Well off children & children who attend private school spend alot less time on screens?

[Ewetoo]

www.screenfreeparenting.com/rich-get-smart-poor-get-technology-new-digital-divide-school-choice/

Interesting article & I agree.. Well off parents can spend more time & money on enriching educational after school activities & sports. It's a no brainer... My wealthier friends are all off hiking, camping or biking with the kids who do a host of extracurriculars during the week & also happen to read loads.. My normal circles kids like my own love roblox & Minecraft & don't have the same after school activities & weekends spent chilling...

I'm sure it's easier to keep kids off screens if they're literally busy doing other expensive hobbies all the time. But it's not so difficult without much money. My kids don't do a single paid extra curricular activity, but I'm still very strict about screen time. We spend try and spend a good chunk of the weekend outside, or at a free museum (my kids are still primary, I understand this will change!)

But we do have a decent sized garden, and I'm not counting the pennies on petrol just yet, so I do understand that it must of course be much more difficult if you're genuinely struggling financially.

So basically, it's not exactly easier if you're rich, but it's definitely harder if you're poor.

We’re not wealthy (lone parent, two children) but both children at independent school. We have no screens/tech in the week because there really isn’t time (longer days + homework + music practice + reading together). It has a natural limit at weekends because we go out lots and I encourage lots of bike rides etc.

Some of their friends at school have a lot of tech (generally children who have parents working very long hours with no additional childcare so children left to own devices).

But most parents limit tech and their peers do lots of sport/riding etc at weekends.

this post makes me feel awful. My DS9 has autism and finds literally every thing other than gaming anxiety inducing. We have given up on limiting screen time. We have tried all sorts of activities - piano/sailing etc but he will have a meltdown that requires days to get over. We used to go out EVERY weekend to museums and national trust but now he just can’t cope with it. It makes me so sad but the screen is his safe place.

Also, I think that not all tech is bad. YouTube/Roblox are blocked on our Wi-Fi. They’re 99% utter, utter dross for children. (I can unblock it when I need to look up how to fix the dishwasher etc 😂)

Same as you, my DS is 10 autistic and happiest when in the digital world. He was at independent mainstream school until recently. My DSIS kids all went to state school and one of them is often on her phone that the other two aren’t. It depends on the child, not how much money you have or don’t have. HTH.

@thegreenlight completely different for children with SEN and I really don’t think that all screen time is bad at all. If your child finds it soothing and helps to regulate then I’m sure you’re making the best decisions for him x

I must add that I really don’t get the stress over screen time that many seem to have. DH and I grew up in the 80s and did a lot of ‘playing out’ but we also watched SHED loads of tv. We had early consoles too. We both managed to get through uni and get good jobs.

Our jobs are in tech and have given us the opportunity to earn enough to put our kids through private school. We just don’t fear tech. There needs to be a balance but I don’t get this ‘15 mins of screen time a day or they will fail at life thing’. DC spent lots of time playing Robolox but still aced her SATs and Entrance Exam and has many offline friends. Her private school uses screens a lot. They all have their own iPads or MacBooks for class and homework.

The future is digital and kids need to be able to engage with this or fall behind.

I know a lot of wealthy kids who were glued to screens. It's their schools, not their parents who made sured they got detached from them, with D of E and trips abroad and loads of sports fixtures and choir tours and debating soc meet ups and art exhibitions etc.

Going hiking and reading are both free activities. Anyone can do them. But if you work long shifts and are knackered when you get in, you might be less inclined to go for a hike or trek to one of the few existing libraries that haven;t been closed down.

In my experience, less well off kids often get a lot of free play time that privately educated kids don’t. My younger half sisters were privately educated and did endless activities, “educational” screen time etc, but never seemed to have a free afternoon to get out all their toys and make an imaginary world, or go play with their friends. Similarly you see a lot of parents on here that are baffled by the idea of “playing out”. So I think the ability to do lots of activities can be a bit of a blessing and a curse- you’re not glued to the iPad, but you’re not getting lots of time for unstructured play either

What an intelligent and logical comment, thank you! A lovely, balanced perspective, which has also helped alleviate a little guilt here. I have an 11 y/o who spends a lot of time on screens (watching Youtube/Tiktok and gaming although that is restricted to weekends). He's an only child (not by our choice) and very social however attends a private school where similar to other posters his friends do not all live overly close so after a packed day of school activities and sport he chills on the screen. We make sure he sees friends or cousins at least once over the weekend (and he plays a lot of sport) but when there's downtime, screens it is. We are in Australia and I find a lot of kids, wealthy or no, do spend time on screens. I've thought about this a lot and remembered my own childhood, although I had siblings, after a day of school or activities we watched a ton of TV so I like to remind myself of this when I'm feeling guilty about it. Also, he does learn a lot of interesting facts on tiktok I must say :)

