We happen to raise our – two years minus a couple days – daughter a screen minimalist, at least until she goes to primary school.
She happens to love reading books, play with toys, do puzzles, role play stuffed animals, crafting, play wit her mini-kitchen, dance and just hang out and do funky stuff.
That, we taught her, plus her talent and personal interest. She doesn’t need screens. Neither asks for them, well, rarely.
Every well developed skill needs 10K hours to develop. That’s nearly 2 years of doing something non-stop.
That goes for communication, focus, patience, love and so much more valuable skills.
If we zombie our kids, they don’t develop those skills.
Starting with screens so early on, their brain will learn that it needs a huge amount of stimuli (a new app, a new youtube video, a new game, social appreciation) and micro dopamine shots.
Result: A kid that can’t focus in a generation of kids that don’t understand how it’s like to communicate with each other in real life.
Parents! STOP putting your kid in front of YouTube before they are 24 months to ‘zone them out’. It really doesn’t add any value to kids.
Don’t let them watch TV for over half an hour until they are 4 years. Don’t let them touch an iPad. They will learn that skill later. They can’t learn from that device.
They don’t need it. You have chosen to raise a kid. Now don’t renounce your responsibility to raise it a kid with a vision on technology, instead of one a slave of it.
Amen 🙌🏽