Cingular is trying to bridge the generational communication gap as parents and teens compete in the first-ever TXT Bee — Do U KNW UR TXT IQ? Cingular Wireless hosting a series of interactive TXT Bees at select high schools throughout the country, with the inaugural event taking place tomorrow, Friday, January 19th at West Orange High School in West Orange, New Jersey. Cingular will be hosting additional TXT Bees in Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, Florida and Texas over the next couple of months.

To help educate parents on text messaging, the Cingular TXT Bee utilizes the spirit of competition to encourage parents to start communicating in the “language” of teens. Cingular TXT Bees put five parent-teen teams to the “text” in a series of wireless communications exercises in a fun game-show style environment. The events are a component of Cingular’s TXT2Connect campaign launched in August 2006.

“Texting has become an entirely new forum for young people to communicate with each other,” said Cristy Swink, executive director of messaging, Cingular Wireless. “To many parents, this new language of text messaging may often seem irrelevant or appear to be unfathomable. Through our TXT2 Connect campaign and TXT Bee events, we are helping parents interact with their kids through text messaging in a fun environment. For some parents, this may be the first time they’ve ever tried to text. Once they see how simple it is, we are hopeful it won’t be the last.”

The teams will be competing for a $5,000 scholarship and a $5,000 donation to their high school from Cingular Wireless.

TXT2CONNECT - A Parent’s Text Tutorial
Together with clinical psychologist and parenting expert Dr. Ruth Peters, Cingular has developed “TXT2CONNECT - A Parent’s Text Tutorial.” The tutorial provides parents with tips from Dr. Peters on how to better communicate with their kids via text messaging and to understand popular text messaging lingo.

Contrary to what parents might think, kids want to communicate with parents - on their own terms. With text messaging, parents can connect with teens in a more convenient way. Text messaging allows parents to get quick answers to important questions, give their teen independence while still staying connected and enter their child’s world by using the child’s preferred mode of communications. Texting gives kids more space and allows parents to keep in touch as often as necessary.

Sixty-three percent of parents who use text messaging believe that it improves their communication with their children, according to a recent Cingular survey on text messaging and parents conducted by Mediathink. In addition, 65 percent of parents who text message say they communicate more frequently with their children when they are away from home and 64 percent said that texting made their kids easier to reach.

According to Dr. Peters, text messaging is a great option for parents and kids to stay in touch because:

- Parents get a quick answer to their questions. This is good for today’s busy kids, who are often in between school and extra-curricular activities or hanging out with friends, and might not, or in some cases can’t, take the time for a normal conversation.

- Kids are more apt to respond to text messages when they are with their friends. It is more discreet and their answers don’t have to be as detailed as in a conversation.

- You, or they, don’t have to worry about tone of voice. Some kids tend to become defensive when they hear their parent’s tone of voice, which often results in delayed return phone calls or avoidance. Texting helps to take tone of voice and misinterpretation out of the mix and can improve response times.

- Texting allows you to enter your child’s world. By using text messaging, parents can communicate in the style their children are used to, and become more hip in their children’s eyes. An example might be a parent who sends a text to her daughter on a blind date to ask her how the date is going. “Is he Mr. Wonderful?” or “Is he a frog or a prince?”

- Text messaging allows parents to compose and edit a message before pressing send. If emotion surrounds an issue, Dr. Peters often counsels parents to write things out before actually saying them to their kids to help edit their thoughts. By making parents think about it more, texting removes explosive emotions from potentially charged communications and situations.

- Texting vs. calling gives kids more space but allows parents to keep in touch as often as necessary. For instance, it is a good way to double check their child’s whereabouts without nagging.

- Text messaging can also be used to strengthen parent-child bonds, and let kids know that their parents are thinking of them. Send them a text wishing them good luck before the school play audition, or let them know you are thinking of them if there is something they were concerned about such as a difficult test or a grade.