networking for 6yr olds at school

[meercat30]

My young son came home from school ecstatic having just spent an afternoon in an IT lesson learning about Super clubs . Great. I was eager to learn more.
It soon became apparent that Super clubs is basically the start of social networking for 6 to 12 year olds and that you can win points to build your own personal web page (without pictures).
He was so taken with the site, and wanted to start contacting his friends straight away.

There was a slight problem with this request, as my son is not allowed to be anyway involved with social networking until he has a fully formed individual.

Of course he is mortally upset as peer pressure to join in, came in the form of a phone call an hour later.

Enticing young children to win points get a web page is rather strange?

What exactly is super club trying to achieve with this site? what are the motives?

How did you manage to get schools to accept this?

I was addressing the point made in the OP. I have no problem with ds using the computer - he made a table in MS Word this evening to do a Christmas greeting. If he had said he wanted to go on to a social networking site to contact his friends he wouldn't have been allowed.

I'm not sure how reading a book doesn't use one's imagination, unless you are referring to picture book.

What if it is a science textbook? Doesn't use much imagination.

There are a variety of web sites on the internet; hundreds at least, maybe even thousands. Just as there are a variety of books.

I think you are moving away from the topic of the OP - social networking sites. Computers in general and in moderation good for all ages. Social networking sites for 6 yr olds. Never. Just my opinion and what happens in our house.

Ds does have friends who spend every spare minute glued to their DSs even at rugby training or at parties. I find that odd, but maybe that's just me (and I would find it odd if it was a book rather than a DS).

cat64 those problems are not a big deal, and education about social networking will help prevent them.

Online is real life. Better they do it at six and think it's for babies by the time they are nine, and be experienced users who know what to post and what not to by the time they are 13 and are on Facebook.

Exactly MrManager and Coalition. It's less about learning how to use computers, more about how to use them safely. And let's face it, if even adults can be caught out online, then education is needed.

So much is reliant on online communication nowadays, and it will be even more reliant on it in the future. Children need to be taught how to communicate face to face, on the phone, and online. Online is especially important right now as that is the way things are going, and also because a lot of parents haven't been brought up with the internet so aren't necessarily in the best position to teach their children about the risks and etiquette to do with the internet.

Talking about communication, (body language etc) why is it wrong to also teach them about how to communicate online without body language to go by? I'd have thought that was a useful skill.

Superclubs is good. DD was on it when she was younger. It teaches safe and responsible use of the internet, which the OP might have discovered if she had bothered to go further than her first knee-jerk reaction.

I thought you had to be 14 to use facebook.

Online communication does not have to be social networking sites and I'm amazed that 6 is viewed as an acceptable age for this.

UQD do you think 6 is an acceptable age? Maybe my ds and everyone in his year are just socially immature. They are still at the age of struggling with personal relationships let alone dealing with online ones.

It's part of safe use of IT. It's all moderated by teachers and you can only register through school. It encourages them to build their own very simple "pages" and has a reward-based system.

Maybe not everyone is ready for it, but then not everyone is ready for football.

I can see it being something to do through school when they are 8 or 9, 6 just seems very young imo. I hope ds never ready for football

Well, as for so many things we all have different points of view. I am happy with this and also happy that DS (6) loves football.

They're not taking away that framework, they're adding to it.

Unless they are refusing to let them talk face to face they aren't taking that away, just teaching them other methods of communication. In particular a method of communication which is more commonly used nowadays.