Do you think rich children stop playing younger than poor children?

[elliejjtiny]

I was watching an old episode of rich holiday poor holiday (don't judge me it's my guilty pleasure!) and there was a little girl, from a rich family who I think was 9 saying that a museum would be boring, but then getting interested and really enjoying it, playing with all the interactive bits etc. The mum said it was great and that she hadn't played like that since she was about 6. I've since noticed that other children in that programme and in real life from wealthy families be more interested in screens and grown up stuff from quite an early age.

We live in a deprived area and the children here, including mine seem to play well into their teens. They aren't glued to phones etc until 16-18ish and when we have friends round to our house the 13/14 year old's are loving the climbing frame, trampoline etc. My nearly 17 year old will have a bit of a moan about a family day out to a museum but when we get there he is really into it. He also loved a trip to the park with his friends. My younger teenagers have their costs on and are standing by the car before you can finish suggesting going out somewhere.

It made me wonder if it's just a coincidence or do children from poorer families carry on playing for longer? I'm also wondering why. One theory I had was that the children of rich families might have better/more exciting phones/games consoles etc. Children of rich families are probably more likely to have a games console each rather than one shared between the family like we do.

I live in France, in an area where most people are pretty affluent but still live in small apartments with no private outside space.

My children are still quite young but I get the impression there is less screen use here. There's a lot of very clear anti-screen messaging from the government, and the official advice is that children should have no screen time at all before the age of 3, and ideally older.

Playgrounds, libraries and swimming pools are always rammed, activities and events for children are usually fully booked, and extra curricular activities get booked up by the pushy parents like me who put reminders on their calendars to sign up the moment reservations open up for the following school year. There are lots of large families here as well, so you often see big family groups playing together outside.

My impression is that the middle class parents round here are doing absolutely everything they can to avoid putting their children in front of screens, which is very looked down on.

If you give your child a phone or an iPad in a restaurant, you will be silently judged by everyone around you. (Or not so silently judged if you're daft enough to have the sound on.)

I think it's very cultural though. I used to be in a baby bumpers group where most of the other mums were US based, and discussion around screens tended to be along the lines of, "How many hours of screen time do you let your kid have each day?" These were generally affluent American women who lived in big houses with loads of outside space and yet their two year olds all had their own iPads. There was one Finnish woman in the group who always used to say her kids had no screen time at all and the others used to bitch about her behind her back.

@MissScarletInTheBallroom do they include watching TV as screen time?

Depends on the poor area I think.

The slightly richer area - aspirational working class area in poorer area - we used to live in kids just weren't about in parks or on street. On asking they were in childcare, groups/activities or big futher afield days out or out with family doing childcare.

Here slightly lower sociel economic class - kids play out more on streets etc but there also more a sense of community in many areas they do. It's not all good there are many late primary and older kids out in dark unsupervised much younger than I think safe.

Both areas had gardens - though more without in second and both had green areas and parks - though luckily more in second - assesible woods and canals.
Having said that second area despite some walkable to mususms and historical sites very few local kids have actually been to them. More edcuated they parents more likely they'll have been to some at some point - though often one further afield and a bigger deal.

I would say though tech wise poorer more of it and for longer and once secondray ages are hit the poorer kids to seem to want trapping of adulthood at younger ages. So I do think overall here more middle class kids get longer childhoods even if at younger ages wc kids are visible playing out more.

I’m also in a middle class French town, I think a lot of people don’t own TV’s here. The kids are all super sporty too, ski on their day off in winter and cycling/ swimming in summer. I take my three year old to the park most days after school and it’s always busy! I think a lot less parents use screens here.

My DD played outside with other children, I though that as she's an only child she would benefit from playing with others and she has.
I don't think it matters if you're rich or poor, your child is an individual and if they want to stay indoors that's ok and so is playing outside. Dd made friends with four children who all played outside and she's still friends with those folk now she's in her twenties.
I wonder how much time each group spend on screens though

Yes they do.

Lots of massive gardens on the council estates probably bigger than the townhouses ones in the posher bits of the city.

The kind of people who put their kids on a TV show are probably not a very good reflection of their class in real life.

It's an interesting point for discussion though. When I was young I was always envious of the kids from working class areas. They played outside until all hours on greens whereas i had a big garden but no interest in playing, if we did go anywhere my Mum would supervise and fuss so I didn't bother playing much. We had a beat up old car and didn't even own a VHS player (80s/90s) let alone a gaming console but ate out a lot and went on foreign holidays. Many of my classmates never went anywhere but had all the latest gadgets, better cars and cooler clothes. Neither was wrong or right, just different approaches.