Parents and the Digital Divide...

I think parents find it tough to stay in tune with their kids' world today. It's way too sophisticated for most. When I was growing up, basically it was still a wyswyg (what you see is what you get). These days...what you see may not be what you get. In fact, crappier stuff may be coming your way even though there is nothing you see!

There were no Flickr, Facebook, Friendster, Twitter, MSN, mobile phones (which have opened up another different world) etc, etc. Every now and then we hear of new apps being developed, new ways of staying in touch... so many new things. It's easy to feel overwhelmed even by the jargons let loose every day. For the computer illiterate parent, it can be a bewildering time. Half the time, you won't know what's going on or what hit you! Basically clueless! LOL! For the literate ones, their kids will constantly try to outwit and outsmart them. Parents don't seem to cope well with this steep learning curve. Incidentally, Son saw me writing this post and says too bad his mom is computer literate...but that still does not stop him from trying to outwit me.....see what I mean?

Kids today have more than one social environment. There're the physical and the digital. They bring their physical into the digital and the latter goes beyond....Buzz Lightyear's signature call 'to infinity and beyond' seems apt here. Hence, the digital divide between parents and their kids is wider than you'd expect....and I think most parents are left with an almost zilt feeling of what their kids are up to most of the time.

Young people have become masters of multitasking. They may seem to be doing their work when they are actually doing other 'off-limit' stuff. Tell them not to chat with so and so...changing nicks (nickname) is one of many solutions, password the computer so that it cannot be switched on....they change the power supply plug so that they fool you into thinking that the computer has been switched off when it is in actual fact in sleep mode. Then when parents are asleep, they sneak out and play their games! Put on parental control into your router and they'd reset it so that the gateways are all opened again. You'd be surprised how imaginative they can be! If you want a good mental workout, try keeping up with your kids in this.

So who says keeping tab on the teenagers is easy these days? But all is not lost, the digital divide, if can be bridged would actually open up new insights to their world too and open up a new one for us as well. 8)The thing is....parents need to do something about that learning curve of theirs. Jump in, join in the fun...be a part of the digital world. Start a blog, join Facebook, try IM.... You may not take too well the steep learning curve but if you persist and persevere, it may actually taper off and become a gentle slope. My two sen today!

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