Check It Out: The best defence against screen time is real life
By Joan Janzen
If you played a game of word association, you may respond to the word "addiction" with drugs, alcohol or pornography. However, there is a much more prevalent addiction that’s affecting children, seniors and everyone in between.
A senior made this comment: "I’m 71, and it’s hard to concentrate on any reading material since I started relying on my phone for entertainment and news 10 years ago." And let’s take a look at how it’s impacting children.
Sophie Winkleman, a children’s welfare campaigner from the U.K., recently gave a talk on this topic. She had been speaking to a teacher at a primary school who had cancelled lessons one sunny afternoon and instructed the children to go outside and play. The children shuffled onto the grass, looked confused, stood awkwardly for a few minutes and then asked to come back inside.
The teacher realized they didn’t have the capacity to create their own fun because they were so accustomed to receiving their entertainment from their devices.
"They weren’t traumatized by harmful online material," Sophie said. "They were deactivated by constant low-level stimulation."
Technology is definitely useful to help teach, communicate, explore information and connect people. However, Kirk Cameron asked a relevant question on a recent podcast: "Is technology forming our children more than their family, their friends, their imagination, their faith and their real-life community?"
The recent movie Toy Story 5 has the familiar toy characters Woody, Buzz and Jessie trying to save childhood. Evidently, parents are recognizing the battle they’re in because the movie had the biggest opening of the year worldwide.
The movie tells the story of Bonnie, who wants to fit in and have friends, but her classmates mock her because she still plays with real toys while they’re on their tablets. Bonnie’s parents decide to buy her a tablet, and now the toys in her toy box have a new rival.
Woody and Jessie are off on a rescue mission because they realize Bonnie doesn’t need entertainment; she needs a friend. They focus on a neighbourhood girl who still loves traditional toys and who can give Bonnie the human connection she needs.
"Toy Story 5 is giving us a lesson worth paying attention to," Kirk said. "The best defence against screen time is real life. That’s what homes are supposed to be: imagination stations."
Every parent remembers hearing the first words their child uttered following the beginning of summer vacation: "I’m bored!" According to Kirk, we are doing our kids a favour by simply allowing them to be bored because boredom is the doorway to imagination.
Kids need imaginative play because imagination is part of how they practice being human. They act out courage, they pretend to be helpers and heroes. They build with sticks. They solve problems and extend empathy to others.
Maybe that’s why grandparents are so important. They let their grandkids make a mess, dress up, listen to their stories and play games. More importantly, they let them learn how to lose a game without having a meltdown.
"What our kids need most is someone brave enough to step in and see what’s really going on," Kirk said. "Kids need someone mature to help them stop chasing what is popular and help a child have real friends."
The movie reminds us children don’t need entertainment and stimulation; they need moral formation, Kirk observed. "People form us. Family shapes who we are. Faith gives us identity. There’s a difference between a child being occupied and a child being cared for and nourished. There’s a difference between keeping a child quiet with a device and helping a child come alive by taking him or her outside into nature."
In the first Toy Story movie, Buzz and Woody were young, wanting to be the centre of attention. In Toy Story 5, they are mature, on a mission to help someone else find friendship.
As parents, we want our kids to grow up to become people who transition from self-importance to serving and caring for others. They’ll learn that through everyday relationships, not from looking at a screen.
Yesterday, I watched a dad playing ball with his sons. It was a beautiful scene and a reminder that we’re made for relationships, to love and be loved. Technology is a valuable tool that needs to be used with a great deal of wisdom. It should be a tool that serves our children, not one that imprisons them.
A middle-school teacher made a relevant comment following Sophie Winkleman’s talk. She said one-third of her students have highly engaged parents who limit screen time. Those children are vastly different from the ones who spend more than eight hours a day on their phones.
"Lessons that were once highly engaging and fun, like building a bridge, are now 'too hard.' Parents get angry when I don’t allow their child to look up ideas on the internet," she said.
The same principle applies to adults. A university professor who has taught English for 30 years and is also a computer systems and telecommunications engineer made an important observation. He noticed the more technology is used in the classroom, the less students learn. That’s saying a lot.
Yes, technology is wonderful. But there is absolutely nothing that can replace real-life love, laughter, imagination, community, and caring for and serving one another.