14 Netflix fake ball drop shows to trick your kids into an early bedtime this New Year’s Eve
The Netflix fake ball drop has been a total parents’ New Year’s Eve lifesaver for us. If you haven’t heard of this magic yet, you’ve got to check it out. If your kids are too young (or you’re too tired, ha!) to stay up till the new year,...
What you need to know about the new YouTube Kids parental controls
We’ve been fans of the YouTube Kids app, but admittedly when so many questionable videos were making it onto their little eyeballs, we were waiting for them to make some updates to give parents more control over what their kids were seeing. And well, they did....
YouTube Kids app gets better parental controls, finally.
We’ve been fans of the YouTube Kids app ever since it launched a few years ago, but as more and more publishers are creating content on YouTube, it’s not surprising that there have been some issues in terms of what ends up showing up as kid-appropriate....
Amazon’s Echo Dot for Kids is here. But there will be no “Alexa, buy me a pony.”
The Echo Dot has been one of Amazon’s most popular speakers, so it’s no surprise that they saw an opportunity to bring all the joy and magic and Orwellian fun of Alexa to kids in the form of the new Echo Dot Kids Edition available exclusively at Amazon....
Web coolness: A free girls’ coding camp, the dangers of Facebook quizzes, and Mr. Rogers on Twitch.
Here are some of our favorite tech links from around the web. We hope you enjoy them as much as we did. Hooray for this girls’ summer coding camp, run by Karlie Kloss, which will sponsor 1000 girls in 50 camps across 25 cities. Are you aware of the real dangers...
Could Han Solo really survive in carbonite? The new series Science and Star Wars has the answers.
My son is the type of kid who can’t just watch Star Wars and enjoy it as a fun fantasy world. Instead, it gets his mind spinning: How do the AT-ATs really walk? Could Han really have survived being frozen in carbonite? How do the Bacta tanks work? Well, now we...
Watch Levar Burton read Goodnight Moon to Neil Degrasse Tyson and swoon a little.
We love Levar Burton. Did you ever listen to our podcast interview with him? He’s the best! We love Neil Degrasse Tyson. He’s not yet a podcast guest, but we’re still hoping, because he’s also the best! One thing we’re torn on...
9 of the best educational YouTube channels for teens and tweens to help keep brains sharp this summer
There are so many cool educational channels on YouTube for tweens and teens, but I don’t think that a lot of parents think to open our YouTube app when we look for educational resources for our kids. But we should. Let’s put it this way: when I ask my kids...
How to explain the the U.S. election to kids
We’re always thankful for resources that help make sense of tricky topics for our kids, like today’s election. Even if you really paid attention in history, the Electoral College can be confusing. So, if you’re looking for ways to explain the U.S....Hi! We’re Kristen + Liz
We started Cool Mom Tech in 2010 to help make our increasingly digital lives easier, more organized, more meaningful, and more fun, however old your kids may be.
We love that it's grown to become the go-to source for millions of parents who want commonsense info about tech delivered with a smile.
We even have the privilege of sharing our tips + tricks with The TODAY Show, CNN, HLN, GMA, Nightline, newspapers and magazines around the country, and our favorite -- regular parents who stop us at PTA meetings and ask us how old kids need to be to get a smartphone, and whether they really need to panic about Snapchat.
(Answer: It's complicated.)
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NEW For 2019!
Atomic Habits by James Clear :Oct 1
No More Mean Girls, by Katie Hurley
The Yes Brain, by Daniel J. Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson
How to Break Up with Your Phone, by Christine Price
The New Childhood, by Jordan Shapiro
How to Be a Happier Parent by KJ Dell'Antonia
Raising Empowered Daughters by Mike Adamick
Radical Kindness by Angela Santomero
“We just had our first instance of one of our kids lying about a social media account. Any advice is appreciated on how to handle this in as positive a way.”
So they want to get a smartphone…
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