Mr. Fudens' email address: mfudens@schools.nyc.gov
Mr. McCartney’s email address: smccarteny2@schools.nyc.gov
Assignment Title: "Spring 2016 MP2 – Should Parents Have Access To Their Child's Cell Phone?"
SIP Graphic Organizer Due Date: 3/18/16
Essay Due Date: 4/1/16 (no joke)
Your essay can be emailed or typed out and handed in to me.
Instructions:
Read the Context, Task and Prompt FIRST.
If you need to do your SIP Graphic Organizer, read all of the articles.
If you have already completed your SIP Graphic Organizer then proceed to write your essay.
Be sure to visit the page: http://physed2003.educatorpages.com/200302 in order to see how your assignment will be graded.
My email address is listed above and feel free to visit my home page at www.physed2003.educatorpages.com.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.
Context:
Cell phones have become a staple in today’s society and basically everyone from young children to the elderly has one. Having the ability to stay in touch with their parents at all times is definitely a reason why children should have cell phones, but there are some potential dangers that also come along with children having cell phones. The mere existence of these dangers suggests that parents should be able to monitor all activity on their child’s cell phone, but some people feel that this is a violation of privacy. While some may believe that it is a violation of privacy, others feel that their child’s safety trumps everything else and that’s why they monitor their child’s cell phone activity.
Task:
Read the following articles that discuss the various implications of parents having access to their child’s phone. Then, using information from the text, write an argumentative paper addressing the prompt below. Please feel free to do additional research on this topic, but if you do, be sure to properly cite your resources.
Prompt:
Considering the fact that there are several potential dangers to children while they’re using their cell phones, do you feel that parents should have access to their child’s cell phone or is that simply an invasion of someone’s privacy?
In your essay, be sure to
- establish a precise and credible position that responds appropriately to the prompt.
- explain your position with claim(s), reasons, and evidence from the texts.
- analyze explicit ideas/information from texts and interpret the authors’ meaning and purpose.
- refer to sources when appropriate.
- discuss and respond to counterclaim(s) or alternate claims and/or evidence.
- represent content from reading materials accurately.
- order ideas and information within and across paragraphs and uses appropriate transitional words/phrases in a way that allows the audience to follow the argument.
- include a rebuttal that supports the position.
- use language and tone appropriate to the audience and purpose.
- demonstrate a command of standard English conventions.
Article #1:
Reasons That Parents Should Monitor Their Children's Cell Phone Use
by Kathryn Hatter, Demand Media
Teens confirm the popularity of cell phones with 78 percent of all teenagers owning a cell phone and 47 percent of this number owning smartphones, according to a 2013 Pew Research Center report. After providing your child with a cell phone, there are important reasons to stay involved with your child’s cell phone use.
Sexting
Children often embrace texting to communicate with friends on a cell phone. A concerning trend among cell phone use, “sexting” involves the transmission of suggestive or even pornographic images via text messages, according to the Dr. Phil website. Instruct your child about the appropriate use of text messages, explaining that sending suggestive images of herself to someone else or communicating with someone in a provocative or sexual manner is off limits. Some sexual predators prey on minors via cell phones to attempt to entice a child into a personal encounter, states Greg Abbott, Attorney General of Texas. Check your child’s cell phone text messages as well as your cell phone bill to ensure that sexting does not occur.
Cyberbullying
A child may encounter abuse from a cyberbully via cell phone contact, according to the ControlMobile.com website. Cyberbullying involves virtual harassment or abuse through social media, text messages or email. Watch your child for indications of anxiety or distress as she uses her cell phone. A child may act secretively about cell phone use, she may become moody, or she may withdraw from friends and family. Talk with your child if you have concerns about cyberbullying.
Internet Safety
If a child has a smartphone, he has extensive access to the Internet through his mobile device. This translates to your child having convenient access to virtually any type of website, including gambling and pornography. Many wireless providers offer parental controls as a part of wireless packages, according to the SafetyWeb website. Contact your provider to inquire about blocking specific types of websites and downloads. Find out if you can place time restrictions on your child’s cell phone to control usage.
