Back-to-school season is here, marking an important and sometimes challenging transition period for students. Late nights and sleeping in during the summer suddenly give way to early morning alarms, structured schedules and daily activities.

While you work with your child to help them set boundaries and add more structure back into their routines, it's the perfect time to also set up guidelines around social media use. Parents can encourage their children to use social media in a positive way, but also set clear boundaries around the amount of time spent and type of content they see on social media sites. 

Dayna Geldwert, head of Global Policy Programs at Instagram, shares the following Instagram settings that parents and caregivers should consider as they transition to new family routines. 

Take a break. Set time limits with 'Take a Break' on Instagram. When enabled, a full-screen reminder will tell users to pause and leave the app for a while.
Quiet mode. Quiet mode gives teens more ways to focus and set boundaries. Once on, they won't receive notifications and an automatic reply is sent when people receive DMs.
Hidden words. Users have the option to turn on "hidden words" for comments and DMs. Once on, comments and DMs containing emojis, words or phrases selected by the user will be hidden.
Restrict. Teens can use "restrict" to help prevent bullying. Restrict was developed specifically for teens who want a more subtle way to block bullies without them knowing they've been blocked.
Parental supervision tools. Parents are able to see their teen's social media settings, be notified if a change is made to those settings, see who their teen reports or blocks and set "blocking hours."

According to the American Psychological Association, parents can also try the following tactics to limit their children's social media usage and protect them from inherent harms:

- Limit your child's use of social media platforms that include counts of 'likes,' which can be particularly damaging to developing minds. 
- Prohibit screen time that interferes with your child's ability to get at least eight hours of sleep.
- Keep an ongoing dialog by talking to your children regularly about various social media platforms and how they work. Ask them about posts they've seen and pose hypothetical questions to see how they might respond to various situations online.
- Model healthy social media use by setting and adhering to limits you place on your own social media usage.