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This section offers information that will help parents and children make the best possible use of the resources available on the Internet. If you are new to computers and the Internet or would like to improve your "surfing" skills, you will find helpful information under the "Navigating the Web" section. A click on any of the following items will take you to the information on this page. Most of the information included on this page may be found in Spanish in the online publication La Guía del Internet para Padres de Familia. Tips for Safe Internet Use Navigating the Web Tips for Safe Internet Use If you are a parent, you probably have rules for how your children should deal with strangers, which TV shows, movies, and videos they're allowed to watch, what stores they're allowed to enter, and where and how far from home they're allowed to travel. It's important to make similar rules for your children's Internet use and to be aware of their online activities. If you are a child, using the Internet is like all of the other activities you take part in, and there are some basic rules that will help you get the most out of your Internet time. You'll want to make sure that surfing the Net doesn't take the place of homework, social activities, or other important interests. You might even set an alarm clock or timer if you tend to lose track of time. This section offers tips for ensuring that you have safe, productive, and enjoyable experiences on the Internet. Interacting with Others Limiting Children to Appropriate Content Encouraging Information Literacy back to top Interacting with Others on the Internet Just as we tell our children to be wary of strangers they meet, we need to tell them to be wary of strangers on the Internet. Most people behave reasonably and decently online, but some are rude, mean, or even criminal. Teach your children that they should: Never give out personal information (including their name, home address, phone number, age, race, family income, school name or location, or friends' names) or use a credit card online without your permission. Never share their password, even with friends. Never arrange a face-to-face meeting with someone they meet online unless you approve of the meeting and go with them to a public place. Never respond to messages that make them feel confused or uncomfortable. They should ignore the sender, end the communication, and tell you or another trusted adult right away. Never use bad language or send mean messages online. Also, make sure your children know that people they meet online are not always who they say they are and that online information is not necessarily private. back to "Tips" Limiting Children to Appropriate Content on the Internet Even without trying, your children can come across materials on the Internet that are obscene, pornographic, violent, hate filled, racist, or offensive in other ways. One type of material--child pornography--is illegal. You should report it to the Center for Missing and Exploited Children by calling 1-800-THE LOST (843-5678) or going to missingkids.org. While other offensive material is not illegal, there are steps you can take to keep it away from your children and out of your home. Make sure your children understand what you consider appropriate for them. What kinds of sites are they welcome to visit? What areas are off limits? How much time can they spend, and when? How much money, if any, can they spend? Set out clear, reasonable rules and consequences for breaking them. Make online exploration a family activity. Put the computer in the living room or family room. This arrangement involves everyone and helps you monitor what your children are doing. Pay attention to games your older child might download or copy. Some are violent or contain sexual content. Look into software or online services that filter out offensive materials and sites. Options include stand alone software that can be installed on your computer, and devices that label or filter content directly on the web. In addition, many Internet Service Providers and commercial online services offer site blocking, restrictions on incoming e-mail, and children's accounts that access specific services. Often, these controls are available at no additional cost. Be aware, however, children are often smart enough to get around these restrictions. Nothing can replace your supervision and involvement. Find out what the Internet use policy is at your local library. Ask about the Internet use policy at your child's school. The following sites may provide some additional help to assure that you and your family have safe and enjoyable experiences on the Internet: SafeKids.com SafeKids includes a link to SafeTeens.com which has topics and information on special Internet safety tips just for teens. It also is an excellent site for kids and parents, and includes Kids' Rules for Online Safety, Guidelines for Parents, What are the Risks, and a Family Contract for Online Safety. GetNetWise This site is designed to provide information families need to make informed decisions about how to use the Internet. It is a site sponsored by many of the Internet industry corporations and public interest organizations. Family Guidebook Just about everything you need for learning how to enjoy the Internet safely can be found on this site. America Links Up This site is a public awareness and education campaign sponsored by a large group of non-profit organizations, education groups, and corporations that are concerned with providing children with a safe and rewarding experience on the Internet. Cyberangels Internet resource sites, safety tips and suggestions, and news articles are among the many things you will find on this information-packed site for both parents and kids. It has been described as "the largest Internet