Setting Up Your Child’s First Computer

Background

My 5-year-old daughter has always been fascinated with computers.  This is not surprising since she sees Mommy and Daddy on their computers every day.  When she was only three, we began making a game out of typing words that she was learning in pre-school, and soon she began picking out the letters of her name on the keyboard.  She would giggle for hours as we helped her identify the letters in words she knew and helped her type them on the screen.  She was typing her name like a pro long before she ever learned how to handwrite it.  Not long afterwards, I installed some age-appropriate games on my computer so she could begin developing her hand-eye coordination by operating the mouse to manipulate the characters in the game.  However, as her skills and enjoyment increased, so did her demand for time on MY machine (these demands always seemed to occur when I was in the middle of a website, photo, or video project.)  So, when I upgraded to a new desktop a few months ago, I knew that it was time for my little girl to take over my old one. Here are some of the issues I considered when setting up her computer:

Location

A child’s computer needs to be located in a place where her activities can be monitored by mom or dad at all times.  I’m not a big believer in a child’s computer “privacy” (more on this in a future post).  We chose to place “her” computer in the living room.  It is where we all hang out together and if my wife or I need to work online, we can bring our laptops into the living room.  As you will see later on, the system is locked down to the point where she can’t get into any trouble at this point, but if she learns that what she does on her computer is not private now, she won’t be lulled into the false expectation that it is private later on.

  The Hardware

My daughter is using my handed-down Pentium 4 PC.  It has 2 GB of RAM and an inexpensive video card that are both more than capable of handling her needs.  No elementary school child needs a brand-new, tricked out, uber-badass gaming system.  However, I have found that even games for pre-schoolers can tax the integrated graphics chips in older systems (older laptops in particular), so having even a cheap graphics card could be necessary, depending on the needs of the software.  I connected an spare monitor and a pair of headphones.  The headphones are a nice way to go if you have the computer in the same room as the family TV.  They really cut down on the audio chaos.

The Software

After transferring all my data onto my new machine, I used the system restore discs that came with the computer to wipe the hard drive and reset the system back to the factory defaults.  I then installed Windows XP Service Packs 2 and 3 and ran all the security updates.  I used a program called ImgBurn to copy the images of her game CD’s to the hard drive, and Daemon Tools (a CD drive emulator) to play the images as virtual drives.  This way we didn’t have to mess with loading and unloading discs, or the risk of the discs getting scratched.  I installed her games from the virtual CD drives and made sure that their icons were on the desktop.  I placed the icon for Windows’ free WordPad on the desktop so she could practice typing and playing with basic text formatting (changing font size, color, etc.)  After installing all of her software, I created a limited-user account (Control Panel –> User Accounts) in her name with no password.  That way when she boots up the computer, she just clicks her name to see her desktop.  A limited user account locks down the system so she can’t install any programs or make other changes to it.

Network / Internet Access

My original plan was to not connect her computer to our network.  I wanted the machine completely “off the grid.”  There would be no worries about malware or accidental access to any of the other computers in the house.  What I didn’t anticipate was her need to access my printer.  Sure enough, not only does she want to print from WordPad, but one of her games has the capability to generate printed coloring pages.  Due to physical space limitations, it was impractical to hook up a local printer to her computer.  So instead I installed a wireless card and connected her to my shared printer.  I then went into the router settings under “Access Restrictions” and added her computer to the list of PC’s that are blocked from accessing the internet (See this post for detailed instructions.)  If we do discover a rare need to access something on the Internet, she can have mom or dad go online on one of our computers and help her access what she needs.  Of course, now that her computer is connected to the internal network, it is necessary to scan for viruses and malware on a regular basis.

Exploring the Issues in Detail

I hope that this case study serves to introduce some of the issues one must consider when setting up your child’s first computer.  In future posts we’ll tackle issues surrounding online security, social networking, and age-appropriate computing, as well as provide detailed tutorials for configuring features and software tools that every parent should

become familiar with.  I invite your questions and comments.