I implemented your suggestion of never giving a child a device out in public or in the car, and aside from a 3 hour bus ride from Seattle to Portland, I haven't caved on this. I am also pretty adamant about never handing him our cell phone. I was tested on this recently when our laptop did not pick up very good wifi on a plane, but our cell phones worked (for the most part). I ended up just switching seats with him so he could stare out the window and open and close the shutter (annoying, I know, but better than him opening and closing the tray table, which is his number one passion on an airplane). I felt triumphant when we kept him satisfied for about half the flight without the screen.
One thing I have noticed is how I like to use my phone while he is watching TV, and I see him trying to get my attention while I am on it. I know I need to change this, but I am so tired and it is hard for me to read or do other seated things when his shows are on. I like to be near him, to feel him next to me, but I know that I need to either go in a different room or find something else to do with my hands.
As a teacher, I find my district's reliance on digital curriculum and programs to be really frustrating because I would like to have a good balance of on- and offline work. I am not allowed to order class sets of novels, we don't have text books, and I am limited on paper, so it's very hard to get a good balance.
This piece was so thorough and helpful to read. Thank you for your vulnerability and encouragement on this topic!!!
Thank you so much for writing this piece! I often feel like a real outlier in terms of our family's attitudes towards screens (especially phones), so it is really nice to know that there are other folks out there making different choices. My daughters are 7 and 10 and the older one has been asking (and asking and asking) about phones - so many of her classmates (4th grade) started this school year with either phones or watches. I was shocked to see this happening at the beginning of this school year. Of course she started asking even more about getting a watch or phone and when I asked her what she thought she would do with it she said "everyone looks at their phones and watches at recess and I have nothing to look at." I found this absolutely chilling and heartbreaking (and told her so). At her 9 year well child check her pediatrician launched into a diatribe about kids and social media and phones - she said that what she is seeing in her teen patients is very very worrisome and much of it is linked to social media, so it has helped to be able to reference that conversation with our kid. We are resolute that neither of our kids will get a smart phone before high school and I really like your rationale around 16 being the right age so I may adopt it.
Meanwhile, we do let our older kid walk home from school (~1 mile in a residential neighborhood in Portland, OR), go to our library branch on her own, walk to the park, etc. and she is one of very very very few of her peers in the neighborhood who is permitted to do this. So many people say I should put an airtag in her backpack or get her a fitbit or something similar which I also find chilling and to be a total invasion of her privacy. And I feel very alone among my cohort of parents in our approach, but her confidence and overall wellbeing have so improved from getting more and more autonomy and unsupervised time to herself. Anyway, I'm rambling but just wanted to say that I am here in solidarity and am grateful for folks like you who share about these decisions publicly and honestly.
Thanks for this, Edan. I have gotten good at saying no to phones and screens. When they ask when they get phones I say I don’t know. My kids are 10 and 12. We are a very low tech family. Husband and I each have computers. Kids have their school computers (thanks Covid grrr). We watch occasional movies and shows together on a laptop .(also I’m fairly addicted to my phone. Need to work on that.) Of all my parent friends I’m the most vocal about encouraging everyone to hold off. I share articles and studies and tell my friends to ask me to stop if it’s annoying. So far so good…Sometimes I feel smug about my mostly screen free kids probably because we are conditioned to be siloed by late capitalism. Listening to social psychologist and book author Jonathan Haidt on a podcast recently woke me up out of my self-congratulatory state. He argues that the only way we are going to get our kids out of this is through community action - we should be storming district offices to lobby for phone-free schools, holding meetings at our kids’ schools about what can be done because it’s not that hard but it has to be done together. Aaaand I’m so very tired as I think all parents are these days - job husband kids parenting self care - it takes individuals to organize. I’m not sure i have it in me but maybe if I stop scrolling!
