Parenting in the Digital Age

If you have kids or teenagers at home, chances are you have a complicated relationship with screens.



On one hand, you know that capturing monsters in Pokemon Go or taking a portal to the Nether in Minecraft is probably not the healthiest way for your kids to spend the afternoon.

On the other hand, they are so happy and quiet when they are bathed in the glow of a smartphone, tablet or TV. And some of those apps and shows have educational value, right? What if your child is tracing letters or learning to count? Can screen time ever be beneficial?

To provide some guidance to parents grappling with these vexing issues, the American Academy of Pediatrics has issued new guidelines for how children should spend time in front of all types of screens.

The recommendations are based on dozens of studies on screen time and its effect on the emotional and physical health of kids of all ages. They also incorporate evidence about whether young children really do learn from apps and TV shows.

However, the authors of the guideline noted that the digital landscape is changing faster than researchers can study it.

Here's the latest advice from pediatricians for managing your kids' screen time.



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Use of mobile devices like smartphones has risen dramatically in the last few years. When the Kaiser Family Foundation began surveying parents in 2011, they found that 52% of children ages 8 and under had access to a mobile device. By 2013, that figure had jumped to 75%.

Other studies have shown that most babies start interacting with digital media at the tender age of 4 months, and that most 2-year-olds use a mobile device on a daily basis.

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Some studies have shown that 1-year-olds can learn new words from certain kinds of videos, but only if a parent watches the video with the child and reteaches the words.

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In a 1996 study of 5- to 10-year-olds in the U.S., researchers found that the odds of being overweight were 4.6 times greater for children who watched more than five hours of TV a day than for those who watched no more than two hours.

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Source latimes.com

Dot is like a lot of 8-year-old girls in 2016 — spirited, smart and savvy when it comes to all things tech. Although Dot is a cartoon, she is doing real-world work to inspire girls to take these qualities into their adult lives.



A new children's show, Dot, featuring the young character recently premiered in the hopes of tackling tech's gender gap. The titular character is a spunky girl with insatiable curiosity about the world — and she uses technology to help learn, create and explore.

The groundbreaking show explores what it's like to live as a child — particularly a young girl — in a tech-focused world.



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To help address the gap, Zuckerberg created the character of Dot in 2013 to inspire young girls to see tech as exciting and engaging. Dot, she says, is a role model for girls to picture themselves in a tech industry dominated by white men.

"I grew so frustrated by so few women in the room wherever I went," Zuckerberg tells NPR of her time in the industry. "It was a fantastic decade, but also a lonely one. And so I thought, what if we could get more messages out into pop culture with female role models for young girls, showing them how exciting and cool and wonderful this world of technology is? Maybe that could inspire the next generation of leaders."

In the show, Dot goes on everyday adventures with her best friend, Hal — a young boy of color meant to inspire kids of color to see themselves in the tech industry, too. Along the way, the two rely on tech to enhance their real-world experiences, constantly using their tablets to guide them along the way. But the pair also engages with high tech as well, experimenting with robots, drones and 3D-printing, according to Zuckerberg.

"Dot and her group of friends don't look like your typical cast of characters," Zuckerberg tells AdWeek. "I wanted them to reflect all levels of diversity."

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She hopes, then, that Dot can be a source of inspiration for young kids while also lessening the hesitation parents have to embrace a tech-focused world.

"When [adults] think of screen time, we immediately go to a place of anxiety and fear," she tells NPR. "But children don't feel that way. To them, the future is fun. They don't think about, now I'm using tech, and now I'm not."

Source mashable.com

How much time should kids be allowed to stare into their screens like zombies? New guidelines issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics upturns conventional thinking on the matter, showing that a sweeping one-size-fits-all approach is not the right way for parents to go about limiting their children’s screen time.



For years, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has told parents to limit their child’s screen time to no more than two hours per day, whether that time is spent in front of a television, tablet computer, laptop, or mobile phone. What’s more, the AAP made virtually no mention of age, or the kind of content that should be limited, issuing a simplified blanket approach to media use.

In a series of papers published today in the science journal Pediatrics, it’s clear that the AAP has significantly revised its thinking on the matter, breaking down media use according to all these criteria. And to support parents with these new recommendations, the AAP has published an interactive, online tool that families can use to create a personalized Family Media Use Plan.



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Lastly, the AAP says parents should designate media-free times for the entire family, such as during dinner or while driving, and that families should also create media-free zones in the home, such as in bedrooms—which, good luck.

