Children are increasingly demanding and using smartphones nowadays. This is due to popular culture normalizing the use of smartphones among young children and also due to the number of features, which newer models of phones have, various apps available on the app store or play store which provide endless hours of entertainment at the tips of your fingers. Children are easily enamored by such technology and often spend more time on their smartphones than they do on playing outside. This is the reality of life in today’s world. There are many parent app in which you can monitor your child.
The increased usage of smartphones can have many problems, for instance, disengagement with the real world, wasting time on Facebook, Instagram and other social media sites. It can also lead to decreased attention span, exposure to indecent or mature content, decreased interest in school and other extracurricular activities.
And while smartphones and the internet can be a treasure trove of learning resources and a boundless source of fun, the truth of the matter is that it is also incredibly unsafe, and children very often fall for the trappings of people who mean them harm. The internet has made it easy for perpetual violence against children to find new victims. Not only children, but increasingly young adults have become victims. This is an especially vulnerable age as they feel insecure and many young adults take solace on the internet, often confiding deep secrets to complete strangers. These strangers may as well be other young adults sharing their issues, however, there are times when they are people with a criminal bent of mind.
As parents, it is easy to feel scared for your children and their safety, it is also perfectly reasonable to want them to shelter them. And while it is not possible to completely eliminate smartphones from children and young adults, it is possible to leverage those very smartphones to ensure their safety and also to limit the time during which they use their phones.
So here are a few apps which can be used to regulate and monitor your child’s internet usage so as to ensure their safety and happiness.
MobSafety Ranger Browser
This free app will let you access your child’s browsing history. In addition to that, it also allows setting filters such as whitelisting(allowing) or blacklisting(blocking) certain websites. Another feature of this app is that it has the option of limiting the time during which your child can access the internet.
DinnerTime Plus
This app lets you control the time during which your child can use their phones. It allows you to remotely unlock and lock their phones from your phone. Thus their phone can be locked during study times, meal times and bedtime. However, to use this app, the child must possess an android phone while the parent phone can be either an iPhone or an Android. This app is good to ensure that your child isn’t using their phone when they are not supposed to and it’s not distracting them from what is important and it is not disturbing their sleep cycle.
Canary – Teen Safety
This app is one that is geared towards teenagers and young adults, it lets you know when your child is using their phone when they are driving and if they are exceeding the speed limit. It also lets you know whether they are in an area that is not safe, or if they are in a region with unruly weather conditions which might be dangerous to drive in.
Ignore No Long
This is an app that deals with one of the key issues and concerns and frustrations of being a parent to a teenager. This app will allow you to limit the usage of the phones when they repeatedly ignore your calls and texts. This app will let you lock them out of using the web, games, Facebook etc until they call you back!
Inbuilt parental control
The number of cybercrimes is increasing day by day. It is a parent’s responsibility to ensure that your child remains safe while accessing Internet. To ensure this, inbuilt parental control feature of our smartphones is very useful.
Android
To enable parental control in Android, you need to follow the following steps:
- Step 1: Open the settings menu.
- Step 2: Choose the option “User and Accounts”. Click on the “User” option followed by “Add User” option.
- Step 3: Click on set up now option to create a new account. Enter your phone’s password or pattern lock whichever is enabled
- Step 4: Once the account is created, follow the on-screen instructions. You can restrict various features of your smartphone which you do not want your child to access.
iOS
To enable parental control in IOS, you need to follow the following steps:
- Step 1: Go to Settings. Select General followed by Restrictions.
- Step 2: Click on Enable Restrictions.
- Step 3: Create a Restrictions passcode. You need your Restrictions passcode to change the settings or to turn off Restrictions.
Now, you can turn on or off what you do not want your child to access such as allowing use of inbuilt apps, preventing access to certain websites or content, etc.
These apps are a great way of ensuring your child’s safety and also the responsible usage of their phones. While not all of these will fit the varied requirements that different parents and children will need, these apps represent a variety and can be used in the way that the parents and children find necessary.
Apart from apps, it is also important to talk to your children and educate them about the problems that can arise from increased smartphone usage.