A parent of older children (24, 21 and 18) here just to say you are doing a great thing! My kids would say the same thing if they read your piece. They hate what cellphones have done to their generation, and talk about the 70's and 80's, when my husband and I were kids, as the glory days. They had and have varying degrees of smartphone engagement (my youngest got one much earlier than my oldest, for example) but I do think having restrictions around usage and keeping the conversation front and center in our family has made them more thoughtful consumers of media and screen time, and built up in them a noticeable preference for off-screen life and relationships. It's really brave to go your own way on this, but I think you are at the forefront of where this is headed. I hope so anyway!
Thank you for addressing this. One of my biggest regrets is allowing our son to have a smart phone when he was 13 1/2. I remember feeling proud that we’d held out compared to his peers. I will not make the same mistake with our younger daughter. Although, she does have an I-Pad that she spends way too much time on.
It’s exhausting as a parent to constantly monitor my son’s phone use. Making sure it’s in the kitchen drawer when he’s supposed to be doing homework or going to bed. Limiting his social media time during school nights, but then expanding it during the weekend. We have now banned tick tock. The NYT has been reporting on how the platform is working to influence and manipulate voters- China and Russia backing Trump is just scary. Recently, my teen son said what’s the point of thinking about politics or voting which made me feel like we’d completely failed.
Thankfully my son deleted Instagram which was targeting him for advertising. When he was on it- he kept requesting a new body wash, mouth wash, hair gel, even a tongue scraper. Instagram has teen influencers that encourage teen boys to become obsessed with ‘maxing’ their looks through strict exercise programs and protein powders.
For my daughter, I monitor her time on Minecraft or kid shows- setting a timer and then listening to her beg for 5 more minutes when the timer goes off. Many of my daughter’s sports peers now have instagram accounts with video clips of their games and for what - college? 10 year olds are already learning how to brand themselves.
One success is I would Never let my kids look at a screen in a restaurant. As a patron this ruins the ambiance. (Nor would I let them crawl under a table though). I’ve been strict about manners. But when they were younger it required constant engagement- tic tac toe, hang man, I spy games. Basically giving them full attention until the food came.
I am guilty for letting them watch the IPad while eating at home. Something I’d definitely like to rein back in.
All I know is there is my son before his phone (an avid reader) and after his phone (only reading what’s assigned for school). He is someone who now struggles with impatience, focus, and procrastination. Hats off to you for holding off! Hold off as long as you possibly can!
Really really loved this. We have made similar choices for our family and have won the reputation in our children’s classrooms as being “the strictest,” which I can’t say i’m mad about!
All of this resonates with me. I have an 11 and 8 year old and am hoping to hang on the way you are, AND I am also itching to move forward regulation and policy changes, from schools to states to the federal government because as optimistic as Haidt is about his “low cost” collective action solutions and how quickly we could collectively implement them, I just don’t think solving collective action problems is that easy, or even any easier than policy change 😭
phew this is hitting me in a tough moment--it's spring break and my kids have been home allll week and the weather's been horrible so I can't even just throw them outside to go play, *and* we just got my 10 year old a smartphone, though with tons of restrictions about what he can do. we've really tried to talk to him about what it's for and not for and the downsides of phones and I'm deeply ambivalent about the whole thing. but yesterday I came home and he was roblox online and talking to his friends on his phone, which is exactly the kind of connection I'd wanted for him.
I fully agree with Haidt that we have another epidemic on our hands and only community effort will make a difference. After 20 years teaching high school, I'm tired of fighting the kids for their time and attention. But it's more than that. I have watched out-spoken, creative, annoying teenagers turn into dull, indignant, lemming-like fools. They can no longer think for themselves. I LOVED those teens that thought they knew everything and could argue with you! In the last 4 years, I have changed what and how I teach literature; my thought-provoking American Lit is now a skill and drill middle school curriculum.
