Is there a way for an administrator account to access a normal account...

without resetting the normal account's password?
I'm coming from years in a PC world and I'm very new to the Mac. I bought an iMac several months ago as a family computer. My kids use it for homework, web surfing and email.
I created their accounts as normal accounts and my account is an administrator. On several occasions I've wanted to update some software (like iTunes or MS Office) and the application is locked by another user. I could reset their password, or I could force a shutdown and risk losing unsaved homework.
Is there a process by which an administrator or super user can access a normal user's account?
Of course, I could also use this method to snoop on the kids, which is also an objective...
Thanks.

The user accounts are set up to prevent access by others, and any application that is installed in a public area (in /Applications, for example) is available for all users and can be updated by the administrator. That said, the superuser does have full access to all files from the Terminal if they know what they are doing, but I don't see any particular reason to do it this way (unless you are really wanting to snoop).

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From Here http://support.apple.com/kb/HE37

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Is there a way for an administrator account to access a normal account...

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