The amount of screen time children spend in front of digital devices is worrying. Children don’t seem to tire of watching YouTube on mom’s smartphone, plying apps on their tablet, or playing video games on the family TV.
This one’s squarely in your hands and will take some work, but managing screen time is important and becoming more so at lightning speed. As parents know, kids don’t see screen time as a problem, but you can help them recognize it by working to instill successful screen time management techniques and philosophies in them from the start. So, here we are. Let’s all agree that monitoring and managing your kids’ screen time becomes an integral parental responsibility. What does managing screen time even mean? How does a parent control screen time when it’s her child’s lifeline to remote education and even socialization due to the global Coronavirus shutdown? And, how are parents and kids supposed to decrease screen time when they’re already stressed by global circumstances? It’s important to stay cool, calm and collected during the COVID-19 outbreak. While Coronavirus has made the use of digital devices even more a part of our daily lives, this was happening already. Now, the transition is going to continue to accelerate, which means it’s a good time for parents to both embrace and confront this new reality in which we find ourselves. And, that reality isn’t all bad. Families are starting to be creative and spending more fun time together. Couples are working on deepening their relationship. Kids and adults are hanging out with their neighbors for social time like having a glass of wine together talking over their fence. There are positive messages in windows and written on the sidewalk. People are cooking more. Kids are learning to cook. People are “camping†indoors and in backyards. People are reading more and catching up on movies. In short, we are adapting.