We wanted to take a moment to congratulate all of the Grand Prize winners of the Xbox 360 Family Sweepstakes: Veronica, Tynishia, Randy and Matthew! Throughout the course of the four-week giveaway, we received numerous entries from parents with a wide array of household media tips and tricks on balancing screen time, choosing the right video games for your family and rules around online gaming and social networking. Here’s some of the great advice we received:

• “Our two kids are not allowed to hear voice chat when playing multiplayer games with strangers and they can only use social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter when we are in the room with them.”
• “Online games are allowed after school lessons are done and only on weekends (along with TV and movies) - social networking site rules are that all safety features of Facebook are utilized.”
• “Parents should play video games, watch TV, and use the Internet with their children. They need to establish cut off hours such as 11 pm on weekdays and 12 am on the weekend.”
• “Use a screen time tracker like the Family Timer which is handily built right into Xbox 360 Family Settings.”
• “To find appropriate games for my family, I check game websites and game ratings for trailers and information on family friendly games.”
• “I rent the games first and play them myself so that I can decide if it’s good or not for the family.”

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Sweepstakes! Remember that GetGameSmart.com has step-by-step parental control set-up guides and tools for helping your family enjoy TV, video games, and the Internet in ways that are safer and more balanced. Follow @GetGameSmart on Twitter or become a fan of GetGameSmart.com on Facebook for updates on the go.
 

As you may know from visiting and exploring our site, GetGameSmart.com was created to help families tackle issues related to online and video game safety –setting up parental controls, having conversations with your children about appropriate media use, and keeping up-to-date on the latest topics such as cyber bullying and even sexting.  But what about the hundreds of thousands of parents out there who don’t go online? Where do they find the information they need to make the right media choices for their families? We decided to meet these parents face-to-face by traveling across the country to five national women’s trade shows in Seattle, Raleigh, Richmond, Nashville, and Novi, to spread the word about parental controls for Xbox 360 and other online safety tools.

At the shows, the GetGameSmart.com booth drew in thousands of women and families as the team walked them through the set-up process for Xbox 360 Family Settings and tools like the Family Timer, handed out resources including the PACT and gave attendees the chance to win an Xbox 360 each day. Not only were the majority of parents surprised at how simple it was to set the parental controls, but they were also excited by the various levels of control they were able to achieve with Xbox 360 Family Settings. The Family Timer proved to be a real crowd pleaser, with many moms exclaiming, “That is such a great idea! I had no idea I could control the amount of time my kids played!” Here are a few more of our favorite quotes from the parents we met:

• “My son is always playing way too much … I am so going to use the PACT!”
• “I love your parental controls and am more comfortable with him playing on the Xbox than anywhere else.”
• “These controls are great! I had no idea you could do all of this.”
• “Control was a worry of mine since I’m about to get an Xbox. Thanks for sharing all this with me!”

Aside from all of the great families we had the opportunity to talk to during our cross-country travels, our team also had a fabulous time exploring each of the cities we visited and hope to hit the road again soon.

Who knows – maybe next time we’ll come to you!
 

Get Game Smart will host the Xbox 360 Family Sweepstakes for four consecutive weeks on Friday, May 28, Friday, June 4, Friday, June 11 and Friday, June 18, where families will have the chance to win an Xbox 360 Family Prize Pack or a $100 Best Buy gift card or spa gift certificate! On each of these giveaway days, you’ll find a new challenge question on the Xbox 360 Family Sweepstakes page around online and video game safety and how your family makes smart media choices in your home. For the chance to win each week, simply enter your answer and email address on the Xbox 360 Family Sweepstakes page – we may even feature your answer in a blog post on GetGameSmart.com!

A winner will be picked at random and will receive an Xbox 360 Family Prize Pack, including: one Xbox 360 Elite console, a one-year Xbox LIVE Gold Membership, and 1600 Xbox LIVE points. You can also find our weekly challenge questions on our Twitter page, @GetGameSmart. Contestants will also have a chance to win a $100 Best Buy gift card or spa gift certificate by following @GetGameSmart and re-tweeting the challenge question from that week. There are four days to win – Friday, May 28, Friday, June 4, Friday, June 11 and Friday, June 18, so don’t miss out!

[No purchase necessary.  Open only to legal residents of the 50 US and D.C. 18+.  Game ends June 18, 2010.  See Official Rules for details.]

One of our Get Game Smart partners, Family Online Safety Institute CEO Stephen Balkam, recently wrote an article for the Huffington Post in which he noted that children and teens should be taught "digital citizenship skills" to help them share information in intelligent ways. Here's an excerpt from the post:

"While there is a recognition that there must be a base-line of safety -- using filters for younger kids and monitoring and privacy settings for the older ones -- the emphasis is now placed on education, media literacy and a new kind of civics. It's time for kids of all ages to understand and value the rights of free speech and assembly (ie, connecting through social networking and other means) as well as an expectation of privacy and safety."

Check out his post!
 

(Posted February 9, 1:07 p.m.)