As I dropped my youngest off at daycare this morning, the teachers’ in the 18 month old ro… more
Posts Tagged ‘bubba’
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Childproofing Your Phone: ATT Smart Limits for Wireless
By Daddy Clay Friday, July 31st, 2009
The phone in my son’s pocket chirped about every five seconds, and everyone giggled. His friend was pestering him with a comical stream of text messages. It was funny, but also troubling, and it sent me scrambling to find ways to appropriately monitor and limit my son’s cell phone use. What I discovered was ATT’s Smart Limits for Wireless.
Recently my wife got a Blackberry from her place of work. She rarely used her “family phone” even before she got the smartphone, but we decided about a year ago to upgrade to a rugged, shock and water resistant Samsung Rugby because we anticipated our son using the phone situationally. Now, with the arrival of the Blackberry, the Samsung has become Bubba’s phone.
My oldest is eleven, headed off to middle school, so now seems like a reasonable moment for him to have a phone, but having recently been burned by going over my minutes, I wanted restrictions on the phone use. Unlike Apple devices, the Samsung does not have onboard parental controls to limit web access or store purchases. After a few minutes exploring the ATT website I came across the “Smart Limits for Wireless” program.
The program costs $9.99 per month and offers parents the ability to limit the number of text messages, data usage and store purchases, to filter web content and to set time restrictions on outbound calls (with exemptions for approved numbers).
I configured Bubba’s phone as follows:
-200 texts per month (our plan limit)
-Data usage allowed: 0 kb/mo (aka internet off)
-Purchases in ATT store: $0/mo (aka store access denied)
-Outbound calls blocked after 9 on weeknights, 10:30 on weekends (with exemptions for our phones, an essential feature)
-I activated the internet filtering (redundant since he has no data allotment)
Curiously, the program does not allow for limiting inbound calls, so the phone still needs to be out of the child’s room at night. I wonder why this restriction is not available. Clearly they are able to exempt family contacts and 911. Why not apply this to inbound calls?
I look forward to reporting on how well this program helps my son to use his phone responsibly.
Looking to the future, I’m eligible to upgrade my first generation iPhone at the subsidized prices and will probably do so in the next six months. Should I pass along my old iPhone to my son? The expense of the data plan would be partially offset by canceling the Smart Limits program. I feel pretty comfortable with the built in parental controls on those devices, but an iPhone is a pretty powerful device to hand over to a pre-teen.
I guess we’ll keep an eye on how well he manages the Samsung over the next few months.
[update: Bubba called me this morning before dawn wondering why he couldn't use his phone to call his grandmother (he's on vacation -- I'm not). Guess I'll be setting those morning hours a little earlier. But it works as advertised.]
Happy Campers and a Lucky Dad
By Daddy Clay Tuesday, June 16th, 2009
My wife and I live and die by summer camps. This realization dawned on me as a prepared to drop our five-year-old off for his first day of daycamp. The building where the camp was to be held was somewhat familiar to Coop — the elementary school that his older siblings attend — but it still had to be pretty imposing to a kid who just turned five.
We stood in line for registration and he suddenly seemed so tiny, dwarfed by his backpack. I’m musing over the fact that he’s really only been outside home to a couple different places — the daycare that we helped to found near our home, and his pre-k for the past year — as we edge toward the enthusiastic lady with the clip board and the big cowboy hat.
It strikes me that I am at a moment of significant risk.
If this little boy (understandably) freaks out at the prospect of being dropped off at a semi-strange place populated by decidedly strange (looking) adults, then I am utterly screwed. Like most two-career families, ours depends completely on all the kids attending summer camp all summer for us to preserve anything remotely resembling a work schedule.
That’s why when little Coop summons his courage and walks off in the company of his new “counselor” that as wave of gratitude washes over me. It’s a little act of bravery that I’m really thankful for. I sort of hope that he is unaware of what is at stake. I hope he goes because he thinks there’s something fun going on at this camp deal. Certainly over the next few days, we are overwhelmed with stories of his various triumphs at camp, at it seems like al is well.
Our older two are also off at camp — sleepover camp, no less. This is a big step for Ri-ri, who is only 7 despite having finished the 2nd grade. Yet again she’ll be the youngest kid in the place. I unloaded her trunk in the mall parking lot where we meet the camp bus, and look over to see her struggling with her laundry bag filled with pillows and blankets. On the bus she looks so tiny sitting by herself in an otherwise empty row, that I try the awkwardest parenting trick in the book: “Anybody else here going to be in the Wren cabin? Because that’s where Ri-ri here is going to be!”
A few girls glance back, but nobody moves. Ri-ri, thankfully, is not mortified, but rather sweet. We say a sort of goodbye, and I get the hell out of the way. It becomes clear that this is a correct course of action within ten seconds. I see through the window that she is chatting with the girl in the row in front of her. Within a minute she’s moved up to sit next to her new friend.
I don’t even get to say goodbye to Bubba. He’s off like a shot. No hugs or kisses. He’s just out.
Now each morning at about eleven, I have a ritual, madly searching the hundred or so photos of campers that the camp posts daily (an amazing feature) for signs of the kids. There’s R-ri eating a ‘Smore, jumping on a trampoline, chatting with an older girl and generally looking happy.
