https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/please-stop-pressuring-kids-to-join-social-media-11636203601
What you can do
So how can parents handle the pressure their kids face to join group chats and social media?
Develop a social-media agreement. Laura Tierney, founder of the Social Institute, a company that partners with schools to teach students how to navigate social media and technology, said it’s best to start discussing responsible social-media use with kids early. “Because social media is not going away, you can’t restrict it and then throw them in at age 13,” she said.
Ms. Tierney suggests families develop a social-media agreement to lay out rules such as whether a child’s account is set to public or private, who gets to approve friend requests and how often parents can monitor the account. The Social Institute offers a template on its website.
Create a shared account. Instead of letting kids loose with their own account, you can create one that you control and let them use it only for the purpose of communicating with the school club. You can set up two-factor authentication so that a code gets sent to your email address or cellphone every time your child wants to log in. My editor did this when family friends wanted their preteen sons to communicate over Discord. Just make sure your child logs off when the activity or communication is done.
Take advantage of app settings. If you feel your child is ready to use social media, you can still enact app settings to help protect them. Some teens find they enjoy Instagram more when they turn off the comments and likes. My colleague Joanna Stern provided tips on changing the default settings in apps to create a better experience, such as disabling autoplay on YouTube
Suggest alternatives. There’s no reason for students to be limited to communicating on Big Tech’s biggest platforms. There are plenty of apps designed for students to receive reminders, schedule practices, share videos and photos and communicate in small, private groups. Alternatives used by many teachers and sports teams include Remind, GroupMe, Flipgrid, Band and PhotoCircle.
