All my children’s childhood we have limited screen time. They are generally not allowed any on school weekdays (my partner put this in place years ago and gets angry if I relent). They are allowed it on Saturday and Sunday mornings, and holiday mornings, although partner is always unhappy about this and would like to restrict furthur.
Kids are 10, 8 and 6.
It often causes a lot of grief / anger / upset for 10 and 6 who are both boys undergoing assessment for adhd. They often get upset after school that they aren’t allowed any, and when they are allowed they find it hard to come off. This means they regularly have much too much screen time at the weekend as the fall out of them having to come off the screens is big.
My daughter who is 8 is different. She will happily choose other things to do, even if it is a screen time “time”. What prompted my post is that she has spent this morning reading a graphic novel about dragons, and is now singing along at top volume to the greatest showman soundtrack on Alexa, all of her own accord while her brothers are on screens. She just isn’t that bothered. I was the same compared to my brother who spent most of his childhood playing on either our Amiga or his best friends Amiga 😂.
my brother is now a functional adult - much more functional than me, in fact. He has a very good job, although I do look at him sometimes and wonder if he is ND. My point is the screen time didn’t hold him back.
are we unreasonable limiting children’s screen times (as long as it’s not impacting on school work and friendships etc)? Maybe it’s not actually helpful for some children