Tracking Your Teens … Really?

I will start by admitting my children are no where near the teenager days, however, I do watch the news daily and have heard of many new tracking devices that allow a parent to “track” their teens every moment they are out driving in their car. I completely understand the maternal instinct of wanting to ensure your child is always safe, however, this is the real world you want your children to live in and so I am a firm believer of teaching your children to learn from the mistakes they may make along the path of growing up.

It seems many parents are nervous about allowing their new teen the freedom to spread their wings and live a little. Companies have also figured out they can make money off of these nervous parents and have created numerous GPS tracking devices that go as far as to provide video of your teen while in the vehicle driving.

The GPS tracking device is one thing, literally video taping your child while they are driving – now don’t you think that would make them more nervous? I was a teen driver once and I did things my parents may or may not have approved of, although not illegal, my parents still would have been really upset with me. If I had a video in my face while driving down the road, I would be constantly double thinking every little movement I made and this would make me a worse driver than if the video was not there.

The whole point behind growing up and becoming an adult is to allow your child to spread their wings and get a taste for the real world.  By purchasing and installing a device that literally monitors the every movement your child makes you are allowing the child to grow up too sheltered. From experience, when you raise a sheltered child they grow up to be far worse off than if you had allowed them to trip up a little bit back in the teen days when it would not have mattered as much.

I get it, really I do. Teen driving statistics taken from Rocky Mountain Insurance Information Associations website state that “16 year olds have higher crash rates than drivers of any other age”,  “drivers age 15-20 accounted for 12.9 percent of all the drivers involved in fatal crashes and 16 percent of all the drivers involved in police-reported crashes in 2006″, and “more than half (56 percent) of young drivers use cell phones while driving”. I get it, the stats are against 16 year old drivers, but did you raise your child to be morally conscious? Did you raise your child in a loving environment full of trust and open communication? If you answered yes, then you have already started your child on the path of driving success.

I am a firm believer that if you are truly raising your children to have the moral standards you wish to instill in them such as honesty, integrity and trust then you have no reason to install some video monitoring device into their vehicle. Installing a device that will record your child while driving is not only a distraction while out on the road, it is telling them that you do not trust them to make educated, morally just decisions on their own.

You can stop feeling guilty because you do not wish to purchase these crazy video devices that do not provide the room to grow your children so deserve. Sit back, relax, and worry from home like the parents in the good old days did, then when your child arrives home safely from their day or night out, talk to them, discuss any situations that may have occurred, appreciate that  your child is responsible enough to hold a state drivers license.

Written by: Brandy from Happily Blended

Image credit: Rchard Simpson

About Nichole Smith

Nichole Smith has written 311 posts on The Guilty Parent.

Founder of The Guilty Parent and Chaos in the Country (http://www.chaosinthecountry.com), Nichole is a writer, blogger, social media strategist, wife to one, mother to four and embracer of mommy guilt.

• View all posts by Nichole Smith →
• Blog
• Twitter
• Facebook