Digital parenting – the 4C’s framework

Parenting in the digital age increasingly requires navigating children’s engagement with online technologies, platforms, and media, making digital literacy, safety, and mediation integral aspects of contemporary caregiving. Parents ought to ensure, on the one hand, that smart technologies offer children important opportunities for learning, creativity, participation and belonging. On the other hand, they need to find ways to protect children from exposure to risky or negative experiences that may not be developmentally age-appropriate. This entry outlines: 1. Three approaches to digital parenting: embracing, challenging and resisting 2. The contentious debate over ‘screen time’ 3. Parental mediation of children’s internet use 4. Digital literacy and skills 5. Child-rights respecting solutions to digital parenting inequalities