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Monitoring your child's online gaming
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As online gaming becomes more popular, an increasing number of parents are allowing their children to play MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft. Although many games have several measures to provide safer environments for children, there are still many precautions parents can take to ensure the safety of their children in these games.
Chat Filters
Most games online have a profanity filter. If you object to your children being exposed to profanity, please make sure these filters are enabled. However, children may be smart enough to disable these filters themselves. Many other inappropriate discussions get past these filters.
It is important that you monitor the chat your child is exposed to during their gaming time. This not only means looking over their shoulder, but occasionally asking the child to move over and scroll through their chat windows, as children will often try to hide any inappropriate chat from you.
Time Limits
Unfortunately, few games are progressive enough as World of Warcraft to allow parental controls to set time limits on the gaming of an account. This means that you need to be proactive with setting limits on your child's play time. Although this may not seem necessary, online games offer a strong enough pull that both adults and children, unsupervised, will play them for hours a day and neglect other duties. If you find it difficult to verbally manage this with your child, there are third party programs which monitor and restrict computer usage overall such as TimesUpKidz or KidsWatch.
Social Interactions
There are two social interactions you need to keep a special watch on as a parent.
The first is guilds. Guilds are a group of people who share a chat channel, and get other benefits depending on the game. Guild chat channels are considered private, and are not monitored by game staff. Because of this, they are more prone to conversations you may find inappropriate for your children.
To make sure your child is joining a family friendly guild, let them know they need your approval before joining a guild. When they find a guild they'd like to join, ask to speak with the guild leader, and talk with them in game chat. Let them know you are the child's parent, and let them know the restrictions you have on your child's online interaction regarding such subjects as profanity, sexual content, etc. If the guild leader and you can't come to an agreement, let your child know they can't join the guild.
If you find the guild to be acceptable from what you're told, allow your child to join. Continue to monitor the chat of your child, with special attention to any guild chat they are being exposed to, including any voice chat they may use. Many parents also make a character on their child's account to join the guild with, so they can monitor the guild on their own time and terms.
The second interaction you must keep a close eye out for is erotic role-playing, commonly known as "ERP." This interaction happens when two or more people decide to have cyber sex with their characters in chat. Children, unless they don't understand what they're doing, will go to great lengths to hide this activity from you. While much of this is intended to be harmless, not only does it expose your child to sexual situations, but it may lead to worse situations of child abuse.
Talking to your child
It can be tempting as a parent to scold your child for any inappropriate actions or situations. While it may be proper at times to do so, be understanding that your child may not understand the consequences. Take the time to explain to them why you disapprove of that behavior, and if your child disagrees, work with them to a compromise. A child will be more understanding and willing to work with you if you kindly explain your reasons against the behavior.
Also, display your child some trust. You don't need to sit and watch over their shoulder the entire time. However, do let your child know that while you do trust them, you are also looking out for their safety. With honest communication, you should feel great about your child playing online, and your child should have lots of fun.
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