I should say my comment was in reply to @Goawayangryman comment - I'm new here so wasn't sure how to reply :)

I was worried about my then 6 year old not reading so made sure that at some point in the day he saw me reading, even if just ten minutes holding a book at breakfast time, or at some point at the weekend. We also took it in turns reading alternate paragraphs of something age appropriate then I’d finish hand way through a chapter and tell him he was welcome to keep reading if he wanted to know what came next but didn’t have to. Eventually one day he just kept reading a bit more and more and will now read a while at bedtime without me. The alternative is lights out! He now sometimes reads in the day too but not often. Look up the 13 storey treehouse etc books. They ate totally stupid but the only thing my boy would read independently for months and I’ve heard so many parents say the same. Hope that’s useful

Great comment.

Time is expensive, all of those screenless activities cost time if you don't live near the woods/open area.

My finances changed a lot over the time I have had my children, with my first she was 3 months old when we escaped a long term DV situation, with no money, no clothes, no job, no family, into a shelter. Her whole early childhood was spent with me working 2/3 jobs. We lived in a crappy flat on a rough estate, she could not go out in her own.
Poor does not equate to stupid, we all have access to the same information but some have less options with what to do with it.

If I didn't work on the weekend to get the bus during the day, to a wood for her to run around in and play- it would cost the bus fare but also it would cost me all the hours that I could not be working. I knew that would have been good for her, she loved running and she liked trees and nature and was so excited by looking for bugs- but I could not afford to take her to do the 'free' activity. Same as I could not afford for her to go ride a bike (even if I could buy one it would have been nicked, and she could have been hurt in the process).
I could get her to the local park on the way home from school, but not for long and our area was rough and she (as a 5 year old) got racist comment yelled at her, sometimes by other mums. So yeah quite often she watched ceebeebies or our dvds because although I was with her- she could do it while I worked.

Finances changed later, our situation changed and although we never had much money, I could work one job with normal hours and we lived somewhere safer.
I could now afford to take her to the woods and to play parks and she got given a bike and she rode it everywhere and she watched way less ceebeebies and our dvds were kept for evenings together.
She was playing in rivers on weekends and climbing tress and it was brilliant- but all of then would not have been possible when she was younger and I had to work during most of the daylight hours when we could have gone out.

Free activities are not free if a parent has to not work in order to facilitate them or if they involve transport to outside the shitty concrete city they live in. Even stupid things like felt tip pens run out and crayons snap and rub away and our library was 3 miles away- so she couldn't always colour and draw or read, but she could watch the emporers new groove, because we had it and it wasn't going anywhere.

@Endlesssummer2022 but you are well educated and coming from a place of relative privilege. Playing Roblox etc isn’t a terrible thing. But I bet your children do other activities and don’t just sit in front of screens? Also, yes, the future is largely digital but playing Roblox/watching Minecraft tutorials and watching children opening kinder eggs on YouTube really won’t help our children much with future careers in tech/engineering/medicine etc. Of course it’s fine to play games for pleasure and fun. But the coding and computing my children learn at school has very little to do with the general crap most children access/watch at home. In the same way that watching a lot of tv as a child didn’t make me a tv producer or actor.

Endlesssummer2022 · Today 07:32
I must add that I really don’t get the stress over screen time that many seem to have. DH and I grew up in the 80s and did a lot of ‘playing out’ but we also watched SHED loads of tv. We had early consoles too. We both managed to get through uni and get good jobs.

Our jobs are in tech and have given us the opportunity to earn enough to put our kids through private school. We just don’t fear tech. There needs to be a balance but I don’t get this ‘15 mins of screen time a day or they will fail at life thing’. DC spent lots of time playing Robolox but still aced her SATs and Entrance Exam and has many offline friends. Her private school uses screens a lot. They all have their own iPads or MacBooks for class and homework.

The future is digital and kids need to be able to engage with this or fall behind.

There'll be no screen time during the week once the eldest begins state high school. She's not going to have time. We're also going to cut child no 2 screen time to zero this term too. Both are free readers from the age of 8 onwards.
Weekends will be more relaxed though.

Poverty of ambition, not financial poverty.

