I have been a Ken Robinson fan every since bumping into this TED Talk on “Do schools kill creativity”.

I have to admit to being increasingly concerned about the education system, both as I watch my children go through the process, but also as an employer. I suspect we’re in a situation where everyone knows the system is broken but there’s too many entrenched views and too little proper communication to help us fix it.

From the article:

• The average age at which a child acquires an online presence courtesy of their parents is at six months, and by the time they are two 81% of children have some kind of ‘digital footprint’.
• A third (33%) of children have had images posted online from birth
• A quarter (23%) of children have even had their pre-birth scans uploaded to the Internet by their parents
• Seven per cent (7%) of babies have even had an email address created for them by their parents
• More than 70% of mothers said they posted baby and toddler images online to share with friends and family

I wonder if our children will thank us or not? Because that stuff isn’t going to go away….

When our children go out into the real world at this age, they never do so alone. We parents accompany them. I go with my son when he needs to go to the store. I take him to his play dates. I take him to his scouting and karate events. Or he goes with my wife or another parent. Pre-teens are almost never left alone without adult supervision, to keep them safe and to ensure nothing bad happens. Kids at this age are not good at seeing consequences to their actions, and they do many ill-considered things.

[snip]

Parents do all these things in the real world, but at the same time many tell their children that they cannot go online. They prohibit all things online because they are scared of the bullying and the predators out there. And they do this even though online predation is a vastly overblown worry and research has shown that bullying is still more an offline problem than an online one.

[snip]

But all of these knee-jerk reactions assume that we are going to hand over the computer and walk away.

Instead, we should start to walk our kids into this online world just as we walk them into the real world. Let them get online but supervise them. Allow them to start exploring and learning how the online world works but stay with them on the journey until they can go alone, the same way we already do this in the real world. (At the same time, we need to recognize how immersive and compelling this online world can be and set sensible limits. Children should still run outside and play with real toys, not spend all of their time online with virtual friends.)

Which I think is a very good view.

Our current approach (with two boys, 9 and 7) is as follows:

• Computers are always in family areas. No computers in bedrooms etc.! This is probably the most important thing as it keeps computer use in the family context.
• Computer use is policed and restricted. They have to ask, time is limited, and they are often restricted to “Only Education City” etc. rather than just paying games all the time. This is somewhat similar to our attitude to TV which is also rationed, with Cartoons more rationed than anything factual etc.
• We haven’t bothered with Parental Controls on their Mac accounts, they are a little bit on the geeky side and we seemed to spend all our time giving them exceptions.
• We have implemented DNS-based Parental Controls using OpenDNS. This is mainly just as a backstop just in case, most of the time we know what they are doing.
• They generally ask if they can Google, Wikipedia YouTube etc, although they can have free access to the Child Friendly Wikipedia clone.
• They have EMail accounts on our Google Apps for Domains setup, and whilst we don’t restrict their email they only really use it with our help.
• Talking about what they see and do is important. They are never told off, more guided and explained – we want to know what they are exposed to.
• They have iPod Touches, but they don’t know the passwords for their iTunes accounts. This is partly so we can police what they download, and partly so we can deduct it from their pocket money
• The other machines in the house (Desktops and portable devices) all have passwords on. Guessing and shoulder-surfing passwords is not allowed!

This is working OK so far, although I am sure we will encounter challenges as they get older and test the boundaries. I also suspect at some point they will apply considerable effort to overcoming our restrictions, and can only hope my technical skills rise to the challenge when the time comes!

One question I do wonder about… at what age do they have an expectation of privacy? I guess this is also found in their physical world too. At the moment I can see use requiring that we know all their passwords until they are 16 or 18, although I don’t know at what age we should stop reading their email.

Then there’s the Facebook question, some of their friends have Facebook accounts already which feels quite wrong really. Whatever the social media network of choice I can see us expecting to be their “Friend” on Facebook etc. just to keep an eye on what is going on, but at what age should we give this up? There’s probably a gap from about 18 to 30 where they would prefer Mum & Dad not to know what goes on in their social circle! And at what age do we need to stop them being our Facebook friend so they don’t see what we get up to?!

