Did You Miss Us? We’ve Been Licking Lemon Ant Butts! Cast of Dads Podcast #57
Yep, we’re baaaack! Have you ever tried to organize the lives of 5 busy dads who are dispersed across the country and time zones? The image of herding cats comes to mind. The desire to record our Cast of Dads podcast is there, the free time, however, is not. Yeah, excuses, excuses. We did manage […]
Remember the Evil. Embrace the Good. Talk with your Kids.
Take a bucket full of water. Pour some oil into it, not too much, but enough so that is forms a small blob floating on the surface. Now find a large rock and drop it into the water and oil. What happens? Obviously there is a splash. And if you look down in the bucket, […]
Social Media Policy for Families
Quite a few years ago, I came up with some Social Media Guidelines, primarily geared towards businesses. I realized I also seem to write a lot of tips and recommendations for parents on how they can help their kids with social media. That got me thinking. Perhaps, I should come up with a social media […]
5 Reasons Why Social Media Might Actually Be Good for your Child
WARNING: The repeated use of Social Media can be dangerous to your child’s well-being. Should we have a Surgeon General’s warning label slapped onto each and every social media site out there? What about some sort of age rating system like we have for movies, music and video games? No, of course not. The Internet […]
Klutz Teaches Kids About Basic Electronics While Setting Up Booby Traps Around the House
As part of my ongoing effort to remain as much like a child as possible, I was intrigued to set up some “Gotcha Gadgets” that would allow me to play 20 tricks on my kids. I wanted to set up trip alarms and motion sensors that would fart when someone opened a door, or set […]
Get Your Game On with the PlayMG, an Android-based Gaming Device (#Giveaway Too!)
I would be surprised to find a kid that doesn’t play games on some sort of an hand-held device. They are either borrowing their parents smartphones or tablets and playing game apps there, have their own smartphone or hand-held gaming device devoted purely to gaming, or using some sort of other gaming outlet like a […]
Huffington Post Launches “Screen Sense” – A Site for Parenting & Tech
Yesterday, the Huffington Post launched a new property called “Screen Sense” which is a new resource designed to help parents understand and learn how to work with technology in their lives as well as their children’s. As part of the launch event, I was invited to participate in discussing this exact topic on Huffington Post […]
Why It’s Important to Teach your Kids How to Cook and Use Social Media
A recent post of mine which focused on an informal and potentially dangerous marriage between Instagram and Kik Messenger seems to have gotten quite a bit of attention lately. I’m always excited when I can share my ideas, opinions, insights and personal recommendations when it comes to educating kids about the evolution of social media […]
7 Unique Ways my Kids Use the iPhone
The Apple iPhone is a necessity in our household, at least my kids tell me it is. It seems that the iPhone is practically grafted to the hands of my children as they walk around the house. I almost think that they are going to grow another appendage for them to simply carry it and […]
How to Use Olympic Gymnastics Scoring to Get Your Kids to do their Chores
There is a lot of excitement in my house with the coming 2012 Olympics in London, mainly because my 10-year-old daughter is a competitive gymnast. We watched the women’s gymnastics trials a few weeks ago, and my daughter has some clear favorites and has been critiquing how each of the gymnasts are doing. But as […]
Parents Beware: Instagram & Kik Messenger Are A Dangerous Combination & What Social Dangers to Check For
Over the past few years, I have written about security and safety for the family, especially when it comes to protecting your kids from online predators and social bullies. My wife and I really try to practice what we preach. But as social networks and sharing services evolve, sometimes it is hard to keep up […]
5 Tips on How To Make your Child Safer When Gaming Online
Just the other day, I was talking to someone about how playtime has changed since when we were children. The line that my parents used to say all of the time was “go out and play” and off we would go, getting into trouble outside, coming back with scrapes, bloody knees and bruises, covered in […]