Instagram is sparking up real conversations between teen creators and their parents/carers. Through a partnership with ReachOut, it’s launching a campaign to talk about safety and wellbeing called Reel Talk. 

Featuring TikTok’s favourite parent and teen duos, the campaign will highlight Kat Clark and her daughter Deja, Bobbi Lockyer and son Sebastian and George Ray and mum Roslyn producing video Reels for the platform. The series showcases how parents and young people can have normal conversations about social media, wellbeing and keeping safe online, and thinking twice before sharing with their online communities. 

We all know it can be daunting for young kids to talk to their parents about their online presence, and vice versa. The campaign hopes to break down these barriers when it comes to social media use. The campaigning aims to encourage conversations – hence its name, Reel Talk. It will focus on how media platforms like Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok work. 

With recent data breaches across the globe, privacy is an ongoing issue, which may also spark conversations in the family on the safest measures to protect private information, particularly with children. The campaign also aims to spark conversations on how to deal with online trolls and racism, aiming to raise awareness about how damaging this can be for younger people. 

“Social media has really helped connect us as a family because I feel like that’s how young people communicate these days,” says Clark, reflecting on the use of social media in her family.

In Instagram’s press release, she goes on to highlight how she approaches her daughters on the topic of social media.

“If there is anything that I am concerned about for my daughters on social media, that’s when I have a conversation with them and talk about it. It is also super important for parents to learn how to follow and message people on social media, because they’re going to be able to pass on their knowledge to their young person to keep them safe. We’re really proud to be working with ReachOut and Instagram to help spread awareness on social media wellbeing and safety.”

Director of service at ReachOut, Jackie Hallan also addressed the importance of the campaign. 

“As the role of social media in teens’ lives has grown, so have parents and carers’ concerns about online safety. We know that parents and carers want to help their teens navigate the online world but it can be confusing and overwhelming,” she says.

Hallan outlines ways in which online safety can be improved, suggesting that “online safety is to empower young people and their parents with online safety tools and the support they need to  have conversations about social media, work together to set boundaries and connect to find solutions if something does go wrong. Reel Talk builds on the work of ReachOut Parents and Instagram via the Parents’ Guides to Instagram by showcasing real life lessons from experts – parents and teens themselves.” 

Earlier this year, Instagram launched wellbeing tools via its ‘Family Centre’, allowing parents and guardians to be able to access tools and resources from experts that help young people access safety across Meta’s platforms.