Why oh why are people giving their under 12s tablets?

[Bigpinksweater]

The evidence regarding the effects of tablets on developing brains is damning. They are absolutely not necessary and barely existed 15 years ago. We are seeing huge rises in behavioural and developmental issues while steadfastly ignoring the fact screen time and in particular tablets can contribute to virtually all of them.

Why oh why are people still handing their toddlers and primary school children tablets?

Critical thinking around ADHD and the explosion in diagnosis involves suspension of "empathy".

In Wales at one point, 50% of kids were listed as SEN. What total BS that renders any diagnosis meaningless. Most people get these diagnoses in order to access the benefits that go with it, let's be honest. For example, extra time in exams. Or, as an adult, cushier office equipment.

You are ignorant and ableist.

You understand that getting hurt like breaking an arm is one thing, a child who will impulsively run in front of a truck getting hurt is something else entirely. You understand that right?

Ok! Go well! :)

There are likely no trucks out in the woods or riverside. We obviously aren't talking about sending kids to play out on the M4

Diagnosis does not = DLA.

So to be clear you don't have children? Have neverpareinted a child? Let alone a child with additional needs? Yet think you know more than my child's neurologist, neuropsychologist, occupational therapist and specialist SEN educators?

I thought that this was about medication and I was going to say “because my kids could swallow tablets before they age of 12” 🤦🏻‍♀️

Yes my son spends 3-4 hours a day outside every day, supervised. Parks, woodlands, cycling, dog walks. Every single day. You want to send a child with no impulse control to a riverside alone?

I'm talking specifically about my 7 yr old who has several developmental issues including a seizure disorder. Strongly suspect if I let him out to play and he drowned or was hit by a car due to lack of impulse control you'd be the first to say 'why on earth would you let a child like that out to play unsupervised at only 7'

The real issues come in with a high number of hours in front of the screen and/or completely unsupervised access.

Let’s face it, the kids that spend hours and hours on an ipad aren’t that many. They will mostly fall in two categories. Kids that need that time due to SENDs or kids who have parents that can’t or won’t spend quality time with them.

With the first category it is what it is, and in fact the iPad can be extremely beneficial and expand that child’s world (for example communication ). Plus , some of those children would struggle anyway in certain areas.

The second category, let’s face it, with or without an iPad, the outcomes would be the same , particularly for the parents that won’t. They’d just send their kids out, put them in front of the telly, ignore them or whatever. Again, very likely for those children to have some issues there with or without the iPad.

I have three. They have no devices.

I have no idea about your child's individual needs. I do know that the iPad was invented less than a couple of decades ago, the ill impact is well documented and that there is absolutely no need for your child to use one whatsoever.

I also know that basic critical thinking indicates that 50% of children (ref Wales) do not have special needs, and that clearly there is something going on around overdiagnosis for incentive-based reasons here.

" In the 90s, we were sent outside and told to entertain ourselves, and guess what, we all did!"

There were also many safeguarding failings with this which parents now are more aware of. I was also a 90s child who was put out in the morning after breakfast and expected to only appear again when I was hungry - this was how my mother coped with serious depression so as you can imagine our engagement and investment from her was minimal. This also affects development. Never mind all the children who were abused or abducted. We have smaller rates of stranger abduction or assault on children now because parents are more vigilant as to where their kids are and who they are with. I think you're looking at the 90s with very rose tinted glasses on unfortunately. Many children with ADHD or ASD were effectively failed in the 90s because they didn't receive adequate support or adjustment.

There's no excuse for a child to be sitting 24-7 on a screen but I think we also need to be careful not to confuse a struggling parent with a lazy parent because that's a race to the bottom and the judgement helps noone. However there are plenty of short intervals where actually a screen can be useful if monitored and utilised carefully for example ds and I were at a hospital appointment recently, it ran over by well over an hour than what I'd been prepared for so naturally ds got bored of the toys I'd brought and there was nothing to use in the waiting area. We did many rounds of eye spy etc but eventually he started to get bored and fussy and was beginning to sing to the rest of the people waiting. So in that scenario I had no issue providing my phone for a short episode of puffin rock which has been listed as low stimulation. It kept him quiet for 15 minutes until we were called. Should I have spent this 15 minutes letting him shout/cry/ sing and otherwise annoy those around me? Do I think those 15 mins have affected him long term? Nope.

You can’t even let them go to school/come home without an adult at age 7.

As someone who regularly takes high risk children on outdoor trails and bushcraft camps let me tell you the risk assessing is scary when you've children with no impulse control or perception of danger. They don't need to be on the m4 to cause serious harm to themselves or others. It sounds like you aren't maybe familiar personally with any children who are functioning at that level if you'd dismiss the other poster.

Can you link to the 50% statistic? I've never seen that nor am I in Wales.

How old are your children?

