They stare blankly at video games for hours on end, barely moving.
They speak in unintelligible sound bites.
They walk around heads down, clutching small devices in their hands.
They have odd thumb pains.

It’s undeniable—kids (and some parents too) are becoming Internet zombies.

With article after article after article telling us that too much technology usage can be bad for us, it becomes increasingly clear that all technology users—from ages three to 103—need to develop some sort of personal guidelines to regulate their online time.

And, with evidence pointing to the fact that younger brains are potentially more susceptible to the effects of technology, it becomes more important that families with school-aged children develop strategies to slow up—if not prevent—their children from turning into single-minded Internet zombies.

Internet Zombie

Here are Oxford Learning’s Top 5 Tips To Develop Healthy Internet Habits in Your Home, for zombies both young and old.

1. Set Some Zombie Ground Rules. Without rules, zombies are prone to run amok. They need guidelines and structure in order to be the best that they can be. This, of course, is true for children. It’s true for everybody. So, when it comes to screen time—be it TV, computer, phone, etc.—setting limits on usage can help kids avoid the problems associated with media usage, such focus issues, dropping grades, and stress.

2. Institute a Zombie-Generated Blackout. What does your family do when the power goes out and wifi is down? The answer is simple: find other things to do. So why not institute a regular family-wide Internet blackout and find activities to do as a family? You can even make it a true blackout and shut the lights off. Play board games by candlelight, or walk the dog together. Make this an activity that your family does that everyone looks forward too. (Plus, with the lights out, you’ll save a little bit of coin on the hydro bill, which never hurts.)

3. Zombie See, Zombie Do. Practice what you preach. If your family decides to have an Internet blackout, Dad shouldn’t be surreptitiously checking his blackberry for the latest World Cup standings. It’s all or nothing. If kids are heavy media users, it’s likely that their role models are heavy media users as well. If it’s good for some to regulate their online time, it’s good for all.

4. Mmmmm…Brains. Don’t just let kids zone out when online—encourage them to think actively about how and why they are using media. Is the laptop used for research for school? Are cell phones mainly to connect with peers? Are video games and iPods for entertainment? Parents can and should set the example by explaining how they use media and what the purpose is. If kids are online for a large portion of the day, it makes sense for them to think actively about what they are doing and why. There is no such thing as being too young to develop media awareness.

5. Zombie Hobbies. Even zombies need outside activities. Whether it is soccer, baking, cycling, dance class, theatre, reading, gardening, skateboarding… it’s important to make hobbies and “unplugged” activities part of the entire family’s daily routine. Again, it’s necessary to lead by example: when parents take part in hobbies, it becomes a reasonable expectation that kids step away from the screen to engage their other interests. It’s all about balance.

The answer is that kids between the ages of 8 and 18 are using media approximately 7 and half hours a day, which is up since the last time this study was done five years ago.

At that time, researchers thought that teens’ media usage was at an all-time high at 5 hours a day. But, today’s technology is increasingly mobile. It can, and does, go anywhere that kids go. The breakfast table. The car. The park. Kids don’t have to plant their butts in front of the TV or the desktop computer to be plugged in.

The mobility of media means that kids are constantly connected, which is how they are spending almost 1/2 of their waking day online. And they’re not just plugged in—they’re using multiple media simultaneously.

Kids today are the ultimate multi-taskers: walking and texting. Listening and surfing. Gaming and chatting. Watching and texting.

For tween and teens, technology is ubiquitous.

It’s au courant.

It’s also problematic.

It can lead to obesity. It can cause social disconnection, focus issues, and dangerous online habits. And, most importantly, it can cause communication problems in the classroom.

Whether you are a supporter of teens’ usage of technology, or worried about potential impact it might have on users, one thing is sure: the techno-savvy teen generation is raising a lot of very important questions about how media usage is changing the way that we think and learn, both in and out of the classroom.

Staying au courant with the ongoing in your teen’s life can be challenging, especially since teens can be notoriously difficult to talk to. Short, one-word responses such as “nothing” is the norm to questions like “How was your day?” and “what’s new?”

A recent article in the local paper told of how one parent discovered a way to open the lines of communication with her teen. She signed up for the popular social networking site Facebook as a way of staying in the loop with her children’s lives.

Facebook began in 2004 at Harvard University as a tool for creating student profiles and performing classmate searches. By 2005, it became accessible to most colleges, universities, and even high schools in the US. It opened up to the general public late 2006. Since then, Facebook has been in the media spotlight frequently surrounded by issues of privacy, a hot topic in the age of identity theft.

Privacy issues aside, the mom reports that Facebook has opened the door to communicating with her teenage daughter. The status updates and photos give the mom helpful conversation starters, and now they actually have discussions that go beyond the monosyllabic grunts she used to get to her inquiries into her daughter’s life.

Facebook—more than a social networking site, it just may be the technology that helps parents to bridge the generational and conversational divide. As author Patrick White notes in the article Facebook: watching the watchers, family dynamics may never be the same.

Last week I wrote about the possibility that Instant Messaging might interfere with children’s learning curve during the early educational years… and said that IM possibly could interfere with language development, that it was potentially harmful and it’s usage should be monitored. Let’s face it—the Internet is out there, along with all its accoutrements: chat rooms, IMs, MySpace, etc. And, as long as computers and the Internet are available it will lure children with its’ technology like a sweet siren’s song.

The Internet: kids will use it—and use it they should. But to keep all things safe, little online-education and monitoring is in order — to keep the wee ones away from potential online predators, cyber-bullying and poor language development.

Online safety starts with a few basic tips. Read these, and surf safely!

Oxford Learning’s Top Ten Online Safety Tips

1. Keep your online profile simple, and don’t reveal too much: first name, but last initial, city but not address, grade, but not what school you attend etc.
2. Use a screen name instead of your name when possible — develop a name to use when online, like cat_girl06 or likesfido21.
3. Use a kid-friendly search engine/browser. They have built-in parental control and a design that kids like.
4. Install your internet provider’s parental control features—this can restrict the sites that your child can surf to, and protects from non-g rated pop ups.
5. When using an IM, change the preferences to contacts-only, or invite-only — this way your child will only get messages from people in the contact list, and no outsiders can make contact.
6. If necessary, purchase parental add-ons that can log all of your child’s online activities.
7. Make your default page a kid-friendly one, like Yahooligans.
8. When surfing around for fun, be sure to only follow links from trusted sites.
9. Limit online time. Agree with your child to a set computer schedule.
10. Always act online as though someone might be watching!

Link: BeWebAware.ca – tools to help keep your kids safe online

Link: KidRocket.org – Child friendly web browser (free)

Link: NetNanny.com – commercial product with many safety features

Do you have a suggestion or a review of a filtering product or service? We’d love to hear about it.