Tech :: The National PTA and LifeLock #ShareAwesome Campaign

Image courtesy of Flickr

Sometimes I think about how much the world has changed in just the past five years.  My daughter was about two years old when the first iPhone came out and boy did that open up our world!  I mean we now had at our fingertips a computer that allowed us to check our emails, Twitter and Facebook pages at any time of the day and Google just about anything we might want to know, Yelp where to eat, etc., etc.! Whereas before I had to wait to come home and check my laptop.  I do sometimes think that life has sped up a bit because of this ability to always be “on.”  Long gone are the days where we can say our beeper didn’t go off (am I dating myself here?) or we couldn’t respond to an email because we had to wait to get home to check our computers.

Today we use digital technology in every aspect of our lives – anything from our children learning their abc’s to keeping up with our online social networks to gaming and shopping.  Yesterday I was having lunch at my favorite Vietnamese restaurant and saw a toddler girl running around the restaurant with a device in her hand – granted she did throw it down a couple of times for the fun of it – but she was engaged with some cute app geared towards little ones.  Wow – image how much information our kids are exposed to with all this technology.  Which can be a great learning tool but there are steps we can take to make sure they are utilizing this technology safely.

Recently, the National PTA and LifeLock have partnered together to share awesome ways families can create an open and evolving conversation about positive, safe decisions when using digital tools.  These amazing resources we have at our fingertips has made the world smaller in a way – we have access to superstars, athletes, politicians and organizations via Twitter and Facebook among other social networks, but also opened up the world by allowing us to access sites that might not be appropriate for our kids. I really like that these two organizaitons have collaborated to help parents educate their kids about safely maneuvering around these digital tools.  The #ShareAwesome campaign seeks to build an understanding among parents and students that no matter the device, the app or the networking site – the skills we need to be safe and positive online are similar to what you need offline.

#ShareAwesome Website is a Great Resource:

They have built a central online hub of expert information about digital safety from National PTA partners, as well as provided activation tools for students, parents, PTAs and schools to participate in the #ShareAwesome campaign. The site contains curated user-generated content that supports a sustained, multi-faceted conversation between parents andstudents that allows students to participate in, and steer, the conversation by creating content themselves.  You can read more about the #ShareAwesome campaign here.

Students Can Take Part in #ShareAwesome and WIN:

The #ShareAwesome contest invites social media users to share a smart and safe decision, uplifting accomplishment, or positive action for the good of others using hashtag #ShareAwesome on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Students who enter a photo between September 15 – November 30, 2014 will be eligible to win fantastic prizes, including tablets and a $2,500 scholarship! Visit ShareAwesomeNow.org to learn more.  You can find the National PTA and LifeLock on Twitter

I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls Collective and the content and opinions expressed here are all my own.