Outlook have just updated their web site which features a segment from me on Outlook in the workplace. Normally I hate videos of me and I don’t really like this one but I’m really happy to be able to do my bit to promote Outlook. Most organisations are quite dysfunctional internally and if the majority of people have attended Outlook things get a lot lot simpler. It was quite fun being interviewed on camera too, I’ve done big presentations but was very nervous about the whole camera thing but really enjoyed it in the end.

This is probably the moment to embarrass my friend and colleague Jodie who is the blonde lady who starts this video off and appears in other videos on the site. She’s just completed Summit and I’ve never seen her happier.

Outlook is one of those experiences which can only enrich you – a great experience, stupidly cheap, and full of great people. Highly recommended to everyone.

Josh: “Daddy, what was your first computer”

Me: “Well, my cousin had a Vic 20, and my Dad had an Osborne 1. My first computer was an SE/30. I’ve got the SE/30 and Osborne 1 in the loft, shall we get them down and take a look at them when Mummy is away?” (Mummy’s going on a business trip for a week, so I’m looking for exciting Daddy things)

Josh: (now excited) “Yeeesss. What can they do? Can they play Miniclip games? Can they surf the Internet?”

Me: “This was before The Internet. You could do word processing, or spreadsheets, or draw things”.

Josh: “What’s the point in a computer that’s not connected to The Internet?”.

Um, yup.

Out of the mouths of babes etc… The Internet has indeed had a massive impact in the utility of an individual computer, to the extent that it’s almost useless if it isn’t connected.

One day I’ll sit him in front of a green screen terminal, see what he makes of that!

The boys are getting older, and there’s now an element of self-service going on. After a few near misses, parental controls are in order.

Turns out the AppleTV has parental controls, which is great. But… you type in the PIN in a way which means it is displayed on the TV, so if you’re looking at the TV they’re going to see it. And of course, because it’s a secret there’s lots of child effort being put into finding out what it is, and great delight in remembering it.

I’ve probably only got a few months before the whole “Close your eyes, Daddy’s typing in a secret” will continue to work…

Ideally Apple will come up with a better way….? Because the current one sucks.

Alternatively I’ll need to setup a separate “Mum & Dad” iTunes install and stream anything rated stronger than PG off that.

Update: This post is getting a lot of hits so I will briefly update with my solution… I eventually split the not-for-children content out and put it onto a different Mac which we access under “Shared Movies” from the Apple TV – the boys haven’t figured that out yet, and I tend to sleep that machine when I am not at home. My new-model Apple TV comes tomorrow, which I suspect will change things again, we shall see.

This makes me cross.

Let me get this straight:

• My parents paid tax, and part of this is meant to pay for education
• They decide they want the best for their children
• So they pay for a better education for their children (Mum was a teacher herself- this was an informed decision)
• Their children don’t take up the state-provided place (thus presumably saving the state money)

And because of this, I should be discriminated against!

There’s a whole bunch of people popping out of private schools, who’ve had a better education than that can be provided by the State, and we don’t want to utilise all that human capital – all that potential – for the good of the country – just because their parents paid extra for their education????

If that’s the case, we’re all screwed. Because we’ve created a country where the parents who invest in their child’s future causes their child to be punished, and the parent who pisses away their money is given a helping hand.

I’m really sorry – my parents sacrificed a huge amount to make sure their children got a good education. Apparently that’s something to be apologised for, and I shouldn’t do for my children?

Surely the solution is to figure out what makes Private Schools better, and replicate that in the State sector??

Surely there’s a big hint that parents are more willing to invest in their childrens’ future – if they feel they are getting something back??

Why can’t we all do better, rather than dragging everyone down to a level of mediocrity??

We should judge people on their merits, not on where they came from. Discriminating against applicants just on the basis who paid for their education is just as idiotic as judging them by gender or age.

Ludicrous, absolutely ludicrous.

