This is a ramble that came on because of recent travels.
I want to start this posting with an admission that I grew up in front on the TV. Most of my friends did as well. But we still got outside and played, even when it was over 110-degrees in the summer. But it is certainly true that I watched A LOT of TV growing up.
But I think things are different now. I have seen this for years, but since I am writing a blog now I thought I would write something about it, and that is kids on devices.
I think it is a problem. I was at a hotel and in the elevator the “3-year-old” was staring at a cell phone from the moment their parents guided them into the elevator until we reached the 4th floor and they guided them out and down the hall. They kept saying, “hurry up, keep coming.” They never said, “Why don’t you stop looking at that phone and pay attention to where you are going and where we as a family need to get to?” It was so weird.
I was at my hair stylus and the entire time I was in the waiting area there was a mother holding up a tablet for their “less than one-year-old” so they could watch a video. The parent wasn’t doing anything else. They were staring at the kid watch the tablet. Why not interact with your kid rather than hold a tablet up? Is there something that is preventing a parent for engaging with their kid?
And I see it all over the place. I think restaurants are another place where I really don’t get it. I grew up going to restaurants with my family at least once a week, and we were expected to talk while we waited for food. Nowadays if I am at a restaurant I always see more kids with phones than without phones in front of them. What is so important on the phone that it can’t wait a dinner time?
I would like to know how many of these kids are going to end up living on their phones when they are older? They won’t see the value in interactions with others if it isn’t connected directly to their devices. I know this is is already an issue. You hear stories about kids that rely more on their likes/hearts/etc. that they get on social media more than what someone verbally says to them. And I think this starts young.
My kids, so far, don’t live on devices. Well, I am starting to see it a little bit with my younger kid and her love for audiobooks. My wife and I were just talking about how we are going to need to limit her time on the listening and make sure she is still engaging with those around her. At the same time at least when she is listening to an audiobook she is sometimes doing something else constructive like cleaning her room, but that is only an excuse I think on my end.
I get that sometimes it is nice to distract kids with something, and nowadays that seems to be a device of some kind, but why do we default to a device as a society? We didn’t. We would try to talk, maybe listen to music, or have them do a craft or something. Or, heaven forbid, have them go outside and run around some.
So, maybe people should think about what it means to have kids (babies even!) staring at screens all the time, everywhere they go. It can’t be good for them. It just can’t be.