The other week, after Reagan graduated from preschool (I’m still recovering), we went to Chick-Fil-A for lunch — his choice. While we were eating, a mom came in with her son, about Reagan’s age. She sat him at a table, handed him her phone so he could play on it, and stood in line to order their food.
A few months ago, my husband witnessed a mom and dad give their baby — less than a year old — a phone in the backseat of a car to keep her occupied.
A picture recently circulated on Facebook of a mom and a little boy, presumably her son, sitting at a restaurant waiting on their food for over 15 minutes, both of them looking at their phones, neither of them saying a word.
We get together for family dinners, and everyone spends time looking down at their phone, or looking at a TV, instead of engaging and enjoying conversation with each other, losing important — and fleeting — time with loved ones.
Our society says it’s OK to let children watch TV shows on the ten-minute drive to the grocery store. We give them our phones — or worse, their own phones or tablets — while we wait at the doctor’s office. We fill time waiting with a gadget, instead of conversation.
We’re ruining their future in the process.
When did we become so afraid of children being bored? When did we decide it was better for them to have something — anything — to do than let them sit and figure out how to keep themselves occupied? When did we become so afraid of them being unhappy that we began keeping them entertained at all costs?
People think we’re crazy, and we might be (slightly), but we have never used any movies, tablets or phones when we go on a road trip. Ever. (Lest you think we’re complete masochists, when we had our 14-hour flight to and from India, we let Reagan have every. single. technological device we could get our hands on, because our travel day with layovers both ways spanned two full days, and there’s only so much you can ask of a four-year-old, especially with a few hundred airline passengers on the plane as well).
When I tell people that — that we do road trips, even our 12-hour trip to PA, without any technology — they look at us like we’re crazy. But the reason we decided very early on not to do that is because Johnny and I both have very fond memories of road trips with our families, and we didn’t have the option of any technology. So why start now? It’s not that children can’t spend hours in a car occupying themselves. Generations before us did it, so why make them believe now that it’s impossible?
We do let him have his Reader, which is a pen that reads the words aloud while it scans the pages (although we talked about it a lot before we let him use it, and he isn’t allowed to use it the whole trip), and Marella has a “computer” that lights up and plays three annoying songs, but that’s it. Instead, we sing songs — usually Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Jesus Loves Me, Jesus Loves the Little Children, The B-I-B-L-E, We Wish You a Merry Christmas, Joy to the World, the Star Wars theme song, Running Over and Deep and Wide (eclectic for sure). We talk. We look out the window. We look at books. I usually get a few new toys (thank you, Dollar Tree), for our road trip.
They don’t know what they’re missing, because they don’t know that it’s possible to even have anything besides books and toys in the car.
True story: Reagan was three, and we were driving to my dad’s. We left at 3:00 in the morning, Central time, planning on being there by dinner. It’s only 11 hours to their house, so that gave us about 14 hours to get there — plenty of time to stop at a few playgrounds, for snacks, etc.
We stopped a total of three times. None of our stops lasted more than five to ten minutes (we packed our food). Each time we stopped, we asked Reagan if he wanted to get out for a while, and he opted to keep going. Our last stop, we stopped at a rest area with a big play area. Reagan went to the bathroom, and then we suggested he run around a little bit. His words, from a three-year-old: “No Mommy, let’s just keep going. I want to get there.”
I hate to think of all that I would miss if he was glued to a screen instead of engaging with us on those trips. Same with when we have to wait somewhere. Sure, it would be easier to keep our children occupied with a screen so we could read a magazine, or do something we want to do, but then we miss the entire point of parenthood. Then we miss them.
According to a 2010 Kaiser Foundation study, children spend 7.5 hours a day using some form of entertainment technology. 7.5 hours. That’s mind-boggling to me. It’s no wonder, then, that children act out when they have to sit and wait for something for more than a couple minutes, because they aren’t used to waiting. We’ve ingrained them to believe that something needs to occupy them all the time, and they, quite literally, don’t know how to do nothing, because we’ve never given them the opportunity.
Consider what Sue Palmer, a psychologist who began warning about the use of technology in children early on, says about our use of screens for children: “If the neural pathways that control social and imaginative responses aren’t developed in early childhood, it’s difficult to revive them later. A whole generation could grow up without the mental ability to create their own fun, devise their own games and enjoy real friendships – all because of endless screen-time.”
