Tag Archives: iPhones

Who isn’t tech savvy?

Posted on by
48
Bondi Blue iMac.
The first iMac we bought for our kids in Bondi Blue.

My kids grew up with iMacs. Apple is the only type of computer I’ve ever owned. I was talking to my son and I was telling him about last week when my husband didn’t know how to take a screen shot and asked me for help with basic tasks.

My kids are millennials — born in the years from 1981 to 1996 — my daughter being born at the tail end.

My son said that not only are boomers (referring to me and my husband) not great with computers, zoomers are also inept.

What’s a zoomer? It’s a new term I learned from my son for Gen Z. They were born in the mid-to-late 1990s up until early 2010s. (Technically my daughter could be a millennial or a zoomer.)

Case in point, my son said his wife’s youngest sibling (yes they are married!) is a zoomer. He graduated college in June. My son asked him to get a workout spreadsheet from his laptop.

“How?”

“It’s on the desktop in a folder,” my son explained.

“Where’s the desktop? What’s a folder?” was the zoomer’s reply.

Wouldn’t you think that young people who literally grew up with technology would know how to use computers? According to my son, zoomers are used to doing everything on phones — which work entirely different than laptops or desktops.

I googled it and discovered this to be true.

What’s your experience with zoomers and computers? Do you find it strange that zoomers are not as computer literate as the generation before them?

Things are going swimmingly

Posted on by
41

That’s me diving off the blocks at my first US Masters swim meet in 2017. This was a relay and I was anxious I’d dive into one of my teammates in the yellow caps.

I got back in the pool last week and swam Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. I’m proud of myself for being consistent and I’m on track for this week too. I asked my husband to go with me on Sunday and after years of him not swimming, he loved it! So, I’m switching my swims during the week from mornings when he works to the afternoons so he can join me.

It’s a healthy fun alternative to our normal neighborhood walks.

The YMCA has an app where you can see if lanes are available and reserve your spot. However, the app has never worked for me. I can see the open spots, but I can’t reserve them. I have to resort to the old fashioned phone call.

When this first happened, I went to the front desk and a young man tried to get the app to work. He gave up and told me I needed a new phone — that my phone was too old. My phone was less than a year old! I prefer the home button on the iphone and Apple still has a model with it. So, my phone may look old to that kid, but it’s relatively new.

Then I contacted the IT people who made the app. They said I had to get help from the YMCA staff. I promptly gave up and used the phone to call and make reservations.

A few weeks ago the Y went to a new app. I thought my troubles would be over. But, no I still couldn’t make lane reservations.

I decided to give it another try and stopped at the front desk where a new young man sat. He looked at my phone, got on the computer and quickly solved the problem. On their end, a box had to clicked to make me the internet user.

Now I can make reservations for my husband and me. I can also cancel without having to call the YMCA and say my plans changed.

What apps do you use that make things easier. In what ways do you find technology makes things more difficult?

Thoughts about social media and kids

Posted on by
29
kids and their dog
My kids at the beach with Angus our best dog ever.

My kids are three years apart in age. They had different experiences with social media growing up. I think “My Space” appeared when my son was in junior high and he didn’t have a smart phone. Kids in his class got in trouble for bullying and posting content that wasn’t considered appropriate.

If I remember correctly, my son got his first iphone for high school graduation. Facebook, My Space and whatever else was popular back then wasn’t a significant part of his life.

My daughter on the other hand had friends with iphones as early as third grade. I think we held off until she was 13 or 14.

At the pool, whether it was swim practice or meets, before the advent of smart phones, the kids would all hang out together under pop-up tents and play word games, cards or Catchphrase. The high school kids would play alongside the middle and elementary school-aged kids. I loved that about swim team.

By the time my daughter was in high school, everyone sat like robots on their iphones. There was bullying going on between teammates sitting yards apart. Nobody talked or laughed like they used to.

Now I’m seeing reports from the CDC, prestigious medical centers and doctors that social media is harmful to kids under a certain age. Although most social media sites restrict use to kids under 13 — it’s a well known fact that 10 year-olds are using social media sites.

Here’s an excerpt from an article called Protecting kids from social media’s harms by Stephanie Whiteside:

(NewsNation) – How young is too young for social media?

Surgeon General Vivek Murthy is saying 13 years old is too young for social media accounts. Under U.S. law, sites that allow those under 13 to create accounts have to abide by stricter policies around data collection and privacy.

Research has shown social media can be harmful to kids and teens who are still developing their identities, damaging mental health and even impacting brain development.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/protecting-kids-from-social-medias-harms/ar-AA16U7sg

Legislation is being considered that would ban social media use for those under 16 years old. It’s much like banning the purchase of alcohol and cigarettes to under 18 or 21.

What are your thoughts about legislation and social media? Should it be up to individual parents? Or would it help to make social media against the law for younger than 16?

5 Tips for Parents to Reign In Smartphone Use

Posted on by
Reply

randk

Life before smartphones.

With all the evidence that more and more kids are suffering from anxiety and depression and with suicide rates skyrocketing, there is research that says smartphones may be making these trends worse. In a Time article by Markam Heid, “We Need to Talk About Kids and Smartphones” he shares these horrifying figures:

“Between 2010 and 2016, the number of adolescents who experienced at least one major depressive episode leapt by 60%, according to a nationwide survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The 2016 survey of 17,000 kids found that about 13% of them had a major depressive episode, compared to 8% of the kids surveyed in 2010. Suicide deaths among people age 10 to 19 have also risen sharply, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Young women are suffering most; a CDC report released earlier this year showed suicide among teen girls has reached 40-year highs. All this followed a period during the late-1990s and early 2000s when rates of adolescent depression and suicide mostly held steady or declined.”