BUT, I also refuse to be the phone police. There are teachers that spend all their energy getting kids off their phones. I'm the teacher that reminds those that can't put theirs away that they can legally drive and will be able to vote in 2 years and I'm not their Mama. Choices have consequences. And here's the kicker: I also have a student that is "TikTok" famous. She gets up at 4:30 every morning to do her hair and makeup which is also when she records her videos. She pays her families RENT with The money she makes which I think is more than I do a month and she isn't on her phone in my class and makes A's and loves to talk.
Stats: 17 and 15 year old boys.
Personal computers in elementary school around age 8 and 10. Mostly played games and watched YouTube.
Cell phones at age 13 and 14-- when they both were in Middle School.
No social media. No addictive games like fortnite.
They mostly make their own choices at this point, but I get to monitor everything they do on their phones and Google account.
Everything about this is outstanding and exactly what we are doing in our house (down to way too much TV but it's all supervised and kid friendly and a family activity and my husband and I watched tons of TV but are still creative and avid book readers and and and...). My kids are 6 and 2. I want to wait until 18, but maybe 16 is sensible with education about etiquette and dangers. I do feel like I should say no social media because all the reasons you list. I've limited my social to 45 min per platform per day and it's hard! I have my phone shut down social media when I've past the time and it counts down my time left in a panic inducing way. But my goal is to free up time and model behavior for my kids. It's an uphill battle
I am so happy to read this! We are on exactly the same page. My oldest is in 6th grade but we are absolutely settled on holding out until at least 16 for a smartphone. Our kids don't have their own devices either, we just really value and emphasize other things- art, music, time in nature, pets, relationships, etc. Do you happen to follow Screenstrong? I've found a lot of good support there - maybe you'd find people near you! Sadly, I still have had no luck finding anyone near us with similar aged kids who is actually living this life. It can be lonely. But the pros for us SO far outweigh the cons. Our kids still have good friends and they are such empathic, creative people who are bubbling over with ideas. They appreciate the value of true downtime with their thoughts and even are learning to appreciate boredom for what grows out of it. They are pretty much in agreement at this point with our approach- but I know it will get harder over the years. They just wish there were a few other kids not focused on the digital world yet.
I have so much to say and no time to say it as I just finished reading this as it's time to fetch a kid but we are very much on the same page (right down to my love of family tv time). 13yo who goes to high school next year does have a phone, regrettably, but no social media and constant (admittedly hypocritical) MomTalks about whether his future self will be happy he watched so much YouTube. More later, I hope.
Thank you for writing this! So much resonates with me, and parallels how we treat screens with our kids. I’m desperate to keep a smartphone away from my sensitive, creative, intelligent 11-year-old son for as long as possible, because I know firsthand how damaging the addiction can be and I can’t help but feel that it’s almost like handing him a loaded gun. I know so many people will roll their eyes at the analogy and think it’s overblown, but when I read Haidt’s piece and think about the science and the numbers of suicidal kids and the report from a friend who recently hosted a bunch of our sixth graders for a sleepover only to go past the room and find the kids who had smartphones engrossed in them while the others just sat there quietly watching them, I don’t care. Fwiw, none of my friends with older kids are happy with their kids’ smartphone use, all of them wished they’d held out longer.
We recently implemented a TV time system with my 5 and 8 year old. They get tokens that represent 30 minutes of TV. On weekdays they get 1 token each and 2 on weekdays. They can save tokens from Saturday to Sunday to have enough to watch a movie. Last weekend my daughter generously gave her brother one of her tokens on Sunday so they could watch Borrowers together.
That system might make me seem neurotic, but I wanted to a) stop fighting when they’d had “too much” for any day, b) give them agency about when to watch and c) build in ways for them to do something else, anything else!
We’re about a month in and it’s going really well! Occasionally my five year old will say, I don’t like tokens! But we’ve stuck to it.
During travel - long car or plane rides - all bets are off and I download movies on old phones and they can watch whatever they want.