But where’s Bubba? Finally, today, there he is having his daily check-in conversation with his counselor. He’s wearing his cool guy shades and looks happy but WHAT THE HELL IS THAT CRAWLING UP HIS LEG? Is it some huge patch of muddy gunk? Oh for the love of…is that a gigantic scab?!? It covers most of his lower body? What on earth has the child done to himself? Well, at least it looks more or less healed over.
There he is again bouncing on the “blob,” hamming it up with his cabin mates, and generally looking like he was made for the place, or vice versa.
They’re all three pretty happy campers, which makes me one lucky dad.
Parental Controls: iPod Touch
By Daddy Clay Thursday, June 11th, 2009
Recently Daddy Troy has posted a number of Apple product reviews on his show: Garageband, iPhoto, and the iPod touch. The latter inspired this post because, like Daddy Troy, I’ve been seeing more and more kids with these gadgets. On a recent multi-family outing, I saw kids as young as 3 playing simple games for the iPod Touch. In all honesty, the Touch may be the best game system for kids on the market because of the combination of music, video and gaming possibilities. We have both a Nintendo DSi and a 16G iPod Touch in our house, and the kids have used them about equally at this point. (I’ll do a head to head comparison soon.)
I have no problem with younger kids playing iPod Touch games, in moderation. Isn’t the fine motor skill involved better for a three year old than watching Teletubbies? What concerns me more, actually, are parents giving a Touch to an older kid. Bubba’s age — 10 years old and up. I worry that some parents may think of it as an iPod and not realize that the little gizmo is actually a powerful little computer, capable of surfing the web, shopping on the iTunes store, and sending and receiving emails.
Thankfully, Apple has been extremely thoughtful in designing the parental controls for this device.
Tap the Settings icon, then the General tab, then the Restrictions tab to get to the main parental control panel. Once there you’ll be prompted to set a four digit security code. The panel allows you to disable explicit downloads, the Safari browser, YouTube access, iTunes and the App store can be turned off as well. I have all of these in the off position. If the kid wants to shop for music or a new app, I will enable them temporarily and supervise. Turning the app store and iTunes off is a bit redundant, because the account on the Touch is mine and they don’t know that password. Truly tech savvy kids might be able to create their own accounts, but that’s for another post.
As with all iPods, you can also limit the maximum volume. This is REALLY important to do, especially if you are going to let younger kids use in-ear headphones (probably not a good idea to begin with, the speakers are adequate for the simple games).
Again from the home menu, tap the Settings button, then the music tab, then the Volume Limit tab. Again it prompts you to password protect this setting. I adjust the maximum down 25-35%. I’ve never had a kid complain that they can’t hear it.
I did enable email, and set up Bubba’s gmail account on the iPod Touch. I do wish that the iPod touch Mail had the same parental controls that the desktop does. On the computer, I have to approve all the email addresses he is allowed to communicate with. So I have to check the emails on the touch every so often if I want to supervise these communications.
Soon I’m going to do a post of creating iTunes accounts for kids — when and how — because I’m seeing DRM problems on the horizon as my son begins building his own music collection.
Do you have any thoughts on the iPod Touch for kids and the use of the parental controls?
Boy Scares Father Half to Death, Has Birthday
By Daddy Clay Friday, May 22nd, 2009
That’s right, my youngest, my baby, is five years old today. In just a few minutes, I will bail from DadLabs World HQ and head over to the pre-school to enjoy special cupcakes with the man of the hour.
I was almost unavailable for the festivities, because the birthday boy nearly sent me into cardiac arrest this week. On Saturday morning at about 7am, Kim sat bolt upright and charged out of the room. The I heard that special tone that is reserved for when she is genuinely afraid.”
“Coop. Coop.”
She runs into the bedroom.
“Coop is gone. The lights are on in his room. I heard him call Mommy, then I heard a crash and the door slam. Now he’s gone.”
I’m groggy, running through the house, heart pounding, calling his name. Sure enough, his room is empty, he’s nowhere to be found. I check every room. Dread is rising in my chest. I contemplate the possibility of a kidnapping. Impossible.
I throw on shorts and begin circling the house shouting his name. Wider and wider circles, trying not to become panicked. On about the third pass around, I see a boy walking down the road, followed by two grown-ups. But he’s too big. My youngest couldn’t be that big.
It’s Coop, of course, crying. He has walked a block, up to the dining hall (we live on an a boarding school campus) where he was discovered by a staffer. She was returning him. I asked him why he left the house.
“It was so quiet.”
Which made no sense for a while. Then I figured it out. On the weekends, when Coop wakes up, he heads into the TV room, where his older brother (our early riser) is watching cartoons. But Bubba was on an overnight. So when Coop came out, all was quiet. He became convinced he’d been left behind (always a worry for third children), and that we’d already headed up for breakfast.
His mom picked him up (I was worried she would throw out her back), and asked him why he hadn’t come in the bedroom to find us. No answer. But that was okay.
So, Happy Birthday, Coop. And please never do that again.
Has your kid ever given you a scare like that?
