Umer Zahid
There is nothing as beautiful, as endearing and as engaging as being a parent. It is a blessing indeed, but also a bit of a challenge. As parents, we tend to be more protective of our children than any other thing. We want to know where they are, who they are with, and what they are doing at all times. Because of that, unknowingly, many parents end up creating a strict environment to keep their children safe, where there’s no liberty to speak of, which can be damaging for a child.
However, it is important to realize that there are certain ages where the children need thorough observation and there are other ages where they need some liberty. To address this matter, this article will tell you all about how to keep an eye on your child at all times. Read!
How to Keep an Eye on Your Child At All Times
Keeping an eye on your children all the time isn’t seemingly a bad thing, but it can lead to a lot of tensions between parents and children.
By keeping an eye, you might mean to protect your child and understand their behaviours, but over doing it, can lead to loss of trust and understanding between you and your children. Teenage is such an age for a child when they want to explore themselves and the world around them. They want to explore and learn. What they really need is your acceptance of them, your respect and understanding.
Build a Strong Bond with your Child
Build a foundation of trust with them. Give them a sense of understanding and also show them the right path, but let them deal with their own thinking alone. You have to prepare them for the world outside. Listen to their thinking, communicate with them, and talk to them about their likes and dislikes.
By giving your children some privacy, you are not only showing them respect, but also an understanding of how adults should deal with children. It creates a bond of trust between parents and children.
Guide Them about Importance of Good Company
Although children deserve some privacy, they also need some degree of check and balance. You have to be aware of your children activities and their surroundings through every stage of growth. If your child is going out, then ask him/her about where they are going and with whom they will be going.
By knowing about it, you can check up on your child to see that he/she are there where they said to be. So, knowing about your child whereabouts can help in monitoring your child. Also, ask for the phone number and address of their friend so you can drop by to check on them.
Although parents ought to be cautious about the influence of friends on their child but, you cannot handpick friends for your children. Therefore, it is important for parents to be aware about their children company and make them understand the harmful consequences of having a bad company.
Monitor your Child Online Activity
Social media is not a bad thing. In today’s world, social media has become irreplaceable survival ingredient for people around the world. It connects young people with range of ideas and world of possibilities and allows them to conduct research, reach out to experts and express their ideas to the world.
However, it has some bad elements. And it’s common for parents to be anxious and concerned about the things their child may see online. From cyberbullying to online predators, there are countless potential dangers that exists online.
The best way to monitor your child’s online activity is to be on the same app with them. This will give you an idea about the app that they are using and what type of content your child gets exposed to. So do some research about the app and find out its privacy policy, risk and reviews.
You can follow them on the social media platforms as well to monitor their activity. If you find the inappropriate content on any app, then you can use the parental control option to manage their online activity. However, this depends on your child age because teenagers will easily unblock this parental control option.
Also Read: How to keep your children safe from online bullies
Conclusion
All parents believe that their children are their responsibility. But as the children grow older, they need more freedom to learn about their surroundings by themselves. Children, especially teenagers, often seem rebellious. This is not because of their nature, but because of the environment they’ve grown up in and the company they’ve had, and what they’ve learned from the adults around them.
As a child grows older, he/she needs more time to adjust and to know themselves. They need their parents’ support and understanding.
There is this great saying by Catherine M. Wallace that goes:
“Listen to anything your children want to tell you. If you don’t listen to the small stuff now, they won’t tell you the big stuff later.”
There you have it! This is all about how to keep an eye on your child all the time. If you like this article, then pass it along to your friends.
