How to Know When Your Child is Ready for Social Media

tween girl holding phone with social media

Is your child ready for social media? Before you say yes, make sure they can answer this important question...

Hi friends!


If you've seen Top Gun: Maverick, you might recall a powerful line: "You don't have time to think up there. If you think, you're dead."


While this moment made Hollywood magic, in the real world of aviation, one of the biggest pilot killers isn’t dogfights or mechanical failures—but a deadly phenomenon known as spatial disorientation. If a pilot loses sight of a landmark or checkpoint to anchor his vision (think: clouds, fog, darkness, bright light), he can quickly forget “which way is up” and lose control of the aircraft. His only hope is learning to fly by his instruments.


Feels a lot like the social media world.


While we like to think of social media as a “blue sky” where we can go any direction we want to go, the reality is that there are strong winds and forces pushing us—and our kids—the direction tech companies want to go. We open our social media app to quickly check in on a friend—and thirty minutes later find ourselves engulfed in a cloud of shopping, gossip, Tiktok tutorials…you name it. Spatial disorientation.


So what instruments—what compass—can we offer our kids as they prepare to enter the thick, fuzzy fog of social media? What tells us when our children are ready for social media? You might be hoping I’ll point you to an app to download or device to purchase, but the answer might be a little more simple. If we could create an entrance exam for our kids to take before they open a social media account—we’d want to include this question: Do you know who(se) you are?

Graphic reads "Your online identity should match your offline identity"


It's no secret that our children's identity can be a big, hairy topic. It feels abstract, overwhelming, maybe a bit hard to talk about (especially with kids?!)...because in any given minute, it might sprout 80 legs and start walking 64,000 different directions...cause a million different reactions. So. When it comes to defining this digital guidepost for my kids, I'm trying to keep it simple:



Our identity is our origin story. Where we come from. Who we are.



It's more than our heritage. It's our name. Our upbringing, our story... its highs and lows, the lessons learned, the character built. It's the foundation that grounds us, which we build our life upon. It's our roots... and our wings. It's our "why"... it drives us, lights us up, inspires us.


And here’s the cool part: as believers, we don’t have to create or search for our identity…we receive it. We are who God says we are.


Here’s the problem facing so many of our kids: If you don’t know who you are, you probably aren't ready for social media. The social media world is full of endless voices telling you how to live, who to be, how to measure your worth. And it’s all too easy to take the bait—to spend your days creating a more perfect version of you. Even young children love choosing a new avatar each time they bootup a device. It turns out, the quest for a new and improved identity begins young, and it never really goes away.


But God doesn’t ask us to reinvent ourselves—in the real world or in the digital world. Instead, he invites us to come as we are. To live wholeheartedly. To be the same person online as we are offline. To live with digital integrity.


Friends, our kids’ identity cannot be birthed in the social media world. And when they feel lost, it can't be found there either. It must be anchored outside the digital world—in a story that is beautiful, and real. 


Before they enter social media, let’s help them receive and embrace their truest identity: They are His.

Graphic reads "true identity can't be found int he world of stars and dots"

If you loved reading the book You are Special  to your preschoolers…I invite you to give it a fresh test drive through the lens of social media. Here’s what Max Lucado imagined about the power of being reminded of our identity:


And all day, every day, the Wemmicks did the same thing…people spent their days sticking stars or dots on one another.


The pretty ones, those with smooth wood and fine paint, always got stars. But if the wood was rough or the paint was chipped, the Wemmicks gave dots. The talented ones got stars, too. Some could lift big sticks high above their heads or jump over tall boxes. Still others knew big words or could sing pretty songs. Everyone gave them stars…


But one day, Punchinello met a Wemmick who was unlike any he’d ever met. She had no dots or stars. She was just wooden. Her name was Lucia.


It wasn’t that people didn’t try to give her stickers; it’s just that the stickers didn’t stick. Some of the Wemmicks admired Lucia for having no dots, so they would run up and give her a star. But it would fall off. Others would look down on her for having no stars, so they would give her a dot. But it wouldn’t stay either.


Her secret? Everyday, she left the village and went to visit someone who could remind her of her identity. She did not find it in the world of stars and dots. 


The woodcarver explained it this way: “She has decided that what I think is more important than what they think. The stickers only stick if you let them…The more you trust my love, the less you care about their stickers.”

Note: If you are delaying social media, but looking for practical ways you can shift your mindset from protection to preparation, check out our three-part series on delaying social media. In each mini-lesson, we unpack the core topics that pop-up when delaying social media for your tween(s). 

  •   Mini-Lesson 1 :  A guide to age-appropriate devices and milestones to look for while they wait for social media.
  •   Mini-Lesson 2 :  Help tweens understand FOMO, friends and social limits while they wait.
  •   Mini-Lesson 3 :  Help tweens understand the harm of highlight reels while they wait.
Krista Boan

Author Krista Boan

Krista Boan is the co-founder of the international nonprofit  Screen Sanity , host of the Screen Sanity podcast and a former middle school teacher. Her current work is developing simple social media mentorship resources for tweens, which she shares through the Social Compass newsletter. Krista has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, NBC with Diane Sawyer, the New York Times and Christianity Today. She lives in Kansas City with her husband and four t(w)eens.

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