(CNN) -- My sixth grader has a secret life online.

It wasn't so secret about a week ago when I discovered his public profile on Instagram, where he was posting dramatic photos and soulful "Versagrams" (graphical text messages), for all the world to see. One moment he was in love, the next full of despair. I was stunned.

My 11-year-old son has never let on that he is remotely interested in girls. Not a word. And he's not exactly the middle school kid with swagger. He's a relatively shy guy. Yet, his Instagram avatar was boldly flirting with a girl, prolifically posting inside jokes about his crush and inviting commentary not only from his school friends, but also from a far-flung social network of kids from Connecticut to New Jersey who I am certain he's never met in person.

His phone was beeping nonstop for three days, with a stream of frenzied text messages and Instagram posts. Something big was going on. My son wanted to ask a girl out. Did she like him, too? He wasn't sure, but from what I saw online, this was hardly confidential information. His plan for asking her out was getting circulated in cyberspace and he had several kids weighing in on both the strategy and his likelihood for success. He was fully exposed on multiple virtual platforms, and that was terrifying to me. He clearly didn't understand the full impact of online activity. What should I do?

When my son was sleeping, I was checking the text messages and followed the Instagram updates -- after all, this wasn't really sneaking if my son maintained a public profile. But what could I say? Should I tell him that I am monitoring his moves? Was my looking at text messages the same as reading a diary? Was I violating my son's privacy and simply making too much of this? My husband told me to back off, that our son was merely a kid with a crush who needed to experience this rite of passage on his own, without a hovering mother. But I wasn't so sure.

Like many parents, I am struggling with the boundaries of monitoring my kids' online activities. Is it an invasion of our children's privacy to intercept or check their text messages, or have the rules changed for parents because of the pure power and danger of technology? Am I justified in cyberstalking my own son? A first crush is hard enough, but I am trying to protect him from the embarrassment that can come from exposing this personal experience online.
Adults know that a careless e-mail, text message, tweet or photo posting can cost someone not only their reputation, but also their career. The scandal over former CIA Director David Petraeus' extramarital affair apparently started with an e-mail breach. If the CIA director can get sloppy with personal e-mails, how can we trust a kid to handle these tools any better?

Experts say that it's important for parents to proactively monitor their kids' online behavior. "It's snooping only if we don't tell them we're doing it," said Scott Steinberg the author of the best-selling "Modern Parent's Guide" series.

"You need to have the discussion up front about why you are there and why you are monitoring their online activity. Passively knowing that a parent is present can alter kids' behavior online. Parents won't intrude on their kids' experience if they do it in a way that's upfront and straightforward."
Parenting in a post-Facebook era where a new, must-have, social media app is churned out every two minutes makes monitoring exhausting, if not impossible. But while I believe my son knows not to communicate with "strangers," the way he's exposing his life in cyberspace is making me tense. But he's hardly alone. The photos and messages that his fellow tween friends post on Instagram alternate between silly and provocative. Maybe it's the digital photo-filters, but the girls seem sexy beyond their years. While it's our duty as parents to teach our kids responsibility with technology, how much can we interfere with their freedom of expression?
Steinberg says it's important that parents are educated about what's out there and are on top of their kids' online behavior without getting totally crazy. He says that parents can't just hand their kids digital devices and expect that they understand netiquette. But at the same time, parents need to respect boundaries.

"Just because you can see what's online doesn't mean that you should obsess over it and micromanage every text message," Steinberg said. "There are boundaries for parents as well. And at the end of the day, you don't want to become paranoid. You really just want to open an honest dialogue and positive computing. You can't put your kid on a leash, virtual or otherwise."
After agonizing for a few nights over how to handle it all, I told my son that he needed to change his settings to private so pedophiles and other "creepy people" can't follow his posts. He's a clever kid and understood that I was on to him. It was an unspoken acknowledgment that I had seen what he was putting out there. So he's gone private. The settings are locked. I asked if I could follow him on Instagram and he immediately said no.
Steinberg would say that parents need to "friend" their kids or follow them online. But what if they refuse? It's well known that kids can be stealth and may "friend" their parents on one site or app, but post on another. Parents can pull the plug on the technology perhaps for a little while, or you can sneak a peak at their phones and devices, like I do regularly now, without any guilt.

What kind of stupid parent gives their 11 year old his own cell phone?

Thats easy- a stupid one!

Quote from: Matthew

If you ask me, it's just another thing people THINK they can't live without, but they really can.

