Posted by Richard Kuhlenschmidt
Sun, 16 Nov 2008 00:48:00 GMT
When we set out to design Famundo Social, we surveyed our users for ideas on what would make Famundo work better for them. Many of their suggestions are incorporated in this new release.
One of the things we heard over and over again was the need for families to be able to interact with their extended family and friends in a manner, similar to Facebook or Myspace, but in a family-friendly, safe and secure environment. With parents having control over who their children can or cannot be friends with. With grandkids and grandparents having the ability to communicate with each other without having to set up an e-mail account.
The result is the “Social” part of Famundo Social. Here is a short flash movie that gives a overview on how this works.
Families are busy today. We tend to get caught up in our own lives and let our relationships with friends and our extended families fall through the cracks. We hope Famundo Social can help bring you together again.
Posted in Parenting, Family 2.0, Family Life, Famundo, Setting Limits, Technology | Tags calendar, family, networking, online, social | 1 comment
Posted by Richard Kuhlenschmidt
Mon, 06 Nov 2006 00:47:31 GMT
Why is it that after years of safe sex classes, drug abstinence seminars, anti-smoking campaigns, teens still go out and get involved with self-destructive behavior like drinking and driving, smoking, having unprotected sex, and so on.
The prevailing thought is that it is because teens feel invincible. They are young, strong, and smart. “It won’t happen to me!” they tell themselves. They have weighed the odds, assessed their own skills and smarts, and feel like they can get away with it, at least this time.
But a new study being done by the Association for Psychological Science discounts this idea and actually claims that teens overestimate their risk of getting HIV or lung cancer. But, they underestimate the consequences. Maybe they will get lung cancer, but how many years do they have to smoke before they get it? Maybe they will get an STD, but how bad can that really be?
Social acceptance and rebellion are also factors. Peer pressure can sway a kid who knows the dangers of drunk driving to do it anyway, regardless of the odds. The Cost/Benefit factor doesn’t even come in to play.
Adults, on the other hand, through experience, knowledge and insight, have an intuitive reaction to avoid risky behavior. It is a “gut” feeling that stops them from getting involved in these activities.
So how do we impart this intuition that has taken years to develop in adults, into our kids?
There is currently a study being conducted by Valerie F. Reyna and Frank Farley at the Association for Psychological Science where teens are being subjected to positive images of healthy behavior and negative images of risky behavior. It appears that this strategy may work better than the tactics that are currently being used.
To dig into this more, click here.
Posted in Parenting, Setting Limits | no comments | no trackbacks
Posted by Richard Kuhlenschmidt
Wed, 25 Oct 2006 20:03:27 GMT
We just had our annual parent meeting at our daughter’s middle school this week and, as we did last year, we ended the meeting with, for lack of a better term, a parent covenant. This is where parents agree to set limits on what our children are allowed to and not allowed to do, especially when it involves activities that include other children in the class.
This provides a real safety net when your children are having a sleepover or visiting a friend, you know that the other family has agreed to certain standards won’t be broken. It makes a very powerful statement when you can tell your child that the parents in the class have decided this as a group that some activity is not acceptable.
It is interesting how the concerns of parents have changed over the years with changes in technology . Although the Internet and e-mail is still a concern, there was much more discussion over issues like social networking sites, such as MySpace, and text messaging. These weren’t even on the radar when our son started middle school three years ago.
You can read my post regarding last year’s meeting here.
We are very appreciative that our school provides this opportunity and actually encourages this dialog among the parents.
Posted in Internet Safety, Family Life, Setting Limits | Tags Internet_safety, parenting, setting_limits | no comments | no trackbacks
Posted by Richard Kuhlenschmidt
Thu, 19 Oct 2006 10:55:00 GMT
I am very excited that Jim Steyer, founder of CommonSenseMedia, will be speaking at my son’s school next week. His talk is on The “Internet: Do You Understand How Much It Affects Your Children, How It’s Changing Their Lives and What You Can Do about It.” I’m very interested to hear his perspective on this topic especially now that I have a high schooler.
In case you are not familiar with CommonSenseMedia, get familiar. It is an incredibly valuable tool for parents, on topics covering all media, including the internet, movies TV.
You can sign up for their weekly e-newsletter, which covers all the latest releases.
I’ll report back after I hear his talk.
Posted in Internet Safety, Setting Limits, Technology | Tags internet, monitoring, online, predators, safety, web | no comments | no trackbacks