Overage Charges
Children can experience difficulty managing cell phone use and avoiding overage charges. Before letting your child loose with a cell phone, institute firm guidelines about texting, minutes and downloading content such as music and apps, suggests the Cricket website. Check with your wireless provider about instituting use restrictions on your child’s cell phone to prevent overage charges from occurring. Check your account online to monitor your child's cell phone use.
Article #2:
Reasons Why Parents Shouldn't Read Their Children's Text Messages
by Cynthia Measom
In a perfect world, before giving your child a cell phone or other device that allows her to send text messages, you would determine that she's ready for the freedom that comes with it. Once you decide she is ready, you would trust her to use the device appropriately, without interference. In reality, some parents believe it's their right to read their child's texts. However, invading your child's privacy without justification might jeopardize your child's development and result in unwanted behaviors.
Undermines Confidence
As your child continues to mature mentally and physically, it's important to loosen some of the boundaries that you've erected in the past. According to Dr. Steve Schlozman, a Harvard Medical School assistant professor of psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital, in an article at FamilyCircle.com, it's vital to your child's self-esteem that you show him that you believe in his ability to make responsible decisions, without having to know every move he makes -- including reading his texts. If you insist on reading his texts when you have no justifiable reason to do so -- such as a troubling change in his behavior, attitude, grades or friends -- it can undermine the confidence he needs to help him take age-appropriate risks, such as participate in a competition, join a club or strive to make new friends.
Provokes Inappropriate Behaviors
A controlling parent can also trigger rebellious behavior from a child. If your child feels that you are too controlling and she has a lack of privacy at home, she might decide to engage in risky behaviors and keep them a secret from you as a way to make herself feel more in control. Risky behaviors could include lying about where she's going, sneaking out, drinking alcohol, smoking, doing drugs or socializing with people who she knows wouldn't meet with your approval.
Sends a Negative Message
Reading a child's text messages sends a clear message that you don't trust your child. It's understandable if you read your child's texts because you have a reason not to trust him. However, if your child follows the rules you have set for him, acts respectfully and maintains his usual academic performance, you can send a negative message if you read his texts, according to child behavioral psychologist James Lehman in an article on the Empowering Parents website. The message: "You haven't given me a reason, but I don't trust you."
Violates Privacy
Just as you value your privacy and expect your child to honor that value, your child needs the same in return from you. Reading a child's text messages demonstrates your lack of respect for your child's privacy. It also can affect the level of respect your child has for you. Again, if your child has done something to make you think she might be taking inappropriate risks, it's understandable that you may decide to read her texts. However, if you have no reason for reading her texts other than a need for control or simple curiosity, you risk losing the respect of your child.
Article #3:
Is it ever OK for parents to cyber-spy on their kids?
In the new Jason Reitman flick “Men, Women & Children,” a prying mom (Jennifer Garner) monitors every email and text message sent by her teenage daughter.
“You’ve read through every solitary interaction I’ve had on every single website, Mom,” says the indignant teen.
To which her mother responds, “Honey, you know I just do this to keep you safe. OK, let me see your phone.”
This might seem like a far-fetched scene, played up for laughs.
But in this particular case, art imitates real life.
Intense parental scrutiny of phones and other technology — which can include anything from knowing the exact location of a child at all times to having records of a child’s emails, texts and social media activity sent straight to a parent’s own phone — is on the rise.
“People say, ‘I don’t want to spy on my kids,’ but all parents want their kids protected online, and as more and more people get it that they have to take precautions, the industry is growing rapidly,” says Josh Gabel, COO of Qustodio.
His company produces an app that parents can install on their kids’ devices to restrict their Internet browsing and to “monitor for signs of cyberbullying and online predators.”
According to Gabel, at least 60 percent of parents believe they should have control over exactly what their kids do on their phones and other technology, which has translated to nearly $1 billion in annual sales for products like his. And the numbers continue to grow.
And while these parents might seem like the ultimate control freaks, recent news suggests they might have good reason.