safety organization." PEP: Resources for Parents, Educators, and Publishers The PEP Directory provides a comprehensive listing of parental control, blocking and filtering software programs to help make Internet experiences safe for children. back to "Tips" Encouraging Information Literacy Show your children how to use and evaluate information they find on the Internet. Not all online information is reliable. Some individuals and organizations are very careful about the accuracy of the information they post, but others are not. Some even mislead on purpose. Remind your children not to copy online information and claim it's their own or copy software unless it is clearly labeled as free. Help children understand the nature of commercial information, advertising, and marketing, including who created it and why it exists. Encourage them to think about why something is provided and appears in a specific way. Steer your children to noncommercial sites and other places that don't sell products specifically to children. It is important to be aware of the potential risks involved in going online, but it is also important to keep them in perspective. Common sense and clear guidelines are the place to start. back to "Tips" back to top Navigating the Web  On any trip, you need a map with guideposts to navigate well. This section offers some basics to help you begin to explore the World Wide Web and communicate with others on the Internet. Surfing the Net Saving Information from the Internet Using the Internet to do a School Project E-mail Internet Tutorials Computer Tutorials back to top Surfing the Net When you go on the Internet, you may have a specific destination in mind, or you may wish to browse through the Web, the way you would browse through a library or a catalog, looking for topics or things that interest you. This browsing is often called surfing the Net or cruising the Superhighway. There are several ways to get around on the Web. Using Web addresses. To get to a special destination, such as one of the sites described in Resources, you'll type in an internet address in the space provided on the Web browser. Web addresses, sometimes called uniform resource locators (URL), begin with http://, which stands for hypertext transfer protocol. After you type in the Web address, it may take awhile for the site's home page to appear on the screen, especially if it includes many pictures. Once it does, you'll probably see several choices you can click your mouse on to take you further into the site. (If you type in an address incorrectly, or too many people are trying to use a site at once, you'll get an error message on your computer screen. Just try again). Following links. Many sites include hypertext links to other sites with related content. When you click on one of these highlighted areas, your computer will connect to another Web site without your having to know or type its address. Using search engines. Search engines are programs that you can select from your Web browser to enable you to search the Internet by keywords or topics. If you or your child are interested in finding out more about Jackie Robinson, for example, you can click on a search engine, enter his name, then pull up several Web sites for further exploration. Examples of search engines include: Infoseek http://www.infoseek.com Webcrawler http://webcrawler.com Yahoo http://www.yahoo.com Yahooligans (for children) http://www.yahooligans.com All One Search http://www.allonesearch.com All-in-One is the Internet's original metasearch page. Over 500 of the best engines, indexes, directories and catalogs in one place. If you can't find it from here, it doesn't exist! Using bookmarks. As you look through the Internet, you'll probably find sites you'll want to revisit. If so, you can create a bookmark by saving the address on your computer, usually with just a click of the mouse. The help feature on your Web browser can give you specific instructions. When you want to return to the site, you'll just click its address on your list. back to "Navigating" Saving Information from the Internet In your travels on the Internet, you'll probably come across information you want to keep. You can either make a paper or "hard" copy directly from the Web, or you can download a copy of the information onto your own computer. Printing a copy. While you're looking at the information you wish to print, you can click on the print command or icon, and the printer connected to the computer will print a copy for you. Using the mouse, you can also highlight the information you would like to print and click on the print command or icon. Text usually prints quickly, but graphics can take a long time. If you don't need the images, you may wish to check your online help feature to see how to remove them before printing. Downloading a copy. If you'd like to be able to use the information you've found on the Internet on your own computer (perhaps to include it in a report or send it by e-mail to someone else), you can use your mouse to click on a command or icon to download it. Be careful, though. When you travel online, you can bring back viruses, or programs that can destroy your personal files and software. For protection, it's important to buy--and regularly update--an anti-virus program. For added safety, download files and e-mail messages to a disk and do a virus check before copying the information to the hard drive inside your computer. back to "Navigating" Using the Internet to do a School Project (This illustration is taken from the US Department of Education website, with permission.) Assignment: Write a 2-3 page essay on the life of Jackie Robinson. Include facts about his life, his greatest accomplishments, and why you believe he deserves a place in history. Here's how you can find the information to do this project: Sign onto the Internet; once