Left To Their Own Devices

Learning to manage friendships on social media is the key to a positive experience, says Gemma Birt.

- Gemma Birt

My grandmother always used to say that becoming a mother is easy, being one is not. And as a mother of four children, aged between 15 and seven, I can see her point!

Seeing the changes in challenges that children face as they mature is a great privilege. One of the hardest aspects of parenting is helping children deal with the pressures that come from social media use.

Many voices suggest that constant social media use may be contributing to the stresses felt by young people, and so it seems only right, that as Prep or Junior school parents, we start thinking about how we help them manage their use of smart phones and their social media, before they even get to the stage of being allowed to have a phone.

So here are some thoughts: