What you need to know about text message monitoring and digital parenting this holiday season.

Parents often want two things: to be the "cool" parent, and to be the parent that can trust their children no matter what. Unfortunately, in the age of texting and social media, trust is usually a luxury parents cannot afford. In fact, for young children especially, it's a parent's responsibility to monitor their children's online habits to make sure they are using the power of modern day technology safely. 

Here is a festive guest post from our friend Raven over at Ms. MommyHH6 for our Military Appreciation Month. Read on for fun ideas for children and then go visit her blog!

Magical Ideas to Make this Christmas Special (at the last minute)

It’s Christmas time!!!   My entire family is “tech” lovers and there are so many great ideas for gifts this year.  There are also some great ideas to keep the magic of Santa alive for younger children!

Not only does your child have an incredibly active social life, but now a huge part of their social life happens online, away from the prying eyes of parents.  It's probably unknown to you how many hours your child spends hiding under her covers after the lights are supposed to be out, texting away, or browsing through her friends' status updates.  And now, as if Facebook and Twitter didn't give you enough to worry about, there is Instagram and Snapchat; yet one more reason why social network monitoring needs to be a priority for every parent.

The title might turn you off, but don't be offended.  Spying on your kids is not always a negative and can be thought of as something that needs to be done to ensure their health and well-being. Spy the proper way by following the steps outlined below.  

Since cell phones are pretty much in our every day life, of course children will want their own phone to send and receive message to their friends. There is no problem with this if you feel your child is responsible but you’re worried, you can still have the authority to monitor their text messages. Text message monitoring does not make you the bad guy, its actually a helpful cause especially if you think your child is being bullied over texts or sending inappropriate things. Keep these tips in mind if you’re looking to monitor their messages.

Talk With Your Child

Doesn't it seem that new smartphones appear all the time? If the media isn't touting the latest and greatest new phone, your teenager certainly is! While teenagers around the country started to drool over the new features, parents face the same dilemma they have faced since the origianal smart hones started appearing on kids' birthday and holiday gift lists. How do I keep my child safe?

Once upon a time, children would go out and play until dark.  Parents would go to their back porches and call their names and a few minutes later, the kids would ride their bikes in the driveway and come inside for the night. Location monitoring was never a concern because the parents all looked out for each other's children.  

We live in an age that is entirely different from the era most of us grew up in.  If your child is old enough for a cell phone, chances are you remember things like playing your Atari before dinner and going outside to play only to be called in hours later once the sun was going down.  As technology is advancing, so are the ways for your child to get into trouble.  And while everyone else might be doing it, sexting is something you definitely don't want your child participating in.  

Does your child bring a handheld device to school to access the Internet? Many kids aren't supposed to but do anyway, texting under their desk in Algebra and streaming music (with earbuds, of course) in study hall. But some schools are instructing, encouraging, and even begging their kids to bring out their devices and use them during school hours.

I recently caught up with an old friend, and between her three kids and my four, we certainly had a lot of back-to-school info to share with each other. Her daughter's school has a “bring your own device” policy this year. In short, there may not always be enough school computers for all kids all the time, so students are encouraged to bring their own devices to use at school.

Many potential and current customers ask us what features we monitor for the iPhone. At this time, the iPhone has a technical limitation which makes it impossible for a third-party application to monitor native telecom functionality such as text messaging. As soon as Apple addresses this limitation within their operating system, we will immediately move to monitor iPhone text messaging. 

Back to school shopping sure is different than when I was a kid. The most high-tech item on my list was maybe a graphing calculator.

Now many schools are embracing new technology and running with it. Teachers send out class updates on Twitter and iPads are regularly used in the classroom, even for preschoolers. Maybe tablets and smart phones aren't on the official school list, but they're probably on your child's wish list for back to school.

Maybe you don't know what a “dumb phone” is, but your teens certainly do – and they don't want one.

One of my closest girlfriends hasn't upgraded to a smart phone yet: her trusty old flip phone serves her just fine. She does find herself several times a day, however, constantly apologizing for her lack of connectivity.

If we're in a group and someone says, “quick, grab your phone and take a picture!” or “get on Facebook to show me some pictures of your new niece,” she has to shrug and say, “Sorry, I can't. I have a dumb phone.”

The most common use of a teenager's smart phone, aside from texting, is social networking. Teens with smart phones are extremely likely to use them to go on Facebook, MySpace, or other social networking sites.

Recent statistics tell us that 9 out of 10 American teens who own smart phones use social networking sites. They also show that 9 out of 10 teenage smart phone owners have used their phones to go online in the last month.

Okay, the second statistic isn't too shocking: if you pony up for a shiny new iPhone and a data plan to go with it then it would be dumb not to use it. But here's the interesting part: teenage smart phone owners were less likely than their peers to go online using desktops or laptop computers. They preferred their phones.

There's no end to the functionality of a smart phone. It's easy to dismiss your child's requests (or desperate pleas) for a smart phone without really thinking about it. But here are 4 really worthwhile uses for a smart phone that every parent can appreciate.

1. GPS. Kids get lost, and GPS isn't just for cars. Wherever they are, GPS helps them find their way home. And there are services you can subscribe to that will leverage the GPS

When you think about it, 'smartphone' is a real misnomer. If you watch how your child uses his or her smartphone, you're not likely to see a whole lot of actual calls being made and received. In fact, just 26% of teens say they even use their phones to make calls.

In the last 24 hours, here are some of the things your child may have been doing on his or her smartphone:

• Sending 60-100 texts to their best friend

• Downloading music

• Shopping for apps to download

I'll admit it. Smartphones are pretty addictive. They're fun to use, make it easy to stay in touch with anybody no matter where you are, and can do just about everything. I'm pretty sure you could spend a whole day on the couch without ever getting up except to go to the bathroom and eat – and maybe your teen has.

Have you seen your texting teenager and wondered whether they're really addicted to their smartphone?

Does your teen have a smart phone? You've probably noticed that it makes a teenager's life a lot different than when we were kids.

No more asking to use the house phone at a friend's house to call home –  just text mom to ask her if it's okay to spend the night. No need to plan a night out – just check in on FourSquare and find out where everybody is. And that cute guy in Spanish class? You can get the inside scoop on him on Facebook without even talking to him.

Many tweens and teens love FourSquare, a free application available for GPS-enabled smartphones.

Here are 4 vital things you need to know about FourSquare to keep your kids safe when they're using the location-based social networking app.

1. It's not just a game:

On FourSquare, your child earns points for “checking in” at certain locations and earns badges (checkins at 20 different pizza places, for example.) If she frequently checks in at the same place, she could become “mayor” of that location.

But even though it sort of feels like a game, FourSquare is actually a social network where people can

Most teenagers use social-media sites and parents are wise to it, "friending" their kids and monitoring which sites they visit at an increased rate, according to a study presented at an educators conference today.

Seventy-six percent of teens are on social-media sites, with most -- 93 percent -- of them on Facebook, according to the Pew Internet study that examined the behavior of teens online.

And the usage increases with age -- a sign that parents are sticking tight to a rule that only teens 13-years-old and up can go on social-media sites, something such sites have been dinged for failing to police in the past.

I'm at a little bit of a loss for words when it comes to the teen sexting phenomenon, and the statistics I see don't seem to give me a clear understanding of the issue.

Is sexting a socially accepted activity among kids, or is there a social stigma to it? Do 1 in 5 kids really do it? And is this more of a middle school or a high school issue?

After stumbling across the transcript of a 2009 teen focus group on sexting, I was even more convinced that even among kids there's not really a consensus.