El Dorado, Kan. - Shoving in the hall, calling names, being left out… these used to be the only types of bullying kids had to deal with. But as with everything, things continue to evolve. The use of technology – text messages, instant messaging, Myspace, and so on – opens up a whole new level of bullying, cyber bullying. To help educate parents, USD 490 brought Kevin Honeycutt in to talk to all of the students in kindergarten through 12th grade, as well as hold a public meeting for parents and youth Thursday evening. He was first introduced to the idea of cyber-bullying through a presentation her heard at his job. “The more I listened, the more I got scared, as a dad,” he said. “There were things I hadn’t asked.” That includes such things as who his son talks to online and what he has on Facebook. But he suggested parents not run home and demand to see everything right then. Rather, a better approach, he said was for parents to say they want to see what a child is looking at and who they are talking to the coming weekend. He said that makes kids think about what they are doing through mom’s or dad’s eyes. “If you play gotcha – let me see what you have now – you will see it once but never again because they will use different names,” he said. Honeycutt tries to convince kids that everything they put online is their resume. “When you’re running for office, all that is there,” he said. “I tell kids if you want a diary, buy a diary.” He said even if information is taken off of a site, it can still be found on the Internet. “I say even good kids will do stupid things when no one is watching,” he said. “We’re seeing kids be mean on a whole new level. I think because they don’t see the person’s face, they are taking it up a level.” One easy thing parents can do to keep an eye on what their kids is doing is to bring the computer down from the kids’ rooms to the family room. He has three rules for his son. One is not to talk to anyone online he doesn’t know in real life. “What I tell kids is people lie,” he said. The second is to never do anything online that he wouldn’t do in real life. The third is not to do anything you can’t undo. He also said parents should be thinking about cell phones. “We’re not talking about cell phones enough because they do amazing things,” he said. “They can take pictures and videos. “I don’t think kids are any worse than they have been, but they have amazing choices,” he said. “You’ve got to either join them on the digital playground or take it away.” He suggested parents learn how to use the sites their kids are visiting. One way of doing that is through chat history. Another is Google alerts, in which parents can type in a child’s name or some information and they are sent an e-mail every time that information appears online. “I think we have to have a neighborhood watch online,” he said. “We can look after each other’s kids.”