Righting the Tech Ship
This summer it all went off the rails… ok well not it ALL. Just all the tech guard rails and digital parenting stuff. As has been well documented here, we moved and it took over my life (I swear this is the last mention of it!). However, my kids were still around and so it was screens ABOUND. Screens APLENTY if you will.
Kid: “Can I watch a show?”
Me: “Sure.” (As I pack boxes with things that I may or may not have seen for years and should probably throw out.)
Kid: “Can I go on the iPad?”
Me: “Ok.” (As my husband and I clean and pack the truck with yet one more load of stuff for the storage space to make it look like we were the most minimal and tidy of families to ever live in a home.)
I kind of had a sense of what my kids were doing on their screens… but I kind of also let it all go because I had to. It was survival mode.
As we started to get settled into the new house, I knew I needed to reel it back in. I felt awful we got into such screen dependent habits, and how quickly it all happened. Since it was summer combined with survival mode, lots of free time led to this norm of kids getting on screens first thing in the morning… which made me feel guilty and made them feel cranky. Also my 10 year old who was using an old laptop to write stories–innocent enough right?--discovered cloud gaming platforms, had YouTube galore, and was influenced to join Discord–which I later learned is not for kids under 13. Let’s just say he left his author dreams behind in lieu of access to a black hole of games and sites that are the kid equivalent of free online Las Vegas casinos (and they do affect kids brains the same way!).
I kicked the can to August when I knew we would be speaking with Sarah Kimmel from Family Tech for our podcast. I shared with her my current tech struggles, and guilt, and she assured me it would all be ok. Sarah gave me insight on all the parental controls and tools to use to right our tech ship. She also gave me guidance on how to handle working your way up to your kids first phone–a frequent request from my now-5th-grader. The whole episode was basically me sharing the same struggles as most parents (I think?!) and how to keep my kids safe and stay sane as the tech manager in my home.
Here are the main takeaways from our conversation that I put into action:
We did a tech reset while we were away on a quick beach trip. No devices came with us and the kids could watch the tv in the room (which had plain cable so it was Nickelodeon with MASH in the morning and SpongeBob in the afternoon).
Once school started, we initiated a rule of no iPad or video games on school days Monday to Thursday. After homework is done, the kids can watch old school tv together and that is the only screen during the week.
My 10 year old no longer has an old PC, instead we got an Xbox since it is very easy to control and monitor using the Microsoft Family App. He gets to play in one hour increments Friday to Sunday (and days there is no school). This was a great Sarah tip!
So far these tech tweaks have been working well for us (and neither kid has a phone so that does simplify things). Don’t get me wrong, there are days on the weekends when the weather is bad and the screens abound again, but I do feel I am more aware of what my kids are consuming and overall they seem less tied to the tech.
I will be doing a follow up podcast episode to talk about how all these new tech changes got into place, and trust me it wasn’t all rainbows and sunshine. So keep an eye out for that coming soon!
Have you made tech changes in your house recently that worked really well? I would love to hear about it! Email me at cdziembowski@dtownctc.org