I implemented your suggestion of never giving a child a device out in public or in the car, and aside from a 3 hour bus ride from Seattle to Portland, I haven't caved on this. I am also pretty adamant about never handing him our cell phone. I was tested on this recently when our laptop did not pick up very good wifi on a plane, but our cell phones worked (for the most part). I ended up just switching seats with him so he could stare out the window and open and close the shutter (annoying, I know, but better than him opening and closing the tray table, which is his number one passion on an airplane). I felt triumphant when we kept him satisfied for about half the flight without the screen.
One thing I have noticed is how I like to use my phone while he is watching TV, and I see him trying to get my attention while I am on it. I know I need to change this, but I am so tired and it is hard for me to read or do other seated things when his shows are on. I like to be near him, to feel him next to me, but I know that I need to either go in a different room or find something else to do with my hands.
As a teacher, I find my district's reliance on digital curriculum and programs to be really frustrating because I would like to have a good balance of on- and offline work. I am not allowed to order class sets of novels, we don't have text books, and I am limited on paper, so it's very hard to get a good balance.
This piece was so thorough and helpful to read. Thank you for your vulnerability and encouragement on this topic!!!
Thank you so much for writing this piece! I often feel like a real outlier in terms of our family's attitudes towards screens (especially phones), so it is really nice to know that there are other folks out there making different choices. My daughters are 7 and 10 and the older one has been asking (and asking and asking) about phones - so many of her classmates (4th grade) started this school year with either phones or watches. I was shocked to see this happening at the beginning of this school year. Of course she started asking even more about getting a watch or phone and when I asked her what she thought she would do with it she said "everyone looks at their phones and watches at recess and I have nothing to look at." I found this absolutely chilling and heartbreaking (and told her so). At her 9 year well child check her pediatrician launched into a diatribe about kids and social media and phones - she said that what she is seeing in her teen patients is very very worrisome and much of it is linked to social media, so it has helped to be able to reference that conversation with our kid. We are resolute that neither of our kids will get a smart phone before high school and I really like your rationale around 16 being the right age so I may adopt it.
Meanwhile, we do let our older kid walk home from school (~1 mile in a residential neighborhood in Portland, OR), go to our library branch on her own, walk to the park, etc. and she is one of very very very few of her peers in the neighborhood who is permitted to do this. So many people say I should put an airtag in her backpack or get her a fitbit or something similar which I also find chilling and to be a total invasion of her privacy. And I feel very alone among my cohort of parents in our approach, but her confidence and overall wellbeing have so improved from getting more and more autonomy and unsupervised time to herself. Anyway, I'm rambling but just wanted to say that I am here in solidarity and am grateful for folks like you who share about these decisions publicly and honestly.
Thanks for this, Edan. I have gotten good at saying no to phones and screens. When they ask when they get phones I say I don’t know. My kids are 10 and 12. We are a very low tech family. Husband and I each have computers. Kids have their school computers (thanks Covid grrr). We watch occasional movies and shows together on a laptop .(also I’m fairly addicted to my phone. Need to work on that.) Of all my parent friends I’m the most vocal about encouraging everyone to hold off. I share articles and studies and tell my friends to ask me to stop if it’s annoying. So far so good…Sometimes I feel smug about my mostly screen free kids probably because we are conditioned to be siloed by late capitalism. Listening to social psychologist and book author Jonathan Haidt on a podcast recently woke me up out of my self-congratulatory state. He argues that the only way we are going to get our kids out of this is through community action - we should be storming district offices to lobby for phone-free schools, holding meetings at our kids’ schools about what can be done because it’s not that hard but it has to be done together. Aaaand I’m so very tired as I think all parents are these days - job husband kids parenting self care - it takes individuals to organize. I’m not sure i have it in me but maybe if I stop scrolling!
