap to get, but how satisfying or healthy is it? Just like I try to explain that processed chicken nuggets are not the same as real chicken, I need to explain that just because some guy on YouTube says the sky is green doesn’t mean that it is.

But let’s face it – it’s not just kids. Adults are becoming less able to do things without the crutch of technology. We’re afraid to trust our own instincts and abilities.

I don’t need to look far to find examples. My husband simply will not leave home to travel to parts unknown without his GPS, even though Siri has a lengthy history of telling us to turn right at the ocean and keep driving. She’s like a toxic girlfriend he can’t give up.

I’ll admit that I’m guilty of sharing false “RIP Morgan Freeman”-style tweets or Facebook posts. It’s just so easy to click before I think, post before I check, share before I stop to punctuate the day with any sort of question mark at all.

But it’s important to me that my kids have some alternative, if seemingly archaic, tools at their disposal to get and assess information. It’s a critical life and career skill. But how can I possibly teach digital scrutiny to my children when I’m not practicing it myself? How do I teach them that sometimes they are right and the Internet is wrong – and how to tell the difference?

So far, I’ve had to kick it old school.

My son was doing a research report on the desert region of California last year. After consulting Google for approximately 3.2 seconds, he marched into my office with a mopey look on his face and announced that the California desert has a total of zero natural resources.

“I’m going to FAIL, MOM. Natural resources are required for the report.”

I sat down with him and together, we looked at a few of the other search results Google spit back at us. Eureka! The desert region has natural resources after all.

I explained the importance of not relying on just one information source. Then we talked about trusting his abilities. I asked him, “Do you think your teacher would have required you to find natural resources if there were none to find?”

“I guess she probably wouldn’t have,” he said. {fist bump for Mom}

I imagine I’ll repeat this scenario over and over again for the next eight to ten years. Teaching him not to burp the ABCs at the dinner table took time; this will, too.

For now, I’m the Jiminy Cricket on their shoulders every time they get online, telling them to let their conscience be their guide – and to read more than one search result.

I wish they made an app for this.

Or do I?

Posted on 8/23/2013

Written by Gigi Ross

Gigi Ross is a wife, mom of two, freelance writer and social media geek – not necessarily in that order. Gigi’s lifestyle blog is KludgyMom, a snappish take on parenting, pop culture, technology and much more. She hosts Bonfire Chat, a weekly G+ web series, where she hosts panel discussions on topics that resonate with women and moms. She lives in sunny San Diego, where her 10 year-old son and 8 year-old daughter keep her on constant tooth fairy and homework duty. Catch up with Gigi on Facebook and Twitter.

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