The ceos and senior execs of the tech companies, Facebook, Amazon etc do not allow screen time or it’s very restricted. No or very limited cellphone time and only at a more mature age.

if you have a house with a garden, weeding does not cost, a small packet of plant seeds are not as expensive as a lot of junk. Spending time showing an active interest with children, engaging, conversation does not require money or qualifications. It builds a bond, a closeness - not difficult but seems it for some …….

I'm not sure I agree with this. DD isn't in private school, she has a mix of screen time and outdoor time, she has a walk every night for over an hour with our dog, she rides at least once a week, swims, clubs and other things. And we have a screen time limit.

I have friends with kids in private school who do less outdoor stuff and spend way more time on screens than DD does.

I think it's less to do with education and more to do with the families activities generally.

My DC are privately educated and we are very strict about screens. We would be anyway - regardless of school. DC are some of the only children in their year without phones but have an old iPad they can message mates on if they need to. Their friends all have phones. I hate them. We don’t allow gaming at all. Neither myself or DH ever gamed so we don’t have a culture of it at home. We have been asked by parents of school friends to sign DC up to Roblox and Minecraft but it is a firm no from us.

DC do swimming, cricket, and hockey. Films are once a week on a Friday night. I agree with the PP who said it’s good for kids to be bored - they have plenty of Lego and board games to amuse.

This. I’m a single parent who works from home a fair bit and when my daughter is not in school or childcare but I am working screens can literally be the only way to function sometimes.

I obviously also encourage exercise, hobbies etc and set screen limits and my DD loves reading but when push comes to shove it is sometimes literally the only time to guarantee and quiet and undisturbed environment.

All these people saying “children need to learn to be bored”… I get what’s meant by this but this is easy to say if you have the luxury of having another adult around who can deal with the fallout of said boredom.

For me a screen can sometimes mean the difference between being able to be professional at work and having loud interruptions on client calls and I can’t afford to do that.

It's about attitude. You don't have to be rich to see that hours of screen time isn't healthy. It's not a choice between screens and sailing. You can be poor, or not well off, and still turn off the screens and encourage reading or a local walk. If your children 'have tantrums' or 'start screaming', that's on you.

Chalking up neglectful parenting to 'well she has to sit on Minecraft all day, I can't afford pony lessons' really is making excuses.

Walks are free. Reading is cheap. People who want their kids on screens just like the silence and the fact they don't have to interact with them. It's not money, it's attitude to parenting. Is a child something to nurture or miserably tolerate until it leaves? That attitude.

@Trainbear this is what fascinates me... What do these ceo's & tech seniors know & what info do they have on the developing brain to say their children can't access tech for long... Apparently Silicon Valley parents who are making millions in tech (or on huge salaries) keep there kids unplugged & enrol them in tech free schools...

What crap!

I live in the most expensive area outside London. I’ve never bothered policing screens much. My dd 16 has a room like a library, she loves reading.

We go out walking at week ends and after school. She was never interested in after school clubs except art clubs. But we do loads as a family.

She’s just started 6th form with ten excellent GCSE’s behind her.

And yet she had unfettered access to screens😲

Also anyone who believes hours of watching YouTube ads is encouraging a child's technical capabilities is deluded. Universities are already reporting that young people are rubbish at basic computer use as all they've done is consume media. They can't download files, install software, type or use a mouse. There is still a shortage of developers amongst young people because 'it's hard'. Yes, because it's not blind consumption.

The more technical parents are, the less screen time their kids have, in my circles. Techie parents know the risks of endless consumption without any attempt at creation or actually utilising tools.

LOL! No trust me they get in lots of screen time. Albeit with fancy gaming PC’s rather than iPads and consoles.

My DD went to private school from 2-18 and all of her friends would have plenty of gaming time when they got home, largely because they had au pairs or nanny’s who wanted a quiet life and their parents weren’t generally home from work until 8-8.30.

We’re a IT worker household and didn’t mind her screen use in the least. Would be a bit weird for her to be surrounded by technology all the time and to not understand how it works, how to use it and what it can be used for. I’ve had her taking apart and putting computers back together since she was about 7 or 8.

Private school kids have every minute of their day from 8am to 4.30pm (later if they are doing sport, school clubs or homework), 6 days a week planned for them by school. So there is less gaming time, but they somehow managed to fit it in.

She and several of her friends are doing computer science degrees now, because gaming was their introduction to it. It’s about how you channel that passion, and don’t let it become a passive thing.