"Well, they don't always get everything"
Jul 22 '00
I unfortunately don't have any children yet but after reading my sister-in-law's (dreammom) epinion on this subject, I felt compelled to offer my perspective as a high school teacher.
I teach 150 ninth grade students in a lower-income school in southeast Texas. Three years ago, my school was awarded a large grant where a computer lab and internet service was purchased. Naturally, the librarian installed all the appropriate filters on the new machines in order to try and keep what the school regarded as "smut" out of our library.
During my conference period, I often travel to our library to help students in the library with their searches and check up on the latest lesson plans available on the internet.
One day I went into the library to search the net for some of the previously mentioned educational sites. I certainly was not prepared for what was about to happen. The first time I tried to click on a site, a huge stop sign appeared on screen and a loud announcement rang through the library that I was attempting to open a restricted site. (I was horrified!) After quickly getting off of that particular screen, I decided to do a search and bypass any further embarrassment by randomly trying any sites I had merely heard of. I was totally astonished that a filter would restrict access to a site for educational purposes.
Later on during the year, some colleagues and I were talking about some pornography that was printed and found in the library. Surely if I couldn't access innocent sites, students wouldn't be able to access material that really needed to be filtered out! (But I also realized that students were not adequately monitored while on these computers in the back of the library.)
So I took it upon myself to visit the library again and see just what I could access. After many trials, I found that I was denied access again and again to known pornographic sites. Then, however, I tried take a bit more creative approach to the experiment and looked up sites for off-beat subjects like necrophilia (the act of having intercourse with the dead). I was utterly shocked when the stop sign was absent and images of naked females and various sex acts flooded my screen. I reported my findings to the librarian and the only response I got was "well, they don't always get everything."
So after having this experience, I urge parents with computers and the internet to fully explain the game rules with their children regarding what is okay to access on the computer. I also suggest that parents do go ahead and install any filtering system available. (It may not "get everything" but it will remove access to the most blatant pornographic sites.) For what does manage to slip through the cracks, I believe monitoring is the key. I strongly believe that a child is not likely to risk getting caught trying to access questionable sites if he knows he's being carefully watched. However, if you do suspect that your child does try this anyway, make sure you are much more computer literate than your child. Check previously visited pages and memory files to see just what your child is accessing. In the end, it takes mature responsibility in order to protect our children from the abundance of questionable material on the internet.
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
aimm
|
|
Member: Amy Burke
Location: Groves, TX
Reviews written: 156
Trusted by: 39 members
|
|
|
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.