Tech parenting tips for toddlers to teens
Interviews with two of my favorite parenting newsletters
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Happy Monday! Things have been busy over at Techno Sapiens HQ (i.e., my house) these past couple weeks. My toddler learned the word “fox,” but keeps pronouncing the letter “x” like a “ck.”1 My local coffee shop started selling homemade, dark chocolate sea salt cookies. I finally set up my printer. Big things happening here!
But most exciting of all, I was lucky enough to get interviewed by two of my favorite parenting newsletters. I spoke to Parenting Translator about how to talk to young kids about technology, introduce new devices, and keep them safe online. I also spoke to Evil Witches Newsletter about tweens and teens, social media, and how to help them transition off their devices when screen time is over.
See below for excerpts and links to the full interviews. We’ll be back to our regularly scheduled programming next week!
Parenting Translator: Having “the talk” with kids about technology
…should we, from a young age, be talking about the addictive nature of screen time? I know that a lot of us even as parents struggle with how addictive these devices are. So should we talk about that with our kids? Is this something we should be preparing them for?
Absolutely, this can all be part of a larger conversation about the risks and benefits of technology. So, we can talk about how technology is great for so many reasons, but that sometimes it's really tricky to use our screens in ways that feel good to us, and in ways where they’re not getting in the way of other stuff we want to do. It's important to normalize that it can be really hard to put down our devices, both for kids and adults. You might even try using an analogy for your kids, like “Cookies are really delicious and fun to eat, but if we eat 100 of them, we're probably going to feel sick. It can be hard to stop sometimes.” You can convey that as a parent, part of your job is to help them practice putting their screen down when it’s time to do that, even though it can be really tricky.
This is something you can model as well. If you do find that you get distracted on your phone–as we all do sometimes–you can say something like, “I'm sorry that I got distracted. Sometimes it's hard to put my phone down. But I know it's not polite to use my phone when other people are trying to talk to me.”
Evil Witches: An issue to make you feel a little less guilty about your kids’ screen time
What are some of the takeaways that parents will be getting from [your research]?
So often when we talk about parenting and screens, the word “guilt” comes up. What I’m learning from the research is that the guilt is not justified. There isn’t really research to back up this idea that screens are this all-encompassing terrible thing. There isn’t evidence to suggest that the sheer number of minutes or hours the kids are spending on screens has a big impact on their well-being or development.
I do think when it comes to screens, there are a few things that do matter. One is, of course, what they’re actually doing on the screen, which seems obvious, but there’s a big difference between spending hours scrolling through social media comparing yourself to other people and texting with a good friend and catching up.
The second is who they are. Obviously, kids have such different reactions. Kids have such different reactions, different vulnerabilities and strengths. Part of this is just about knowing your kid and knowing what works for them and where they run into challenges.
The third thing that we’re finding is that it really matters what screens are replacing. Not the number of hours or minutes necessarily, but what could they be doing instead?
In case you missed it
Also, “push it” (most recently, in reference to his attempt to push the bathtub plug back into the drain), but the “pu” sounds a lot like a “boo.” Also “clock,” except he can’t pronounce the “l” sound. Has this happened with other people’s children?!
Oh, absolutely! Record the heck out of the toddler swearing - get it on video. One of my favorite videos is of my son struggling to pronounce truck (classic f for tr) replacement, then noticing on camera that he has a nipple, and proceeding to talk about that for a bit. The best use of screens!!