connected, click the mouse on the search key. From the menu, select a search engine based on your topic. (Here we have selected AltaVista). At the subject box, type in Jackie Robinson and click on the search key. Review search results: "Found 1 category and 19 site matches for Jackie Robinson." Select one or all site matches (all sites are underlined). Each site has additional sites for more information. Print or download all the information you need for the essay. Use this information to write your report. back to "Navigating" E-mail The most popular online activity is communicating with individuals and groups throughe-mail, listserv, and Usenet newsgroups. E-mail. You and your children may want to send notes to friends and family. To send an e-mail message, you'll need the e-mail address of the person to whom you are sending a message. E-mail addresses often start with a version of the person's name and continue with the "at" sign (@), the Internet service provider's name (usually abbreviated), a period (called "dot"), and a three-letter extension. Extensions include com for businesses, edu for educational institutions, gov or mil for the federal government, org for nonprofit organizations, and net for networks. Make sure that when you type an address, you key it exactly as it is given to you--copy the capitalization, spacing, and punctuation. Some examples of e-mail addresses are: jdoe@ed.gov cbass@school.edu sgreene@nonprofit.org tjohn@boxbuilding.com Listservs. You can use e-mail to participate in discussion groups focused on topics that interest you. When you put your name on a listserv, you can read all the messages sent to members of the group, and you, too, can send messages to the entire group. Each group has an administrator who sets the rules for how the group will operate. If the listserv is moderated, the administrator will also keep the discussion on track and make sure participants treat each other courteously, or follow Netiquette. A list of listservs and the e-mail addresses for subscribing to them is available from http://www.liszt.com/. Usenet newsgroups. Usenet is a system of thousands of special interest groups that allows people to post messages for anyone else to read. Readers can respond by posting a general message or sending an e-mail to the author of an earlier message. Unlike listservs, usenet newsgroups do not require people to subscribe; however, newsgroups must be registered with Usenet. You can probably find newsgroups through your Internet Service Provider. Most ISPs let you search for newsgroups that interest you by using keywords. Try "parenting," for example. Because Usenet newsgroup messages can take up a lot of space, ISPs aren't able to carry all newsgroups. If you know of a newsgroup that you can't find through your ISP, ask to see whether it can be added. Caution: Most newsgroups are not moderated; no one keeps the discussion focused on the topic or exercises control over inappropriate behavior. Some topics are not suitable for children. back to "Navigating" Internet Tutorials Connected: An Internet Encyclopedia, Third Edition Not necessarily for beginers, this site is a readable, technical, useful guide to Internet operations. Definition of Terms If you would like the basic definition of some of the key words used when using the Internet and its resources, go to the Glossary. The Inner-City Net What you'll find in this site is an online tutorial to acquaint you with navigating and using the World Wide Web, including the parts of the Netscape window, Web addresses, bookmarking pages, Tipas and Tricks, and a Treasure Hunt. Kids' Space Connection 2000 This is a kids' site, designed and maintained by kids, for kids. It has a little bit of everything, including email penpals. Great site! Check it out. Netscape Tutorial Netscape Navigator is one of the popular web browsers, and this site expalins how it works. It has an "Introduction to the Web" quiz you can take when you are done. The Online World Resources Handbook This handbook has extensive information on the online world, including using the Internetfor business, hobbies and games, to set up a personal healthnet, and tells you where to find free expert assistance and practical tips. Roadmap 96 Roadmap 96 is a free, 27 lesson Internet training workshop designed to teach new "net travellers" how to travel around the rapidly expanding (and often times confusing) "Information Superhighway" without getting lost. SafeSurf's Internet Lifeguard Site contains online safety basics, parent/child agreements, and questions and answers about parental controls and other online basics. Search Engines You can find all of the search engines and more at the All-in-One site or your web browser's home page. If a search on one engine doesn't produce good results, try another engine. TechKnow TechKnow is a children's site which explains basic Internet concepts and navigation, and provides links to popular children's sites, including preschool resources. back to "Navigating" Computer Tutorials The Wizard of Austin The Wizard's philosophy: technological change will constantly occur and people and companies will always want that change explained to them in an entertaining, plain-english, no mumbo-jumbo fashion. The Wizard's services: computer training, web design and hosting, custom graphics design, Mac networks and support, onsite services at home or office, and always computer novice friendly. Easy-to-Use Online Tutorials These are designed to show teachers how to use Microsoft software in the classroom. They were created in partnership with ACT360 Media, developers of interactive, online courses for teachers and students. Tutorials include sessions on Office 2000, Frontpage 2000, Internet Explorer 5.0, Outlook Express, PowerPoint 97, FrontPage 98, and Internet Explorer 4.0. back to "Navigating" back to top