Yes and before iPads there was always something else wasn't there?! The TV, video games, in my generations case chucking is out the door until mealtimes so we just wandered round getting in trouble or not as the day may go. I'd love to know how that's more educationally or developmentally useful.

Those of us raised in the 80s and 90s have a whole wealth of gut problems from high use of formula and processed foods, a whole wealth of mental health problems from absent parents, high levels of lung cancer and adult asthma from passive smoking but it's involved parents who use tech tools for their kids that are somehow lazy.

And that's a typical 7 yr old! Which mine is not.

You do realise that SEN/ALN also includes physical disabilities/chronic illnesses, right?

I have a 4 yr old neurotypical child, she had a GP appt recently, we waited half an hour, she sat by me in the waiting area talking about what to expect, about her day at nursery, about her favourite doctor based toys etc. we went into the appt, she basically answered all the history questions herself, when symptoms started, what shed eaten that day, what she drinks in a day etc, got examined, asked questions and waited patiently while the locum GP checked with a superior and came back with a prescription.

I had a flashback to having my son at an appt same age, I went armed with a bag of lego, hot wheels, fidgets and a tablet, we waited 10 minutes and he was screaming running round (he has medical trauma from hospitalisations right through babyhood) was trying to climb INTO the filing cabinet in the doctors room, ultimately I let go of him to grab the prescription copy form the GP and he opened the door and bolted, made it into the car park by the time I grabbed him luckily unharmed. I wished I could have got him to focus on 15 minutes of paw patrol. When he started happily having short stints of gaming he was easier to keep safe and everyones life improved. And as I said he's academically advanced it's everything else he can't do and it all predates any interest in a screen.

I do wonder if my daughter had come first would I even believe people like me because the difference is ridiculous. I could parent my daughter all day long and in any siruation with nothing but a pen and paper and a handful of Sylvania families.

schoolofeducation.blogs.bristol.ac.uk/2024/07/29/wales-sen-children-research/ - again, if 50% of all children have a special need, it isn't special anymore and over diagnosis and unnecessary pathologisation is very clearly at play. So you have to ask what people's motivation might be for getting such a diagnosis on paper...

My children are 4, 6 and 10. All have asked for ipads and smartphones once or twice and the answer is no. They don't continue to ask as we've held the line.

That's right. Past generations of parents had different issues to contend with. But I do feel devices such are these are distinct in that they are collecting data on usage and identity and optimizing along those metrics all the time for purely cynical reasons. There is no need for them at all or benefit to them.

Even if that's the case, it's clearly absurd. If half of people have a special need, it isn't special

Just think back to your own time at school. 50% of your year group were so profoundly disabled they needed special support and provision? Come on

Do your 4 and 6 yr old play out unsupervised? How many hours a day are you spending outside? I'm genuinely interested because having a neurotypical child and a neurodivergent child the difference is massive. I actually COULD lazily parent my daughter and shed manage absolutely fine. She potters from her room where her small world toys and dolls are to the dining room where her messy play and colouring is to the living room where her roleplay toys are and if she wants screentime it's 15 minutes of numberblocks or doc McStuffins. She will actually watch a Disney movie or whatever curled up on the couch with a snack on a rainy afternoon and she might play a tablet game for 5 mins now and again but it's not even weekly id say. I could definitely have been entirely screen free with her no trouble at all.

As I said I was with my son too all through babyhood and toddler years. But he had hospitalisations and keeping a hyperactive 3 yr in a hospital bed on a busy ward opened the portal. And we discovered that gaming was the only thing he'd do sitting down. I'm going to have a look at that link now. I am however genuinely interested in your kids playing out and ages

In Wales, recent data from the January 2024 schools census showed that 11.2% of pupils in maintained schools had Additional Learning Needs (ALN) or Special Educational Needs (SEN). Another study based on a birth cohort found that nearly half of children born in 2002/2003 were identified with some form of ALN at some point during their schooling.

The 50% statistics focuses on a specific cohort. “At some point during their schooling” carries a lot of weight for that statistic as well.

So what that link states is in kids born between 2002-2008 50% were identified as having 'special needs' AT SOME POINT. so that would include bed wetters, it would include kids with dyslexia, it would include me who had ankle surgery in childhood and was immobilized for a time, it would include every child who went through childhood cancer, every child with a childhood seizure disorder, type 1 diabetes, severe eczema, every child needing additional exam support, every child a school didn't want to support so wanted to document as academically behind. It specifically states that a restructuring to allow support in education for additional support needs led to a 20% drop instantly in those considered AT ANY POINT on their childhood to have additional needs.

You understand the difference there right? At no point did 50% of children at any time have a documented additional needs, across the 18 years of their childhood 50% of children at some point had AN additional need. Can you understand the statistical difference there?

I would question if this also includes children and young people in care, with school avoidance or anxiety or trauma experience including bullying etc? When all of that is taken into account that's quite an extensive cohort.