The more stories we hear about bullying the more it becomes clear what a big role the Internet is playing in all of this.
Cyber bullying is just one more way to do it.
If you are a parent whose child is being bullied, or maybe your child is the bully, there's a new tool out there that you should know about.
The old saying, "Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me," is being proven wrong time and time again.
Because of bullying, there are children dropping out of school, dropping out of life and even trying to kill themselves over the pain caused by those searing words.
Cyber bullying on social networking sites is increasing, but there's a new free application on Facebook that can help parents be a lot more cyber savvy to fight it.
The creator Ron Stevenson says, "It breaks down who are your kids friends, what are the age groups and where they are located."
The application called
Go-Go-STAT Parental Guidance doesn't block anything, it just alerts parents to what's going on. Things like inappropriate words, pictures and postings.
"The whole idea is to give parents tools that they have some insight about what kids are posting and what they are saying," Stevenson said.
Through their Facebook accounts parents can set up some guidelines for their children's Facebook account. They will not see every post or picture, just the ones that break the rules.
"If those postings fall outside rules you've specified or break boundaries you get an email alert, you go to Facebook...review a report that our application shows you," Stevenson said.
In the case of cyber bullying, a parent can see right away if someone is sending nasty messages, or if it's your child sending that hurtful message through cyberspace
The Parental Guidance application is only for Facebook. It's not a complete protection for your children, but Facebook is where many kids do a lot of their communicating, so it's a good place to start.
It's also an opportunity to sit down with your child and begin a conversation about what is okay and not okay to email, text or post to their social networking accounts. If you would like more information on log onto
www.GoGoSTAT.com.
