Instagram

I have 2 kids, a daughter whos 14 and a son whos 16. I remember having a conversation with my oldest when he was about 11. He was saying all his friends had it and all that. I did some of my own research and told him that he needed to be 12. . There were going to be some rules though, his Mom I and would follow his account. We did not want him to waste a lot of time on it. Instagram does make time fly, we didnt want him to be a pariah but we wanted him to not waste too much time on it. He has a screen time limit of 2 hrs a day; Instagram/Gaming/Youtube/Netflix are all mixed in this. Normally we wouldn't care how he split the time, but gaming has benefits to the brain while Instagram does not. The maximum amount he could ever spend on it was 35 minutes. And we checked every week. He did go over it sometimes so we had to reinforce the rules and suspend it once in a while. He is now 16 and still follows the rules. As parents we tend to underestimate kids, if you clearly state rules and punishments, they will follow. With my daughter I was worried about creeps. I was worried about the bad people getting to communicate with her. I let her get Instagram for her 14th birthday, we had very strict rules for her. She could follow only her friends and celebs. NO STRANGERS. Strangers could follow her because teens want followers but, she could only follow her friends. We made it clear to her that if someone started flirting with her over Instagram, and she didnt know them, it was not ok. We wanted her not to be scared of us forcing her to delete it so that was not an option. What I've learned from friends children is that if you do not let your child use it, they will use it on their own terms ignoring you. That opens many bad doors, its better to let them know that we are allowing them, not that they are doing it themselves. After all, how long can parents control their kid. Instagram is a double sided sword. Used wisely it can be a good tool. Used unwisely, could lead to problems. As parents that's where we come in, don't be afraid to take their phone without warning and check it. Before giving them Instagram lay out the rules. My rules are; 1. Strangers can follow, but no conversations with them. 2. Parents follow the account to see what stuff they post. 3. Strict time limit of 35. 4.Parents can search phone if wished. 5. It can be suspended until further notice as punishment. PS: I have found that Instagram is much safer than Facebook and SnapChat.

Horrible app! Just disgusting! all the teens get depressed because they see things that are not real ! Photoshopped pics of models, semi nudes, etc . Also lot of predators, so parental care is always better. and the app is always malfunctioning. took 30 min to do ONE POST!! It just crashes my phone constantly! It gets super slowed down just when I'm about to post and then it blocks my phone completely and i lose the post! Got to do it ALL AGAIN. feel super bad for the people who live of the work for Instagram because the app is terrible full of bugs !Not to mention the Photoshop that make us all think we're worthless...Mark Zucker,u can do better than this lol ,ur algorithm works better than the app functions!

Yep, this app is actually a nice app for sharing art and getting positive feedback, never have a once got any mean comments or anything like that. Yes the internet tends to have nudity and swearing, but the things you scroll through are only people you follow, so unless you follow someone bad it won’t happen, also if you VERY worried about that stuff, than stay away from the search section, and delete direct messages from strangers, also you can make your account private, I HAtE When kids act like they are adults on here when they ARE Children! That needs to be stopped. But overall I’d let my teen have this over the WAY more explicit tik Tok. Thanks for reading! ❤️

I think this app is very appropriate for all ages and should be used to shape young minds and inform them of the things going on in the world

I thought Instagram was really good for mental health, to make connections, and to be popular. But I really felt used, betrayed completely, and backstabbed behind my back. Even I received social discrimination in society, rejection, exclusion, stress and anxiety. But you know what? You will never get a second chance after all the damage you attempted to accomplish. Please, reconsider of having social media. It will use you, make a profit of you, exploit you, and act like nothing happened in front of you. Instagram, thanks for helping me see the 2 faces of the coin. On one side you are nice when actually you are a miserable treacherous social media app. In fact, I hope you get sued and end completely because of all the damage you have done to millions of people. Also, because of all the things that whistleblower has said. Already GOODBYE!!!

Social media is a huge influence and instagram is guilty of making it seem like everyone else's lives are perfect. It's great for sharing photos with other people but I'd make sure your kid keeps a private account until they're about 16/17+

I have a 2 year old daughter and a 14 year old son. MY son begged me for it and I said no on the first try. Until I looked at the app and discovered there is positivity out there. My son has it and he uses it to connect with his friends and only texts his friends. He blocks people he does not want to talk to. And I helped him put his account on private and turned off geo location so random people do not know where he is and only his friends can follow him. He only posts his video games on there and his dirt bike skills. He watches appropriate stuff on how to dirt bike and learns about cool new video games people his age play these days. I think t is really fun for your teen for them to learn new interests and dig deeper into what they already love. My son is so called the pro gamer and he learned how to dirt bike and he does it everytime I take hime to the near by trails. I think you should give your teen a chance to connect with their friends. Do you want to see your teen upset and depressed or do you want to see them connecting with their friends and being happy. I want to hear a teen say "Hey dad!! Guess what? I learned how to code on Instagram." (pretend name) "Techsavyguy taught me!!!" (dad speaking) "Wow that is so cool son. I am proud of you. You will win a coding contest some day!!!" I don't want to hear a parent complaining yeah yeah yeah, back in the day you figured things out yourself... Thats cool you are learning new things on this app.

I would not recommend you this app