A parent of older children (24, 21 and 18) here just to say you are doing a great thing! My kids would say the same thing if they read your piece. They hate what cellphones have done to their generation, and talk about the 70's and 80's, when my husband and I were kids, as the glory days. They had and have varying degrees of smartphone engagement (my youngest got one much earlier than my oldest, for example) but I do think having restrictions around usage and keeping the conversation front and center in our family has made them more thoughtful consumers of media and screen time, and built up in them a noticeable preference for off-screen life and relationships. It's really brave to go your own way on this, but I think you are at the forefront of where this is headed. I hope so anyway!
Thank you for addressing this. One of my biggest regrets is allowing our son to have a smart phone when he was 13 1/2. I remember feeling proud that we’d held out compared to his peers. I will not make the same mistake with our younger daughter. Although, she does have an I-Pad that she spends way too much time on.
It’s exhausting as a parent to constantly monitor my son’s phone use. Making sure it’s in the kitchen drawer when he’s supposed to be doing homework or going to bed. Limiting his social media time during school nights, but then expanding it during the weekend. We have now banned tick tock. The NYT has been reporting on how the platform is working to influence and manipulate voters- China and Russia backing Trump is just scary. Recently, my teen son said what’s the point of thinking about politics or voting which made me feel like we’d completely failed.
Thankfully my son deleted Instagram which was targeting him for advertising. When he was on it- he kept requesting a new body wash, mouth wash, hair gel, even a tongue scraper. Instagram has teen influencers that encourage teen boys to become obsessed with ‘maxing’ their looks through strict exercise programs and protein powders.
For my daughter, I monitor her time on Minecraft or kid shows- setting a timer and then listening to her beg for 5 more minutes when the timer goes off. Many of my daughter’s sports peers now have instagram accounts with video clips of their games and for what - college? 10 year olds are already learning how to brand themselves.
One success is I would Never let my kids look at a screen in a restaurant. As a patron this ruins the ambiance. (Nor would I let them crawl under a table though). I’ve been strict about manners. But when they were younger it required constant engagement- tic tac toe, hang man, I spy games. Basically giving them full attention until the food came.
I am guilty for letting them watch the IPad while eating at home. Something I’d definitely like to rein back in.
All I know is there is my son before his phone (an avid reader) and after his phone (only reading what’s assigned for school). He is someone who now struggles with impatience, focus, and procrastination. Hats off to you for holding off! Hold off as long as you possibly can!
Really really loved this. We have made similar choices for our family and have won the reputation in our children’s classrooms as being “the strictest,” which I can’t say i’m mad about!
All of this resonates with me. I have an 11 and 8 year old and am hoping to hang on the way you are, AND I am also itching to move forward regulation and policy changes, from schools to states to the federal government because as optimistic as Haidt is about his “low cost” collective action solutions and how quickly we could collectively implement them, I just don’t think solving collective action problems is that easy, or even any easier than policy change 😭
phew this is hitting me in a tough moment--it's spring break and my kids have been home allll week and the weather's been horrible so I can't even just throw them outside to go play, *and* we just got my 10 year old a smartphone, though with tons of restrictions about what he can do. we've really tried to talk to him about what it's for and not for and the downsides of phones and I'm deeply ambivalent about the whole thing. but yesterday I came home and he was roblox online and talking to his friends on his phone, which is exactly the kind of connection I'd wanted for him.
I fully agree with Haidt that we have another epidemic on our hands and only community effort will make a difference. After 20 years teaching high school, I'm tired of fighting the kids for their time and attention. But it's more than that. I have watched out-spoken, creative, annoying teenagers turn into dull, indignant, lemming-like fools. They can no longer think for themselves. I LOVED those teens that thought they knew everything and could argue with you! In the last 4 years, I have changed what and how I teach literature; my thought-provoking American Lit is now a skill and drill middle school curriculum.
