Net Family News: Online-Safe Resources for Kids and Families

Online-Safe Resources for Home & School

Please note: The reports in this section are not product reviews or tests; they're meant to spotlight options for you to consider, as well as milestones in children's online-safety technology development. Comments from readers on their own experiences with these products and services are most welcome - and, with your permission, we publish them. Do email us your own product reviews anytime!

Lessons learned: A video/wakeup call for parents, and 1 for kids (Oct. 28, '99 issue)

One thing we've learned from your survey responses is that we have many teachers, technology coordinators, librarians, and other subscribers with professional as well as parental interest in Web news and online safety. We've just seen two new educational videos - one for parents, one for teens - and we think many of you would find them useful in your work with young cyber-explorers.
We're singling out educators only because the videos are expensive ($145 each) - they were developed for the education and social-services markets. But there probably isn't a parent out there who wouldn't be moved by this material. Entitled "Cyber-Seduction: Danger on the Web" and "Cyber-Seduction: What Parents Need to Know," both videos feature Caroline and Brian, two young teens who met adults online and were lured into out-of-state meetings. They tell their own stories on camera (Brian himself, now mature well beyond his years, gives the rules about giving out personal information online). The stories are interwoven with comments and context from their mothers, FBI special agent Randy Aden in Los Angeles; Shirley Goins, executive director of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC); and psychologist Samuel Kimbles.
Both the children and their mothers were courageous to "go public" with their stories. Filmmaker Gary Mitchell told us in an interview this week that Caroline and Brian were willing to go on camera because they wanted to help keep others from experiencing what they went through. These children's cases are not typical. It's important to view the videos in this context. Gary told us in an interview, "My whole career I've tried to avoid making scare films. We weren't trying to do that at all, but the stories were inherently scary." They're scary but not sensationalized in any way.
Gary told us he's been doing abuse-prevention documentaries since 1975, starting with "Child Abuse: Cradle of Violence." In the early '80s he began using animation and puppets to "talk" directly to children, teaching good values as well as how they need to protect themselves against threats to their well-being.
We asked Gary why he picked this particular subject. "We've been aware of developments in the child-abuse arena and people working in it for so long, and it just hit me one day that we're remiss if we don't get out there with a prevention picture on this right away." Did he intend to do separate videos for parents and teens from the start? No, he said, "As I was doing the kids' one it became apparent that a lot of the material [from interviews with the adults in the film] wasn't that appropriate for a kids' film, but it was perfect for what parents should be hearing."
Some examples:

FBI agent Aden says, parents would never let their child confide in a stranger on the phone, but some are comfortable with letting a child do so on a computer in his bedroom."
Caroline's mother says: "I didn't realize how intimate they get in chat rooms."
The NCMEC says: When children don't tell their parents what they're doing online they almost always tell friends. So parents need to know who their children's friends are!
Psychologist Kimbles says: "It's important to make a distinction between weak and strong ties." Strong ties, he says, are with those who have an actual physical presence in our lives; weak ties are like those that can develop in online chat - even after months of chatting.
The videos come with a discussion guide, including take-away lessons. They can be ordered at the film company's Web site, EmpowerKids.com. If any of you do view these videos or would like to recommend other resources your school or family has found useful, do email us!