S2 Ep. 21 Ministry Highlight: Canopy

Disclaimer: today’s episode contains sensitive topics and so we recommend listening without children present.

Parenting in the digital world is tough work. It seems like we are always fighting an uphill battle, and the hill continues to get steeper and steeper. Access to the internet, and everything that exists in it, is both a blessing and a curse when it comes to teaching and protecting our children.

Today’s guest was Sean Clifford, father of four and founder and CEO of the digital parenting company Canopy. Canopy’s mission is to help parents teach their children how to interact with technology in a healthy way, and part of this is protecting their children from online pornography. 

Sean shared with us 4 tips for better digital parenting:

1.) Protect your kids. You'd never let your child wander around with a stack of pornography in their hands. Putting an unprotected, unmonitored device in their hands is much worse, so it's essential and imperative that you take the important steps of protecting your kids from online pornography.

2.) Explain why you care. It's important to communicate age-appropriate reasons for why you are setting boundaries and rules. Explain that these apps and social platforms have teams of scientists and psychologists trying to figure out how to keep you and your kids on their devices longer. The more time you spend on a device, the more addictive it becomes, and the more money these companies make from ads and interactions. 

3.) It's okay to be different. When your child is the only one without a device or certain privileges, it's tough to teach through that. It helps to surround yourself with like-minded families who think about tech the way you do. Reiterate the fact that it's good to not be like everyone else, and then fill the void. Sean shared the example of giving an electric guitar with lessons in place of a device. 

4.) Lead by example. Our kids will mimic what they see, and so we as parents need to set really good examples when it comes to screen time usage. We control when device are used, not the other way around. 

 Make sure to listen to this episode for some eye-opening statistics on what is going on in the digital world, as well as how Canopy works and how it's lightyears ahead of the competition.

Make sure to check out Canopy today!

Technology is not going away, so it's imperative that we teach and train our kids to handle it in a healthy way. 

You can do this! Love,

Rachel + Stacy