BUT, I also refuse to be the phone police. There are teachers that spend all their energy getting kids off their phones. I'm the teacher that reminds those that can't put theirs away that they can legally drive and will be able to vote in 2 years and I'm not their Mama. Choices have consequences. And here's the kicker: I also have a student that is "TikTok" famous. She gets up at 4:30 every morning to do her hair and makeup which is also when she records her videos. She pays her families RENT with The money she makes which I think is more than I do a month and she isn't on her phone in my class and makes A's and loves to talk.
Stats: 17 and 15 year old boys.
Personal computers in elementary school around age 8 and 10. Mostly played games and watched YouTube.
Cell phones at age 13 and 14-- when they both were in Middle School.
No social media. No addictive games like fortnite.
They mostly make their own choices at this point, but I get to monitor everything they do on their phones and Google account.
Everything about this is outstanding and exactly what we are doing in our house (down to way too much TV but it's all supervised and kid friendly and a family activity and my husband and I watched tons of TV but are still creative and avid book readers and and and...). My kids are 6 and 2. I want to wait until 18, but maybe 16 is sensible with education about etiquette and dangers. I do feel like I should say no social media because all the reasons you list. I've limited my social to 45 min per platform per day and it's hard! I have my phone shut down social media when I've past the time and it counts down my time left in a panic inducing way. But my goal is to free up time and model behavior for my kids. It's an uphill battle
I am so happy to read this! We are on exactly the same page. My oldest is in 6th grade but we are absolutely settled on holding out until at least 16 for a smartphone. Our kids don't have their own devices either, we just really value and emphasize other things- art, music, time in nature, pets, relationships, etc. Do you happen to follow Screenstrong? I've found a lot of good support there - maybe you'd find people near you! Sadly, I still have had no luck finding anyone near us with similar aged kids who is actually living this life. It can be lonely. But the pros for us SO far outweigh the cons. Our kids still have good friends and they are such empathic, creative people who are bubbling over with ideas. They appreciate the value of true downtime with their thoughts and even are learning to appreciate boredom for what grows out of it. They are pretty much in agreement at this point with our approach- but I know it will get harder over the years. They just wish there were a few other kids not focused on the digital world yet.
I have so much to say and no time to say it as I just finished reading this as it's time to fetch a kid but we are very much on the same page (right down to my love of family tv time). 13yo who goes to high school next year does have a phone, regrettably, but no social media and constant (admittedly hypocritical) MomTalks about whether his future self will be happy he watched so much YouTube. More later, I hope.
Thank you for writing this! So much resonates with me, and parallels how we treat screens with our kids. I’m desperate to keep a smartphone away from my sensitive, creative, intelligent 11-year-old son for as long as possible, because I know firsthand how damaging the addiction can be and I can’t help but feel that it’s almost like handing him a loaded gun. I know so many people will roll their eyes at the analogy and think it’s overblown, but when I read Haidt’s piece and think about the science and the numbers of suicidal kids and the report from a friend who recently hosted a bunch of our sixth graders for a sleepover only to go past the room and find the kids who had smartphones engrossed in them while the others just sat there quietly watching them, I don’t care. Fwiw, none of my friends with older kids are happy with their kids’ smartphone use, all of them wished they’d held out longer.
We recently implemented a TV time system with my 5 and 8 year old. They get tokens that represent 30 minutes of TV. On weekdays they get 1 token each and 2 on weekdays. They can save tokens from Saturday to Sunday to have enough to watch a movie. Last weekend my daughter generously gave her brother one of her tokens on Sunday so they could watch Borrowers together.
That system might make me seem neurotic, but I wanted to a) stop fighting when they’d had “too much” for any day, b) give them agency about when to watch and c) build in ways for them to do something else, anything else!
We’re about a month in and it’s going really well! Occasionally my five year old will say, I don’t like tokens! But we’ve stuck to it.
During travel - long car or plane rides - all bets are off and I download movies on old phones and they can watch whatever they want.
Loved this, Edan & read much of it aloud to my 10.5 year old daughter :)
Thank you for normalizing this! I’m one of these moms with the same fears but know it’s for the best.