Indeed, these guidelines are all well and good—and they’re undoubtedly not even wrong—but implementing these prescriptions is another thing entirely. The AAP, with its lofty recommendations, doesn’t sound entirely in tune with the realities of daily life. Parents obviously want to raise healthy children who aren’t constantly glued to computer screens, but these devices are a godsend for those moments when a parent needs to make dinner, or when they simply need to go to the bathroom. A few moments of peace and quiet can do wonders for a parent, powering them with the patience to truck on and put on a genuine smile when the kids comes calling. When it comes to limiting screen time, there’s a tradeoff between parental health, and the needs of a child—and that needs to be acknowledged.

And let’s face it, sometimes it’s fun for both the kid and the parent to watch Minions for the 30th time.

Source gizmodo.com

Common discipline tricks include time-out, spanking, removal of privileges, and grounding. Many parents are even getting quite creative with their tricks, using humiliation, public shaming, and hot sauce. Unfortunately, while these tricks may work in the short term, they erode the trust and connection that are so vital to our true parental authority.



Which leaves many asking “well what do we do?” Giving specific discipline advice is my least favorite thing to do as a parenting author and educator because all situations, children, and family dynamics are unique. I believe we parent at our best when we evaluate each circumstance, reading our children as best we can in that moment, and meeting them where they are to teach them what they need to know depending upon what the problem reveals to us. I believe we need to let go of fanciful ideas of one-size-fits-all discipline, promising programs, and quick fixes and look to our own intuition and knowledge of our children and circumstances.



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Depending upon development and maturity, you might ask her how she made the other child feel and what she can do to fix it. Keep your sentences short and simple. “I’ll keep everyone safe.” “Are you feeling better?” “If you push again, we will go home.” Then, of course, follow through by going home if she continues such behavior.

If she is frantic and will not sit on your lap or next to you, it’s probably time to go home and give her some food and/or a nap. If leaving isn’t an option, consider keeping a calm down travel bag in your purse. I’ve used them in stores while grocery shopping.

Calm-Down Area – This is basically a time-in while you are in the comfort of your own home and can transition to a place your child can go independently to calm down with time and practice. I’ve given detailed instructions on setting up a great calm-down area in this post.

Cool-Off – For older children, taking a period of time to cool-off may be just what they need. This works well with arguing siblings, too. Ask them to go to their separate rooms or separate areas of the home until they can be peaceful together. There is a difference in using a harsh attitude to force a child into his room for 30 minutes and suggesting that a child take some time to read a book or get some space from his frustration. Delivery is important.

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Source creativechild.com

Anger is a perfectly normal emotion, and learning to manage it appropriately is one key to emotional health and well-being. If your child is having frequent angry outbursts, it’s important to get to the root of the issue and teach them calming strategies that work. Before we get into those calming strategies, let’s look beneath the yelling, hitting, and aggressive behavior and into the emotional world of a child.



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The emotional life of toddlers and preschoolers is much more complex, the paper says. Notably, the authors say, “The emotional health of young children is closely tied to the emotional and social characteristics of the environments in which they live.” While differences in temperament are part of their biological makeup, their experiences are coded in their brain circuitry, and what we both model and teach regarding emotions affects how their brain circuits get “wired.” The early childhood years are critical for learning positive ways to deal with one’s emotional world as the emotional center of the brain and the prefrontal cortex (where empathy, reasoning, and self-control lie) are rapidly developing.

This brings us to our main point: How do we help an angry child calm down?

1. Help your child name the emotion.

2. Meet anger with empathy.

3. Try time-in instead of time-out.

4. Teach your child breathing techniques.

5. Teach mindfulness.

6. Give him play dough. For many kids, tactile sensory activities can be soothing.

7. Allow enough time for kids to de-stress through free and creative play.

8. Put her in the bath.

9. If your child needs space to calm down, that’s fine.

10. Teach them how to do a body scan.



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Source: creativechild.com

We’d just collected my third grader from school and made it back home again, which meant my two littlest ones had been held hostage in the car for an hour round-trip.



Which is why the second my feet crossed the threshold, 1-year-old Charlie wriggled out of my arms and headed straight for the LEGOs, with 3-year-old Bailey at her heels.

Charlie picked up a bowl filled with LEGOs, and Bailey snatched it from her. Charlie threw her head back and let out a high-pitched wail.

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But what’s the difference between telling another person they are something bad versus telling them they’re being something bad?

Were these labels helping my children learn an important life lesson? Or were my words introducing shame and sadness, squashing any potential for them to learn from the situation?

