Raising Humans in a Digital World ― Helping Kids Build a Healthy Relationship With Technology

Digital literacy advocate Diana Graber demystifies the complicated digital landscape facing today’s kids and provides answers for parents and teachers eager to show them how to use technology as an empowering force in their lives and in their role as future leaders.

Simply telling your child to stay away from technology may eliminate the dangers but also means that your child loses out on the many benefits and opportunities that technology brings. In Raising Humans in a Digital World, digital literacy advocate and founder of Cyberwise, Diana Graber, a mother, producer, and educator with an M.A. in Media Psychology and Social Change, demystifies the complicated digital landscape today’s kids are navigating and provides answers for parents eager to know how to teach their kids to use technology well.

Here are some startling facts about the current relationship of children with technology:

• 50% of teens feel “addicted” to their phones — Common Sense Media, 2016.
• 34% of students will experience cyberbullying in their lifetimes — Cyberbullying Research Center, 2016.
• 39% of teens have sent or posted sexually suggestive messages (sexting) —GuardChild 2017
• 80% of students can’t differentiate between real and “fake” news — Stanford University, 2016
• Technology is making children dangerously unhealthy — World Health Organization, 2017

Graber draws upon eight years of in-classroom experience teaching her popular Cyber Civics curriculum, now taught in over 30 US states and internationally, plus countless discussions with and presentations to parents, educators, and students. She weaves in interviews with top experts, including other media psychologists, tech insiders, pediatricians, educators, journalists, and more, with her own story—to explain why and how digital kids must learn social-emotional skills; balancing virtual and real life; building safe and healthy relationships; avoiding the dangers of sexting, cyberbullying, revenge porn, and online predators; protecting personal information; identifying and avoiding fake news, harmful stereotypes, and questionable content; and becoming the positive role models and leaders of tomorrow.

Raising Humans in a Digital World is packed with at-home discussion topics and enjoyable activities that any busy family can slip into their daily routine. Full of practical tips grounded in academic research and hands-on experience, this book gives parents what they’ve been waiting for—a guide to raising digital kids who will become the positive and successful leaders our world so desperately needs.