In Georgia, an appellate court has revived a negligence lawsuit against the parents of a boy who allegedly created a false Facebook profile of a female classmate. The court said a reasonable jury could very well conclude that the parents are liable for having “failed to exercise due care in supervising and controlling” their son’s activity.
Though Qustodio is an app that can be identified by kids once placed on their phone, other technologies, like TeenSafe, are invisible, allowing parents to pry unannounced if they choose.
One Westchester dad installed TeenSafe on his 14-year-old daughter’s phone to track texting and group chats (“areas of potential danger”) once a week. (He declined to give his name because he hasn’t told her he’s monitoring her.)
Though he has yet to find anything worrisome in the texts he scans (“looking at every single letter and every single word might be overstepping,” he explains), he learns enough to have “productive conversations” with his teen, who he feels is particularly socially vulnerable.
Rawdon Messenger, CEO of TeenSafe, a monitoring tool which has had more than 500,000 sign-ups since it launched in 2013 and growth of 10 percent per month, says anecdotal evidence shows more than half of kids know that they’re being watched, and the company encourages parents to come clean about it.
But Messenger adds, “We have no way of enforcing that.”
Tina Sustaeta, a licensed professional counselor with Carousel Pediatrics in Texas, is a big proponent of TeenSafe — both for clients and her own four kids.
“I made the assumption that my kids at private school wouldn’t hear about drugs, but it doesn’t matter the school, the neighborhood, how much money you have. They have access to so much more now, and these tools allow me to know what I need to know at every developmental stage, and to bring it up in a subtle way,” she says.
But not everyone is onboard with this strange new world of constant monitoring.
“You create greater danger than what’s out there online when you try to control every single aspect of a teenager’s life, to track where they are and take their phones and read their texts,” says Yalda Uhls, a developmental psychologist and media researcher for UCLA.
“It doesn’t build an honest, trustful relationship between the parent and child, and like with any extreme parenting, children will rebel like Jennifer Garner’s daughter does in the movie.”
Understandably, she says, “People are terrified, and they don’t know what to do now that technology is so pervasive in their kids’ lives.”
But much of the fear, she says, is overreaction.
“The truth is that very few children actually get attacked by sexual predators, and of the 25 prosecuted cases a year [nationally] of children who met up for sex with someone they met online, they had all exhibited problems in their offline behavior.”
Still, many parents want to stay highly involved in their children’s technology, openly if not on the sly, to help educate kids on how to behave in the online world. And some of them come clean about their monitoring from the beginning.
Kathryn Koegel is well aware of what lurks on social media, especially targeted advertising.
As a result, the digital consultant regularly looks at the emails of her 11-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son, and unapologetically logs on with their passwords to see posts on Instagram and Snapchat.
Though she says she “could definitely see snooping going south,” she believes she “started [early] enough that there is no expectation of privacy.”
Is privacy a thing of the past with this generation?
Recently, Koegel was given greater reason to look more closely at posts when she got a call from a fellow Park Slope parent saying her son was on a date with a girl, and everyone but her knew it from Instagram.
“It wasn’t even really a date, but he had posted online who he was going to the movies with so when he got home, it gave me a great reason to say, ‘Please understand that what you post is public.’ Now that Park Slope is talking about his ‘date,’ he is keenly aware of that.”
Jim Beeghley, Ed.D, instructional technology coordinator for Lancaster Country Day School outside of Harrisburg, Pa., says that openly monitoring the phones of his four kids — a 17-year-old daughter and sons 13, 12 and 9 — is simply a matter of preparing them for the working world.
“All their accounts come in to our phones, and my philosophy is, ‘We pay for the phone, it’s not really yours, and if I want to look at the text messages, I can,’ ” he says.
“It’s not a discipline thing, it’s a responsibility thing. If you get into the work world, your boss owns your email.”
But some say the whole “I own the phone, I make the rules” logic is a weak excuse.
