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Aug 10, 2022
10:33:39am
MapCoug All-American
Suggestions needed for a technology contract for a child

Oh great Cougarboard, impart to me of your wisdom!

So, my oldest daughter just turned 13. Up until the last year or so, she has been a good kid; obedient, happy, kind, etc. Lately though, she has been increasingly cagey, short with me and her mom, angry, and secretive. A few months ago, we did a routine check of her phone and found that she had been engaged in some unsavory conversations on discord. This was primarily with friends of hers that we know, but also in chatrooms filled with people from her school. Most of the content was relatively benign, but some of it was very explicit (R-Rated or maybe even NC17).

Now, I know that the majority of her friends are not LDS, let alone Christians. I had no idea that basically all of their parents don't restrict their child's device usage or the content they can access. This was an eye-opener for me. Our daughter constantly compares our rules to the lack of rules her friends have to follow, and it is frankly, depressing.

Anyway, we took away her cell phone a few weeks ago, with the intent of giving it back to her after a month. However, we found that she continued to use other devices in the house (laptops, tablets) to access discord and those group chats / channels where we found the explicit content. Since then, we have cancelled the cell phone we gave her and have no intention on giving it back to her anytime soon. We are also restricting all of her device access and I am working on blocking specific sites on our wifi router. The bulk of the conversations my daughter had with her friends on discord were about how much she hated us, her parents, and the rules we imposed on her. She also talks about how much she hates the church and we found in her search history that she is watching videos on Youtube that are very critical of the church. She was even engaged in a conversation with a 20 year old man who appeared to be grooming her; encouraging her to report us (her parents) to CPS or other state/federal agencies and talking about how stupid the LDS church is.

Anyway, we are in a tough spot, and I can't help but think that the previous trust we had in our daughter was misplaced and we need to severely restrict her online access. That said, we cannot keep her locked in a cave for the rest of her life and we want to teach her how to be a responsible user of technology while she is still living at home with us.

I have found some great resources online for "Technology Usage Contracts" and similar things. I was wondering if the great Cougar-Borg had any additional resources I could leverage, or general advice.

Thanks!

https://www.pandasecurity.com/en/mediacenter/family-safety/family-media-agreement-printables/

https://cyberbullying.org/technology-use-contract-2014.pdf

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/when-kids-call-the-shots/201804/the-best-technology-screen-time-contract-kids

I am working on making my own amalgamation of a technology contract to present to my daughter. If any of you are interested in seeing what I have so far, please PM me.

This message has been modified
Originally posted on Aug 10, 2022 at 10:33:39am
Message modified by MapCoug on Aug 10, 2022 at 10:36:25am
MapCoug
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tanksalot
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MapCoug
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Apr 29, 2011
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May 10, 2024
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