I thought back to when I was a kid. When my uncle called me “grumpy” or my sister called me “lazy” or my teacher called me “shy.” Labels stick. More than 30 years later, they stick.

The idea of my careless words to my three-year-old sticking 30 years later? My eyes filled.

I promised myself I’d figure out the answer once and for all – what effect do my words really have on my kids? I spent several nights after the kids were in bed reading article after article, post after post. Here are the highlights of what I found:

When your child is shamed for her behavior, she’s so wrapped up in her own negative emotions that she’s less capable of feeling empathy toward others.

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Labeling your child’s behavior (or personality) in a negative way becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. In other words, when you declare something like this to yourself or another person, it’s enough to influence your behavior to fulfill that declaration of “truth.” For example, let’s say you’re nervous about giving a presentation and think to yourself, “I’ll probably forget all the words.” Then you probably will – you’re living “down” to a self-fulfilling prophecy. This phenomenon even has a name – the Golem effect. But if you tell yourself, “I’m excited to share what I know,” then you’re more likely to do well.

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I pulled back from our hug to see whether Bailey was starting to calm down. Her eyes were still rimmed in red, but the tears had stopped.

“Will you forgive me?” I asked.

She nodded, and then a pudgy baby hand appeared between us.

Little Charlie, holding out a LEGO that had been in the coveted bowl. A peace offering.



Bailey smiled. “Thank you, Charlie.”

And in response, Charlie did the hand sign for “thank you.”

An impromptu exchange of kindness between a three-year-old and a one-year-old.

I smiled big and scooped Charlie into my lap next to Bailey. “You guys are awesome sauce.”

Now, that’s a label I don’t mind sticking around for 30 years.

Source: idealistmom.com

In the course of his research, leadership expert and author of best-selling psychology books Dr. Tim Elmore has discovered several major mistakes which parents often make when raising their children, which can reduce their self-confidence from an early age and limit their chances of becoming successful in their careers and personal lives.



To help you avoid making the committing the same errors, we’ve reproduced them below. Take a look.

1. We don’t let our children experience risk
We live in a world that warns us of danger at every turn. The «safety first» preoccupation enforces our fear of losing our kids, so we do everything we can to protect them. It’s our job after all, but we have insulated them from healthy risk-taking behavior and it’s had an adverse effect. Psychologists in Europe have discovered that if a child doesn’t play outside and is never allowed to experience a skinned knee, they frequently have phobias as adults.

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2. We rescue too quickly
Today’s generation of young people has not developed some of the life skills kids did 30 years ago because adults swoop in and take care of problems for them. When we rescue too quickly and over-indulge our children with «assistance,» we remove the need for them to navigate hardships and solve problems on their own. It’s parenting for the short-term and it sorely misses the point of leadership—to equip our young people to do it without help.

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3. We rave too easily
The self-esteem movement has been around since Baby Boomers were kids, but it took root in our school systems in the 1980s. Attend a little league baseball game and you’ll see that everyone is a winner. This «everyone gets a trophy» mentality might make our kids feel special, but research is now indicating this method has unintended consequences.

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4. We let guilt get in the way of leading well
Your child does not have to love you every minute. Your kids will get over the disappointment, but they won’t get over the effects of being spoiled. So tell them «no» or «not now,» and let them fight for what they really value and need. As parents, we tend to give them what they want when rewarding our children, especially with multiple kids.

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5. We don’t share our past mistakes
Healthy teens are going to want to spread their wings and they’ll need to try things on their own. We as adults must let them, but that doesn’t mean we can’t help them navigate these waters. Share with them the relevant mistakes you made when you were their age in a way that helps them learn to make good choices. (Avoid negative «lessons learned» having to do with smoking, alcohol, illegal drugs, etc.)

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6. We mistake intelligence, giftedness and influence for maturity
Intelligence is often used as a measurement of a child’s maturity, and as a result parents assume an intelligent child is ready for the world. That’s not the case. Some professional athletes and Hollywood starlets, for example, possess unimaginable talent, but still get caught in a public scandal. Just because giftedness is present in one aspect of a child’s life, don’t assume it pervades all areas.



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7. We don’t practice what we preach
As parents, it is our responsibility to model the life we want our children to live. To help them lead a life of character and become dependable and accountable for their words and actions. As the leaders of our homes, we can start by only speaking honest words — white lies will surface and slowly erode character. Watch yourself in the little ethical choices that others might notice, because your kids will notice too.

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Source: brightside.me