Ensuring Safe App Choices for Kids: A Parent's Guide to Navigating the Digital Playground
Over the years of advancement, we have overlooked the advantages and disadvantages of technology. We have been amazed by the innovations of this quickly developing digital world. Our lives switched focus to the benefits that technology has brought us, like being on our mobile devices almost 99% of the time since it brings us convenience and gets everything done fast and easily. Various apps have sprung up as they seem to try to catch up with how fast technology grows and although most app developers create apps that are useful, there are those apps that are unsafe for children. The availability of the apps also poses a great challenge for parents in making sure that the apps being downloaded on their children's devices are safe because most apps are free and are accessible even for kids to download. With so many apps to choose from it’s confusing for parents to find the best safe app for their kids. This article should help parents understand the importance of safe apps and the benefits they bring to their children and some helpful tips and tricks on how to check if an app is a safe app that your children can use for both leisure and learning purposes.
Read the app's description to make sure it’s a safe app.
Reading the app description is helpful in determining if it is a safe app for children. All apps include vital information from developers, and that helps parents determine whether it is suitable to be used by their children. App descriptions can be found when you download something from the Play Store or from the App Store, and after reading the description you can then make your own judgment if the app is a safe app for your children.
Ratings and Feedback can help you determine if it’s a safe app.
Both Play Store and App Store apps are being rated with 5 stars being the highest and 1 as the lowest. Safe apps commonly get a score that's close to 5 stars but that's not the only indicator for it to be considered a safe app. Always check the feedback coming from users who have tried using the app. The information they present helps in confirming if it is a safe app and is recommended for kids.
Trusted download sources are recommended for downloading safe apps.
Besides Android’s Play Store and Apple’s App Store, the internet is a vast source of information which you can download apps from, the only drawback is that there’s no guarantee that the app you are downloading is a safe app. Downloading apps from untrusted sources may lead to viruses that can affect your child’s mobile device’s performance which can be costly for repairs. Trusted sources like the Play Store or the App Store are highly recommended because they provide extensive information about the app and most apps found there are safe apps parents can download for their children.
You know it’s a safe app when it has an awesome Parental Control feature.
A convenient way to check if an app is a safe app is that it offers built-in parental controls. These controls can help you customize settings, limit screen time, and restrict access to certain features. Safe apps generally have parental controls while low-rating apps lack parental controls which may be inappropriate for their users.
Do a test run to see if it is indeed a safe app.
After successfully choosing and downloading a safe app on your children's device, try to explore it yourself first before handing it over to them. Making a test run allows you to check if the app descriptions are accurate if the parental controls are working, and if the app itself is appropriate for its intended users. Test runs can help justify your decision that the app is a safe app and something that your kids will not only learn from but enjoy as well.
Monitor the usage to make sure it is still a safe app.
The responsibility to check for the app does not end after we have downloaded it. As parents, we need to regularly check the app and monitor how our children are utilizing it. Sometimes, we forget to continue monitoring the apps that we have downloaded which might result in some issues with its safety.
Read and install necessary updates to keep it a safe app.
Mobile apps need to be updated regularly to make sure that they cater to the user's needs. Keep this in mind and always make sure that the updates that the app is doing are something that would make it more useful to enhance its performance. Generally, app updates are minimal but there are some updates that make the app a bit more advanced than it was before.
We parents wish we could be on top of this every time our kids use their mobile devices. In reality, every now and then, an unsafe app or two would be installed without us knowing about it. We can only hope that technology, as we know it today, is going to be more sensitive to the needs of its users and produce more safe apps for us and our kids to enjoy.