One of my favorite things I’ve ever read is by Renee Robinson, who wrote “A Letter to My Boys — the Real Reason I Say No to Electronics.”
“We can either allow a small screen to fill our child’s imagination, or we can let their imagination come alive on their own. We can either use our time in the car to have honest discussions, talk about their day and whatever else is on their little minds, or we can encourage them to stifle it and instead focus on a computer screen. But this time with them is short, and it’s sacred, and I don’t want to waste one minute of it.”
And,
“Yes, when we are waiting at a doctor’s office for an hour, it would be easier to quiet you with my phone. But if I did that, I fear I would send you a message that says I’d rather hush you than hear those precious words falling from your lips.
I can’t bear the thought of allowing you to miss out on the wonders and mysteries of this world. When you are transfixed on a screen, the beauty of this world will be lost to you. In every moment beauty is waiting to be discovered. I don’t want you to miss it.”
If I use a screen to quiet my children during down time, I’m telling them that I’d rather occupy them than be with them. And while they are young, it would be easier, without question. But eventually, they will be in middle school, high school, college — out in the real world where they are facing real issues. And if they don’t get used to having real conversations with me now, in those moments that are ripe with opportunity, then when they need to have those conversations, I’m afraid they will keep their eyes on the screen, and not come to me, and that terrifies me.
Of course, we have a responsibility in this too. I hate — HATE — when they catch me looking at my phone instead of at them. We don’t look at our phones when we eat. Sometimes I catch myself glancing at it when we’re playing outside — wanting to see who liked my latest Facebook post, or who sent me that email — but I assure you there is nothing, absolutely nothing, that is more important on the tiny screen than the children in front of me. The news will still be there after they go to bed. Facebook will still be there. Email will still be there. But the moment of Reagan showing me how fast he can ride his bike will not. Those moments are gone in seconds. And if he catches me looking at my phone instead of looking at him, I’m telling him that the screen is more important than him.
For the record, we don’t ban screens entirely. Reagan (and Marella if she’s awake), gets two short TV shows in the morning — a Thomas the Tank Engine and a Caillou, which total about 20 minutes. After his nap/quiet time, when he’s home, he gets three short videos on my computer, which comes to about another 10 to 12 minutes. On Sundays we watch a little more TV, usually Little Big Shots and a Pioneer Woman (Reagan loves Pioneer Woman). Sometimes as a special treat during the week, especially if I’m at a work event, he gets five to ten minutes of a Looney Tunes.
We learned very, very early on that more TV time always — ALWAYS — backfires. Sit Reagan in front of a TV for more than a few minutes, and it might be quiet for a bit, but his behavior after the TV/computer was turned off is always infinitely worse. Even when he was one and two years old, after he sat watching TV, once the TV was turned off, he was so much more whiny and difficult and challenging, 100% of the time, that it negated any of the time I saved by having him watch TV. Why? Because he sat with his mind numbed by a screen — even with educational shows — and when it was time for him to engage again, he didn’t want to. He forgot how to.
Look, I’m far from the perfect parent. (I have a running tally of all my parenting mistakes if anyone wants me to list them). But I want to encourage you that it is it’s not too late to turn off the screen and turn on the dialogue. It’s not too late to set a good example. It’s not too late to set restrictions and boundaries, like no screens or movies in the car, or setting X amount of time to be in front of a screen. Sure, there might be some backlash in the beginning, but isn’t it the end result we’re all working towards as parents? It’s our job as parents to set healthy boundaries.
Just like my children might think eating an entire container of ice cream in one sitting would be fun, of course I wouldn’t let them do that, because I know it would hurt them in the end. It’s the same with computers, phones and entertainment technology — they might think they want to sit and be entertained for hours, but as parents, it’s our job to do what’s good for them, not what they want in the moment.
Let them play outside. Let them build forts and castles and get dirty. Let them tell us what they’re imagining, and their latest superhero story, or that they want to be a policeman, firefighter or princess when they grow up. Let us be the sounding board for their imagination, and not technology. Because, someday, it will matter. This time with them is so fleeting, and I want all of them for as long as I can have them.
