Strollerderby : kids on the internet

Five Kid Things You Should Have Seen on the Internet

Jen Chaney — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 14:32:00 GMT

When the Internet isn't providing access to crucial information (Jennifer Love Hewitt is dating Jamie Kennedy? Do tell!) or dishing out hours of endless entertainment (ah, Garfield Minus Garfield, will you ever get old?), it's also very effective at something else: making people feel stupid for not being aware of various pop cultural trends.

To that end, you may have seen or received a link to Greg Rutter's Definitive List of the 99 Things You Should Have Already Experienced on the Internet Unless You're a Loser or Old or Something, a pretty comprehensive list of the viral Web phenomena that have dominated the online world during the past decade or so. (Who is Greg Rutter? He's a New York ad writer, blogger and, evidently, a guy who relishes the challenge of making definitive lists.)

Some of you may read this thing and recognize every reference on here. (Many of the videos -- like the Dancing Baby and the Star Wars Kid -- are indeed pretty solidly embedded in the public consciousness.) Others may scan it and feel like a clueless loser. Or old. Or something.

But if you're a parent, you may be particularly interested in the number of kid-related features that earned a spot: more than 10, by my count. If you don't have time to peruse all of them, here are five of the more compelling child-oriented Internet Things on the list, each of which I have highlighted because they a. are slightly more obscure than some of the others, b. really funny, or c. both.

I Like Turtles

The three words guaranteed to stop a reporter's questioning right in its tracks.

Baby Breakdancer

If he had been born a few decades earlier, perhaps he, too, could have starred in "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo."

Laughing Baby

It's exactly what it bills itself as: video of an infant giggling. But if you can watch it without smiling, it's official: you have no soul.

Bert and Ernie Rap

I always knew those two Sesame Street roommates were hardcore!

Charlie Bit Me

A baby biting his big brother? Kinda funny. When the kids are British? High-larious!

Bonus Item: Boom Goes the Dynamite

This last one doesn't have much to do with kids, really. I include it only because it's a classic, it's appropriate for college basketball season and my son recently learned how to say this phrase. Although his version is more like, "Boom goes the dynamint." Hmmm, maybe someday he too can go viral.

Kids Can Build Habitat Houses Without Lifting a Hammer

JeanneSager — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 16:32:00 GMT

As important as it is to promote philanthropy when kids are still young, sometimes it's logistically impossible to put kids to work for your favorite charity. Take Habitat for Humanity; construction sites aren't for kids (at least not the younger set).

A toddler swinging a hammer is a safety issue on a job site no longer. Thanks to a new online game, kids can build virtual houses while the money paid to access the games goes to build real houses for Habitat for Humanity's Honduran chapter, and a host of other charities.

Elf Island takes a $5.95 monthly membership fee to do its good works (the basic level is free so you can try it out to see if your kids have an interest, but with the money going to charity, it's worth it to pay one month). The money is split among Habitat, Plant-It 2020, Wild Aid and Polar Bears International. Each game is charity appropriate, so playing to help polar bears in the real world requires racing against the Earth's rising CO2 levels in an effort to track female polar bears and help them avoid the melting ice in the virtual one, helping Plant-It requires planting trees in Niger, etc.

I've never been a big "get the kids on the computer to game" Mom, but what Elf Island's parent company has termed mirrored gaming (actions online equalling a mirrored action in the real world) intrigues me. It seems like one of those win-win-win situations. The kids have fun, learn something about the world and learn how to help others.

Oh yeah, and a worthy charity gets some help. Let's add another to the win column.

Source: Atlanta Journal Constitution

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Say Hi To Grandma Through the Screen

JeanneSager — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 17:28:00 GMT

My three-year-old likes to show her grandparents her nursery school projects. Too bad they're in Virginia, and we're in New York. Seeing a construction paper elephant is a tough job when you're looking through a phone line. We're still working on that.

But if an article in yesterday's New York Times is any indication, there may soon be a nation of toddlers who never have to use adjectives to tell Grandma about their new artistic creations. Grandma and Grandpa have gone digital so they can keep up with their grandkids living half a world away.

With half of American grandparents living at least two hundred miles from their grandchildren (according to the AARP) and two-thirds of kids seeing at least one set of grandparents only once a year, Web cams are stepping into the void to make sure kids feel that family connection. Some parents even use on-screen Grandma as a remote babysitter, setting their kids up in front of the computer to chat while they get some work done around the house.

With my in laws living so far away, their biggest fear seems to be that my daughter will forget them. They once handed me a picture of them - so she doesn't forget us, they said. We make sure that doesn't happen with weekly phone calls, and we bring them up in regular conversation. She runs to them when they arrive just as quickly as she does my parents, who live across town and talk to her on the phone even more often (what can I say, my side of the family tends to have bigger mouths!). We haven't purchased a Web cam yet, but it is a temptation. My in-laws will want to see the first loose tooth, the First Communion dress. A photographer by trade, I take pictures of these things, but I don't always have the energy to actually get them online and e-mailed four states away.

One expert quoted in the article said she worries grandparents will get too hooked on what technology offers; that they'll be tempted to visit less because they've already "seen" the grandkids. I kind of doubt it. The kind of grandparent who would power up their computer just to get a look at that cute little monkey is the kind of grandparent who would be there in a heartbeat . . . if they could.

A kid bouncing around in front of a camera has nothing on a kid wrapping their arms around you.

Image: New York Times

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Mom Won't Let Eighteen-Year-Old on Myspace, So He Stabs Her

JeanneSager — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 15:26:00 GMT

Shelley Sue Pangle might want to pick her battles next time. The Iowa mom told her six-foot-two, three hundred twenty pound son he couldn't use Myspace anymore. Then she tried to confiscate his cell phone charger. Now she says the eighteen-year-old stabbed her. Can you blame him?

Before you get all horrified, don't worry. Pangle is fine. The "stabbing" was a cut on her wrist. Her son, Terry Gene Starnes, was arrested on charges of aggravated assault after police picked him up, riding his bicycle to get away from Momma Lift, er, Pangle. When she'd banned him from Myspace, the Associated Press reports Starnes became agitated started packing his bags to leave. She was trying to take the charger when police say he pulled a knife from his pocket and cut her. Then he took off on his bike.

What part of "he's eighteen," did this lady not understand? Banning him from Myspace? Taking his cell phone charger? Not letting him pack his bags? He's a big boy - in more ways than one (no dig at his weight intended, but it would make me think twice about messing with him). Is this taking parenting too far?

Image: Myspace

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