My daughter attends the same high school I graduated from, (I won’t tell you how many) years ago. As I was walking through the halls the other day I realized how much the times have changed.

When I went there we had to hide our pagers in our lockers and hope that no one caught, because they would be confiscated. If we had a message, or text (I’m not sure I remember what we referenced them as, because pagers are so cool now) we would “use the restroom” and head for the payphones at the end of the hall to respond to whoever was trying to reach us. Now, the kids wander the hallways listening to head phones and texting with complete freedom.

The latest obsession with them is anything YouTube, Vine, SnapChat, the list goes on and on. Luckily my daughter shares almost everything with me and shows me the funny videos that her classmates post and also the ones she knows are not acceptable. I have to admit some of the things she shows me make me crack up; these kids have a great sense of humor.

Most apps are in good fun, but they can occasionally become an issue, and when I have to discipline my daughter, the first thing I do is confiscate her phone. You would think that would be enough to prevent her from contacting her friends.

That thinking has failed me in the past, and I found out the hard way just how smart kids are. One evening, I took her phone because I did not approve of the way she was acting or speaking to me. I tucked all of my kids into bed and I stayed up late studying and working. When I finally went to bed, I must have been as quiet as a mouse when I walked into her room because she had no clue I was there. I caught her red-handed with one of her old phones in her hand, connected to our wifi. She was using a texting app to communicate with all of her friends. I took that phone too.

Needless to say I now have all of her old phones in my possession and will be donating them to a greater cause for people who are less fortunate to purchase new ones for themselves.