Strategies to
Start Their Day
Off Right
Does your child need to pay more attention
in school? Use the following tips to help
keep your little ones ahead of the class:
More Whole Grain + Fiber =
Less Distraction
To help keep your children focused on
their schoolwork and not their grumbling
bellies, incorporate more whole grain
and fiber into their diets. Both have
been shown to slow down the digestion
process and may contribute to a feeling
of being full.
Start the Day with Breakfast
Kids need an energy boost after a long
night’s sleep. A recent clinical study
showed that a whole grain and fiber-filled
breakfast of Frosted Mini-Wheats® cereal
helps improve children's attentiveness
by nearly 20%.*
Make Sleep a Priority
Lack of sleep may impact a child’s
performance both in school and at home.
To help your kids do their best every day,
be sure they get at least eight hours of
sleep each night.
For more great tips
on setting your kids
up for success at school, watch
Morn’s Mini-Casts on Better.TV.
(look under the Family Matters channel)
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K eeps e/y? -foCUSed.
'
Based upon independent clinical research, kids who ate Keitogg’s"
Frosted Mm-Wheals' cereal lor breakfast l\ad up to 18% teller
attentiveness tlvee hours after breakfast than kids who ate no break
last. For more information, vis»l vr/rw.trostedrrwiwheats.ccm.
<®
. TM. © 2008 Kellogg MA Co.
healthy you
FAMILY MATTERS
HELP PROTECT PRIVACY
“First thing, Emily and I talked about
safety issues with privacy and
identity online,” Sarah says. Privacy
rules protect kids and make them
more aware of the environment in
which they’re interacting.
“This is not like the locked diary
that you keep under your bed,” says
Nancy McBride, safety director for
the National Center for Missing and
Exploited Children. Most online
information is viewable by anyone,
but kids don’t often think about that
before posting a picture or a blog
entry, and parents are often the last
to know what kind of footprints kids
are leaving online.
As a guardian, you have the
responsibility to keep tabs on your
children. So don’t be shy. Try
running Web searches on your kids’
names. If something odd turns up,
talk about it, and remind them: If you
can find this stuff, anybody can.
Kids can protect their identities
with simple precautions—no full
names, no geographic identifiers.
“I’ll use somebody’s initials or make
up names. It’s like a game. The object
is to make sure you don’t give away
your identity,” says Emily.
STAY VIGILANT
There are plenty of young people
online, and there are Web communi-
ties that cater to many interests.
Such affiliations may grow into real-
world friendships. But a friendship,
even a long-distance one, is nothing
to enter into lightly. Talk to your kids
and decide when—or if—it’s ever OK
to share even your real name with an
online friend. No matter what,
encourage kids to take it slow when
meeting new friends on the Web. It’s
the best way to establish trust
between online acquaintances, and
between parents and kids.
“We’ve talked about how you can
never assume that people you meet
226
JUNE
2008
BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS
on the Internet really are who they
say they are, and about how impor-
tant it is to never reveal personal
information without talking to your
parents first,” says Darrin
Blankenship, Caleigh’s father.
And there are reasons to be
cautious. Caleigh had a ‘friend’ she
met through a community who asked
her for a T-shirt with some of her art
on it, recalls Darrin. “Then he told
her to address the package to him as
‘Dr. So-and-So.’ Except he had
previously told her he was 17,” he
says. It was a scare, but it gave Darrin
a chance to reinforce his rules about
revealing information. i®
BLOG TROTTING
New to blogging? Visit these Web
sites to get your bearings:
LIVEJO U R N AL (i
livejournal.com
) is
known for its communities—shared
blogs where users can discuss their
common interests. Adjustable
privacy settings allow you to control
who reads your blog.
BLOGGER
(
blogger.com
) allows for
the creation of group blogs, and has
some privacy features. Content is
regulated by privacy filters rather
than by age limits—explicit material
is viewable by invitation only.
FACEBO O K
(
facebook.com
) is built
around member profiles, letting
users connect accordingto common
interests. Users can upload photos
and messages to other members.
Privacy controls let you decide what
you share, and with whom.
M Y SPA C E
(
myspace.com
) is all
about making new acquaintances;
users set up a profile, and their
circle of contacts ripples outward as
they share pictures and journals.
VO X
(vox.com) is an entry-level
blogging tool with advanced privacy
controls that let you share thoughts
and pictures safely.
