In restricting her Switch time to this extent?

[Frazzled25]

My daughter is 8 and loves her Nintendo Switch. Loves Minecraft (on creative mode), Animal Crossing, Pokémon, Lego Harry Potter etc.

i usually let her play on it for maybe 30 mins to an hour after school (but admittedly usually closer to 30 mins). She might get an hour or so a day at the weekends and on school holidays. But i don’t really allow her more than that.

Shes started complaining that she can’t get into anything properly because I’m always harassing her to get off, that I don’t give her long enough to do anything decent, her pals are allowed to play all the time etc.

to be fair on her, she’s not a massive one for other screen time, isn’t particularly interested in iPads etc although she’ll watch a bit of tv. She’s not all that keen on sports but I’ve been encouraging her to try some new stuff - she swims a bit, goes to brownies, and has recently started tennis lessons. She reads a lot.

i just hate watching her glued to a screen and I can’t really articulate why 😬 but she’s my eldest and I have nothing to compare it to in terms of whether she’s on it a normal amount or whether other kids get more? Should I relax on this a bit? is it not enough?

Sounds pretty balanced to me. Similar to our 8 year old, although he watches a bit of telly on top too

I kind of have to agree with your daughter. We don't allow the switch in the week, but Friday after school and Saturday between clubs are a yes.
Could you do similar? Then she's getting the same making of screen time, but for longer at the weekend?
That being said, they got the switches as Christmas, and I have seen a real change in their attitude. There are going to have to be stricter rules in place to manage it!

I don’t think 30 mins is enough to get into a game tbh. My DS is almost 7, he isn’t allowed it at all during the week, but at weekends he doesn’t really have a set limit. Today was freezing and we had no plans so he played pretty much all morning, then I dragged him out after lunch and he had another hour or so while I was making dinner. But yesterday we had plans so he had an hour in the morning before we went out. I’m the summer he plays much less as he’d rather be outside on his bike. It all evens out.

My eight year old GC doesn't watch television, so she games for at least an hour a day and sometimes more on weekends over winter. We are all gamers though. I agree with her and think that she should get more time. I hate the attitude on here to adult gamers.

If she’s playing things like Minecraft 30 mins is not enough to really develop anything. There’s a lot of great stuff they can do in games like Minecraft. While it shouldn’t be the only thing they do, games like that are creative and imaginative. My kids have gone on to learn coding and engineering skills. In many ways it’s been better than actual lego (which we also have a lot of!) in terms of skills building.

I agree with her.

You don't like screen time because you likely grew up being told it's bad for us, our eyes will go square etc etc.
The new world is tech focused. We will never escape it and a lot of TV shows and games actually help development.
Everything in moderation I say :)

30 minutes is nothing for the games she is playing. She’s right, it’s not enough time to make any real progress. Let her play for at least an hour at a time.