Jono, Ben & Megan - The Podcast - Parenting Expert Holly Jean Brooker on Whether Snapchat is Okay For Kids

Episode Date: November 5, 2023

Holly from the parenting place gives us the ins and outs of snapchat and whether it is safe for kids!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Well, kids in social media, when is the right time for them to be allowed on there? And what are some of the dangers? There's a really interesting article being put out by The Parenting Place. You can get their website at parentingplace.nz. And we're joined by Holly-Jean Brooker from The Parenting Place. Good morning. How are you guys? We're doing all right.

How are you? Good. I listened to your podcast today, Benjamin. It was awesome. I did a podcast for The Parenting Place. Yeah. Parents we've met. Yeah. Look, I did a podcast for The Parenting Place. Yeah. Parents We've Met. Yeah, look,

I kind of had, I enjoyed it, but I kind of had, I definitely had moments where I just started talking and I didn't have an answer to a question. And in my head,

I was like, oh, geez, where am I going with this? And sometimes I brought it back and other times I just talked and I could tell everyone like, well, look at me like, oh, where's he going?

There's definitely a couple of those moments. So I don't know if they edited those out. He just loved the sound of his own voice. Yeah, because you're the only one being will look at me like, oh, where's he going? There's definitely a couple of those moments. So I don't know if they edited those out. He just loves the sound of his own voice. Yeah, because when you're the only one being interviewed, you're like, yeah, well, I need to answer this. And then sometimes I would be mid-answer going, I don't know where I'm going. Did you pull it back?

Yeah, sometimes I did. Other times, not so much. But, yeah, other times it was really nice sharing some stuff about parenting and learning a lot from it, actually. What were the takeaways from the podcast for you, Holly, from Being Boys is Parents on the Parenting Place podcast? Oh, gosh, now you're putting me on the spot. You start talking and then try and work out your answer midway through.

I really loved how you talked about getting to know your children for who they are and kind of honouring their interests and their strengths. So, you know, one kid might really enjoy just spending time at home reading a book where the other one might enjoy going on a luge and doing something more adventurous. So kind of finding the things that your kids really enjoy doing. There we go. Okay, and where do you think he lost it on a couple of answers? I'm not going to call him out because the podcast, what's it called?

Parents We've Met. It's so great. I've enjoyed, there's been three episodes that have been published so far and I've really enjoyed all of them. They're all very different, different perspectives of different Kiwis, and yeah, it's really good. Now, Holly, Snapchat. It's something that obviously is featuring in a lot of kids' phones nowadays.

I know just from my experience, my son Oscar, he's on Snapchat all the time, and they've got this thing where they just take pictures of the roof, and I'm like, why are you wasting Snapchat's hard drive with clogging up pictures of ceilings? Or a photo of their face with maybe their tongue out, or a peace sign or something, and they'm like, why are you wasting Snapchat's hard drive with clogging up pictures of ceilings? Or a photo of their face with maybe their tongue out or a peace sign or something. They're like, I can't break my streak. It's a 300-day streak.

We've sent each other pictures. You're like, well, okay. The streak, yeah, the old streak. I actually had someone say, too, that they had, there's some really boring stuff on Snapchat, and then there's some wild stuff. The one kid said to their mum who told me recently, oh Snapchat is so boring. It's just like pictures

of people's walls and food and feet and it's very boring. Another friend said that a 12 year old boy from their school was being harassed with sexual images sent to him repeatedly from a classmate in Auckland. Oh really? Bit of a mixed bag. Okay now that you've wrapped your head around Snapchat and

all I know about it is pictures of people's ceilings uh what what is the conversation that you and feet and what is the conversation you need to have uh with a kid who's getting onto snapchat like actually just having the conversation with our kids about what is online what they're sharing what their friends are sharing what the implications of that could be snapchat is fast moving the the snaps disappear as soon as they're viewed. So it's kind of got this feeling of, oh, it's fun and it's authentic and it's like sharing the moment. Low key and snaps aren't saved, so I'm not going to get into trouble.

But people can screenshot the snaps. But it can also mean that kids are pushing the boundaries on what they share. And we know that young people, young teenagers, teenagers, their prefrontal cortex is not quite developed, just like you guys. Yeah, I'm still waiting for mine. Now, this is your decision making, isn't it? Yeah, it's actually like supporting self-control and it's decision making about risky behavior. So this is where the Snapchat can be problematic

for young people as they can push the limits of what they would actually maybe do in real life. We want them to understand that people can potentially save their snaps and reshare them. That's problematic. We want them to understand that sharing images of themselves like, you know, nudes, that type of thing, that's not a great idea and why. Oh dear God, isn't it? I've made a terrible mistake. You've been involved with that.

Yeah, I've made a terrible mistake. It's been involved with that. Yeah, I've made a terrible mistake. It's funny you mention Holly. No, don't do it. We spoke to Sean Lyons from Netsafe a couple of weeks ago. Oh yeah, he's so great. And he was saying, yes, this is great to have all these conversations about warnings, dangers and what you need to navigate. But also he said on the same hand, make sure they're aware that if anything does happen,

any slip-ups do happen, that you're there to support them. Don't be embarrassed to come forward sort of thing. Well, this is the thing is that sometimes kids can be scared to tell their parents because they're worried they're going to get into trouble and have their phone taken off them. So that's why little conversations along the way can be great so that your kid has the idea of, oh, I can actually talk to my mum or dad or caregiver about this stuff and they're not going to lose their call and take my phone off me. Well, Holly-Jean, thank you so much for your insight on that and a really, really interesting article people can check out at theparentingplace.nz, right? Yeah.