In another article, “Is Your Kid Hooked on Smartphones? 5 Tips for Parents” Heid gives some great advice for parents who are concerned with their kids’ smartphone use. Here’s the abbreviated version. You can read his article in its entirety here.

ONE
Keep devices out of kids’ bedrooms. There is already strong data linking bedroom screen time with a variety of risks—particularly sleep loss, says David Hill, director of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Council on Communication and Media.

TWO
Set up online firewalls and data cutoffs.
Most devices and Internet providers offer parenting tools that restrict access to illicit content and curb data use, and there are apps that do so as well.

THREE
Create a device contract. “This is something you create with your child that details rules around their device use,” says Yalda Uhls, an assistant adjunct professor at UCLA and author of Media Moms and Digital Dads. These rules could include no smartphones at the dinner table, or no more than an hour of social media use after school.

FOUR
Model healthy device behaviors. Just as kids struggle to stay off their phones, so do parents. “We’re all, even adults, drawn to devices,” says UPenn’s Jensen. And if you’re a phone junkie yourself, you can’t expect your kids to be any different, she says.

FIVE
Consider old-school flip phones for your kids, or a smartphone without a data plan (and therefore no Internet access). This may seem like overkill for some parents—especially those of older teens. But unconnected phones still allow teens to call or text with parents and friends, says Jean Twenge, a professor of psychology at San Diego State University and author of iGen.

I think the best thing to do is put down firm guidelines and don’t give in. I was strict with my kids about when they got their first cell phones and I bought them at Target as pay-as you-go phones. It wasn’t until my son’s high school graduation that he got an iPhone. My daughter got one a little sooner because they were much more common, but not until age 16.

Today, I’m the one addicted to my phone. I’m always reading stories, looking at Twitter, checking out FB, etc. My daughter gets so mad at me when we’re together and asks me to put the phone down. “I”m here with you now!” she’ll remind me. I worry a lot about the kids who are in the iGen with peer pressure following them wherever they are. Getting the smartphones and computers out of their bedrooms at night is a smart idea. Making a weekend or week to unplug as a family is a plan, too. It’s such a different world, isn’t it, from when we grew up?

What rules do you have for your kid’s smartphone use?

IMG_8231

Me not on my iPhone–being in the moment with my daughter.

 

Are Children Living Life Through a Lens?

Posted on by
1

DSCN0116

Experiencing the beach.

My daughter and I walked into an elevator yesterday at Nordstrom’s with a mom pushing a Thule baby stroller, snapping pics of her infant and tapping away on her phone to post the pics. My daughter whispered to me, “Thank God they didn’t have iPhones when I was a kid!”

I told her I was thankful that their early childhood was before the era of smartphones, too.

Later, I asked her why she was glad we didn’t have iPhones. Her answer surprised me. “Because you would have been taking photos constantly and posting every moment of my life on FaceBook,” she said.

Psychologists warn about kids spending too much time in front of screens and not enough of their time outdoors in an article in the DailyMail.com called “Why children should not be selfie stars:”

In advice to parents, Dr. Godsi said: ‘Leave technology at home. When you go out as a family leave mobile devices switched off and have a rule that says no mobile phones during family meal times.’

The author added: ‘In my opinion selfies should not be encouraged.

‘I think there is a place for taking a few photos, as a way to help families remember or look back and to share memories but the constant pressure to post on social media means there’s a risk that they (children) don’t experience anything except through a lens.’

My daughter said that once I got my first iPhone and was learning how to use it, “You relentlessly posted ugly, fat pictures of me on FaceBook.”

I view those photos not as ugly, but on a scale of cute to adorable to gorgeous.

DSCN0221

Learning about the ocean in Junior Lifeguards.

I explained that I was so glad she and her brother weren’t posing for pictures constantly, weren’t worried about what other kids were doing at the moment, but went outside to play. That’s why I’m glad the iPhone wasn’t a thing in their early years.

When we had kids over, they weren’t sitting side by side texting each other. No, they were running around the backyard and house playing a reverse hide-and-seek game called sardines—for hours on end.

When we were at the beach, they were jumping in the waves, body surfing, building drip castles, digging holes and yes—occasionally fighting and throwing sand. As annoying and painful as throwing sand was–especially dealing with sand in the eyes–it sure beats constantly posing for pictures.

My daughter says there is room for both. When she goes to the beach with friends, they now get a few pics, then toss the phones in a beach bag and dive under the waves.

Here are a few frightening stats from the article in the UK Mail:

Dr. Godsi spoke out after a survey of 2,000 parents by outdoor education provider, Kingswood, found that the biggest source of quality time among families is spent watching TV together. Sixty-eight percent cited this as their main activity shared with children, followed by going to the cinema (35 per cent) and playing computer games (24 per cent).

The average age of the parents’ children was ten, while 445 were seven.

Asked to look back to when all their youngsters were seven, 85 percent of families said their sons or daughters had never gone camping.

Sixty-five percent said they had never played pooh sticks or climbed a tree (51 percent).

Forty-one per cent admitted their children had never been on a bike ride, paddled in the sea (43 percent) or played in a park (31 percent).

It’s very easy to get sedentary. It’s also easy not to talk to each other when we’re buried and focused on our screens. I’m lucky to spend this week with my daughter just hanging out and being with eachother.

What are your thoughts about selfies, kids and family time? Do your kids spend enough time without their phones experiencing outdoors?

IMG_1474

On the lookout for dolphins and whales.