A little known fact is that Herman lives on Gin & Tonic and all good Children will leave a G&T alongside the Sherry & Mince Pie (for Father Christmas) and Carrot (for Rudolph).

There is currently a lively debate ongoing chez Coles about the existence of Herman and how it all works out. However we believe we have spied him on some of the NORAD Santa Tracking videos.

Happy Christmas everyone….

Then I bumped into Wikipedia for Schools and the problem is solved!

This 2008/9 Wikipedia DVD Selection is a free, hand-checked, non-commercial selection from Wikipedia, targeted around the UK National Curriculum and useful for much of the English speaking world

Excellent stuff – the power of open content…

In last week’s Economist Magazine they had an article on how inheritance laws differ across the EU.

In 26 out of 27 European Union countries, Mr Buffett’s plans would not just be shocking, but illegal. The exception is Britain, or rather England and Wales (Scotland has its own, centuries-old legal system, with a strong continental flavour). In continental Europe a big part of an estate (often around half) is reserved for the surviving children of the deceased and must be equally divided between them. This “forced heirship” makes it impossible to disinherit feckless children (though several countries exclude bequests to “unworthy” children, who have for example murdered a parent or two). Such rules also make it hard to reward the deserving by, say, leaving more to a daughter who gave up a career to care for her ailing parents. Finally, “clawback” laws in many countries stop parents from dodging forced heirship by giving assets away while they are still alive. This applies to gifts made in the last years of life (two years in Austria, ten in Germany), or much longer: in some countries, no time limit applies.

Wow – I had always taken it for granted that you could leave your assets to whomever you pleased. But apparently not… and I’m not sure that’s a good thing. Read the article for all the details, but I can see it would cause us real problems.

It is quite a shock how something Id’ viewed as almost a human right turns out to be viewed with abhorrence in a next door country which I had viewed as being broadly similar to the UK. It’s a reminder that some things are very cultural dependant and you can’t make assumptions… especially about things you assume are common!

For myself, and my social “network” the sharing is mainly amongst our peers. My children are still learning to read, although as they do they notice what Mummy and Daddy are doing on computers, and get interested in what we’re writing. At the moment that’s a something we can easily control, just by switching windows or shooing them away. Josh (8 years old) thinks that Twitter is silly because you can only use 140 characters, but he does have his own blog although he doesn’t know he can subscribe to Daddy’s.

What happens when they get their own Twitter and Facebook accounts? And we can see them, and they can see us?

Currently, I write without concern for what my children might think. But in a few months I will probably have to explain every Tweet I make, every blog post, to my eldest Son. That will probably change what I write, but it will also mean he gets exposed to a version of “Daddy” which I’m not sure we’ve ever had to deal with before.

I introduced a friend of mine, who has teenage and adult daughters, to Facebook. Their Facebook world was very peer-centered, and I am sure it was a little shocking for Mom to have free access to that. Their one message to me (I’m “Mom’s friend” – a very “I don’t know what to do with this” bucket) was “Thanks, now you’ve somewhat ruined Facebook”. Which is fair.

What happens when our children see everything we write to our peers? If we do the Social Transparency thing right, I’m sure there’s some interesting ground there.

What happens when my kids get their own accounts, talking to their peers? And we see it all?

What happens when my colleagues kids start following me on Twitter, or subscribing to my blogs? Do I need to take account of that? Do I lose something when I do so?

Historically the relationship between Parent and Child has been pretty compartmentalised. That’s going to take a hit if the kids on the same social networks as the parents. Similarly, the Work Vs Home compartments disappear if your partner, children etc. are on each other’s Twitter or Facebook list – and those of your colleagues. (and even worse, if they choose not to be!).

I’ve always thought that the Work Vs Home distinction is somewhat artificial, something that’s only arisen in the industrial revolution. Perhaps the social networking revolution is taking us back to where we belong, but it will be a shock for us all. I’d like to think the end result is richer, more understanding relationships – but there will be uncomfortable moments. Perhaps we’ll emerge with a greater understanding of each other and our various roles in life, which can’t be bad.

Here’s the talk’s page on the TED site with some interesting comments.