I know you're more "cut off" without a cell phone (I'm speaking as an adult now without one), but if you simply communicate with your spouse before you head for the store, you can simply REMEMBER (or write down) what kind of cake mix to buy, rather than rattling off all the varieties to your wife via cell phone while you're at the store.

Here is where I disagree with you. You don't need a toilette Matthew- just go outside, dig a hole (if you must), and you're good. Toilette paper? Ha!

I think you work from home, no? I can see why you don't need one. But some people do 'need' one- not because they cant get by, but because they may have long commutes to work (so their spouse can say home perhaps, like me and my wife). Would a cell be 'necessary' for life to go on? Nope. But has it does it make things much much easier- heck yeah. Just saying, as an adult.   :wink:

Yes, I realize I'm just giving my opinion on this one. I'm biased because I work at home, etc.

Still, I can see what cell phones have done to change the modern lifestyle. Sure, you can talk to your wife on the way home from work, but does that mean when you get home you can both bury your heads in your screens that much more, and effectively ignore each other IRL? Because, after all, you already took care of all that "talking to each other stuff". But you didn't talk to each other in PERSON. Something is lost.

And even if talking to your wife WERE just as good as talking to her in person, what about all that time people used to be forced to spend alone with their own thoughts -- their own consciences? People used to be able to unwind by singing along with the radio, think about life, think about anything. Now, we keep "working" or being stressed out by dealing with issues (with other people) even during our one break from the world -- the commute to work.

I realize an adult giving up a cell phone is taking it to "the next level", but sane people (Trad Catholics, I hope?) can at least see that a 10 year old doesn't need his own private cell phone with a full data plan and smartphone capabilities.

Even just having a private cellphone will mean that he can get -- and make -- calls his parents won't know about. When I was a kid, if I called a girl *everyone* in my house would have known about it, and the same if she had called me. Nowadays, that's not an issue since everyone has a cell phone with a private, separate phone number.

You're just asking for corruption to happen. A 10 year old is not that established in virtue to be able to navigate the INTERNET for crying out loud. It's too much responsibility. Why not just let him go on a coast-to-coast backpacking trip, unsupervised, at age 10? He'd be exposed to a lot less than he would be on the Internet!

As an aside: I'm a big proponent of giving children more rights and responsibilities are they get older, as they can handle it. But 10 years old is TOO YOUNG to have enough responsibility to navigate the Internet unsupervised.

If I had children I would never let them have a smartphone with internet access. They could look up anything online and much of what's online is evil. I wouldn't trust a young child to navigate it on their own. They might even end up watching garbage like pornography.

I don't mind the phone calls as much, though they could be evil as well, but unsupervised internet access seems dangerous to me.

What exactly has changed from the 1980's to today, that causes children to need their own cellphones?

Payphones are almost impossible to find now. When I was a kid they were on every corner it seemed.

That's a change.

But you're right about your main point, cell phones for every kid at any age is helicopter parenting gone mad.

They are also attractively cheap now for a "kid phone" (the kind that only call mom, dad, a short list of parent-approved adults, aunts/uncles I presume, and 911)

You can get cell phones that will only call 911 and a couple of pre-programed numbers, like the parents for emergencies.  If a kid needs a cell phone at all, I can't see whey they need one that can do more than this.  

Payphones have indeed disappeared.

On the other hand, there's such a thing as "herd immunity".

Everyone has a cellphone now, so if your car ever breaks down and you're waiting for help by the side of the road, the FIRST PERSON TO STOP will have a cell phone you can use to call for help.

So, if anything, the payphones are all around us now, only cheaper :)

As for traveling through a "bad neighborhood" -- just don't do it. Simple!
What are you there for, some good drugs?

You can get cell phones that will only call 911 and a couple of pre-programed numbers, like the parents for emergencies.  If a kid needs a cell phone at all, I can't see whey they need one that can do more than this.  

My nephew (who was being raised in the Novus Ordo) was turning 7 and I asked him what he wanted for his birthday.  He said "A BlackBerry."  I couldn't believe it.  I told him he was a little kid, not a CEO.  (Incidentally, his mother thought a BlackBerry was perfectly fine for a smart 7-year-old.  She did not seem to care that he could be exposed to all kinds of things via the Internet.)   I think all of this technology is one of the reason kids are not kids anymore.  And this kid is now 12, was never confirmed, and has not been to mass in years.  It breaks my heart.