Comments on my 7 year old being "young" for his age?

[Plimos]

My just turned 7 YO has notably different interests to those of the majority of his peers. I feel like he doesn't have many friends because of this.

He spends most of his free time reading, drawing, doing lego and playing imaginary games. He has a Nintendo Switch which he likes but will do 30 minutes on it max before he gets bored. Whereas the other boys in his class seem to want to do nothing but play Minecraft, Roblox etc. I have had comments from other parents that my DS is very young for his age because he "still" plays with toys. At 7 surely he's fine to be playing with toys?!?! He has also been teased by the other children because he still watches some cbeebies programmes like Hey Duggee, Maddie, Bluey. He also likes some CBBC stuff and other things.

Academically he's fine, ahead in most areas. And I feel that he is emotionally mature. He seems perfectly happy. But people are making me feel that his interests are too "young" and that's why he gets left out of things at school. Any experiences?

I'm willing to bet the other parents are trying to make excuses for themselves about why their kids aren't doing likewise.

Your boy sounds adorable. Let him be his wonderful self.

I don't think these parents necessarily think screens are amazing for kids, they just think it's "weird" that my DS doesn't constantly want to be on a screen and that he still plays with toys. You know a bit like people expect teenagers to be horrible and then if you get one that isn't they say they are odd.

My elder daughters were still playing with Barbies and making up stories for them when they were 15 ( not allowed to tell their friends though). They were also lucky enough to have much younger siblings so no one commented on their addiction to Fifi and the flowertots and Curious George! Both are now happily married. I'd much prefer my dc to play with toys then engage with a screen.

My dd is 7 1/2. She loves playing with her rainbow high dolls and her matching dolls house and car. I can listen to her making up narratives about her dolls lives for ages. She also has an old iPhone on which she can play Minecraft and Roblox (without a Sim obviously). She divides her time between her toys and her iPhone. It’s perfectly normal for seven-year-olds to still want to play with toys. My DS who is now 12 1/2 is addicted to his PlayStation and plays Fortnite when he’s home. But he only really started playing it all the time since being at secondary school. Before that he would still play with Lego, and still play with his younger male cousin at make-believe games (I remember once such a game when his cousin wanted to play as Elsa and wanted my DS to be Anna. My DS said no, I’m gonna be Thor 😂). Every child is different. My DS is very very good at drawing. Only last night, he was at his air cadets squadron and was asked to design a life raft. His was the most detailed, and they even joked about asking him to design their next information posters.

Even my screen attached 12yo enjoys drawing, and Lego
it wasn’t until 10.5 or maybe 11 that toys took a back seat
Have to say, we did moved her schools, several reasons, but we noticed the kids on her previous school were very desperate to act grown up (nothing wrong) and the parents did pushed this (being so proud of their kids acting older that they were)
new school, tons of kids still being kids, and socially she’s so much better
7 yo are still small kids - your kid sounds exactly where he should be

7 year olds should be playing with toy end of. It’s great he doesn’t have much screen time

Sounds exactly like my 7 year old! Let children be children!

As someone working in education, it makes me extremely concerned to hear parents justifying giving screens to seven year olds for anything other than occasional use. If those parents read the research that I have, they would take away the screens and let their children develop normally doing the age appropriate activities that your son is doing. Smoking was heralded as a wonderful discovery when it was introduced. Perhaps not in our lifetime but, eventually, the tech companies will be held to account as the tobacco companies were last century. Tech is destroying childhood, learning and social development.

Yes I see you what you mean.
i was labelled weird because I wasn’t a moody teen and I liked spending time with my parents lol.
anyway I don’t think your kid is weird at all, mayeb there’s just not enough kids doing kid things!
my 6 year old nephew just got rid of all his action figures because another kid poked fun of him for playing with dolls and I actually cried 😭

@CheeseandMarmiteToasties do you mean a bit like before the poor were taught to read and write? Screens and computer usage are part of everyday life and young people need to be able to use them. A bit like young people needed to be able tonread and write in the 18th and 19th Century to have choices and to be able to compete with the rest of Society. Back then 12 year olds went down the mine having no other escape route. Nowadays computer illiterate individuals will have to do what manual labour continues to exist.

It sounds like your son is using this to self regulate.
My son's diagnosed ASD and awaiting assessment for ADHD and when he gets home from school (in a resource unit so loud and busy) he will get into his box, blanket over his head and use his tablet to decompress
Then he goes back to running up and down the living room and bouncing while playing