“If you have to spy on your kids, something’s wrong,” says Michael Brody, a child psychiatrist and head of the media committee for the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
“What works to get kids on the right track is the bond between the parent and the child, and that’s much stronger than any punishment or anything else. If there is a bond, and the parent expresses disappointment, that’s very important.
“The whole business of overzealously monitoring kids is ridiculous and completely infantilizes your child,” he adds.
As for online dangers, he says there are far fewer predators than the media would make us believe, and what parents need to do is discuss real issues, like, “Don’t get drunk in a fraternity house.”
“Kids have to learn to be their own best parent, and parents have to give up control, otherwise kids become helpless,” he says.
Todd Michael Cohan agrees. Cohan — president of the MobileGuard monitoring service for corporate compliance — created ControlMobile for parents after a friend’s autistic daughter started communicating online with a 25-year-old pedophile.
Still, he says, he’s not the kind of parent to use the technology.
“I would feel terrible using this service on my 9-year-old, who trusts me with her diary. Dealing with sex or drugs, you’re not going to stop them,” he says. “Our job as parents is to raise them to be good adults with good advice that fits the times. ”
Article #4:
Here was some information I found from the San Diego County District Attorney’s website:
Protecting Children Online:
Facts for Parents
The Internet is a wonderful vehicle for learning. Unfortunately, it is also a powerful tool for predators who prey upon innocent children. Did you know?
- Internet crime is the fastest growing crime in the U.S., and children are the fastest growing victim pool
- In the U.S., 95% of schools are now connected to the Internet
- Over 45 million children ages 10 through 17 use the Internet. Among them:
- One in five has been sexually solicited
- One in four has encountered unwanted pornography
- Close to 60% of teens have received an e-mail or instant message from a stranger and half have communicated back
- Over 75% of Internet crimes involving sexual solicitations of children and exposure to unwanted pornography is not reported to police or parents
Most children know more about the Internet than adults do. As a result, many parents do not supervise their children's Internet use. Here are some surprising statistics:
- An estimated 20% of parents do not supervise their children's Internet use at all
- Only 52% of parents moderately supervise their children's Internet use
- Some 71% of parents stop supervising Internet use by their children after the age of 14, yet 72% of all Internet-related missing children cases involve children who are 15 years of age or older
- Close to 62% of teens say their parents know little or nothing about the websites they visit
Dangers to Children Online
There are many dangers that your child can encounter while surfing the Net or hanging out in chat rooms. Some websites are offensive and threatening because of their content. There are no rules that govern the Internet, so anyone can set up a website for any purpose. Consequently, there are sites that:
- Explain how to grow and process narcotics
- Advocate hate or anarchy
- Sell stolen goods
- Show how to make fake ID's or manufacture counterfeit money
- Elicits personal information for illegal purposes
- Offer "get rich quick" schemes that put your family at financial risk
There are also bomb making sites and millions of pornographic sites. Unfortunately, over 100,000 sites are involved in child pornography. Almost any search of the Internet can lead to objectionable content. Even the most innocent, legitimate topics can be related, or linked, to something offensive. Chat rooms and newsgroups are available for every topic you can imagine. Chat rooms are probably the most dangerous areas on the Internet. There are many topics that appear safe for children and teens but, in reality, they are not. "Cyber-molesters" are not a new breed of offender. They simply have a new medium to reach their prey -- the Internet. They pose as other children and gain the confidence of their victims by chatting about the latest fashions, music and celebrities. Chat rooms can lead to private conversations, e-mails, instant messages and photo exchanges. If your children talk in chat rooms, chances are they are talking to strangers.
Warning Signs
What are some indications that your child might be at risk on the Internet? The signs could be as simple as excessive use of the Internet (especially at night) or as frightening as your child actually setting up a meeting with a stranger. Other things you should watch out for include:
- Unsupervised time in chat rooms
- Downloaded photos of strangers
- Downloaded inappropriate pictures
- Phone calls, gifts or letters from strangers
- Using an online account that belongs to someone else
- Changes in behavior and being secretive about online activity
- Quickly turning off the computer or changing the screen monitor when someone else enters the room