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A review by kristianawithak
Growing Up in Public: Coming of Age in a Digital World by Devorah Heitner
4.0
I’m a fan of parenting books, and Growing Up in Public is a thoughtful look at raising kids in a very online world.
Devorah Heitner outlines all the ways parents and schools monitor and report on kids, from tracking locations to posting grades. She also looks at how kids post about themselves online.
There’s a lot to think through in how we encourage our kids to show up in the world. This book offers a lot of helpful insights. It doesn’t provide clear answers, but is an outline to think through what courses you will choose to take as a parent.
The idea of monitoring vs mentoring is introduce in the first chapter. That while parents have the ability to monitor much of their children’s lives and locations, a better route is to mentor them in how to best use devices and tools. At the heart of the book is the push for parents to help teach their kids how best to use their phones, their data, their online presence. And that it’s a parents job to help their kids stand on their own.
There is some attention paid to kids with disabilities and how the scaffolding required for those parents may look different for those families. But apart from some asides, the book does not address racial, economic, or abilities in depth.
How much I choose to monitor and mentor my kids is something I’ll have to consider. And I’m thankful for this book for bringing a lot of these issues to the forefront.
Devorah Heitner outlines all the ways parents and schools monitor and report on kids, from tracking locations to posting grades. She also looks at how kids post about themselves online.
There’s a lot to think through in how we encourage our kids to show up in the world. This book offers a lot of helpful insights. It doesn’t provide clear answers, but is an outline to think through what courses you will choose to take as a parent.
The idea of monitoring vs mentoring is introduce in the first chapter. That while parents have the ability to monitor much of their children’s lives and locations, a better route is to mentor them in how to best use devices and tools. At the heart of the book is the push for parents to help teach their kids how best to use their phones, their data, their online presence. And that it’s a parents job to help their kids stand on their own.
There is some attention paid to kids with disabilities and how the scaffolding required for those parents may look different for those families. But apart from some asides, the book does not address racial, economic, or abilities in depth.
How much I choose to monitor and mentor my kids is something I’ll have to consider. And I’m thankful for this book for bringing a lot of these issues to the forefront.