I worry about young kids whose parents give them an iPad at all times, to the point that they're not even without it during a meal at a restaurant or other occasions. And how that may affect their ability to develop resiliency and creativity.
"During a meal at a restaurant" is the time parents are most likely to get them out. Don't assume that generalizes to when they're at home and have lots of options of what to do while waiting for dinner. Keeping kids quiet and happy while they're hungry and waiting is the hardest part of going out to eat with young kids. We use crayons and paper, but I don't think that's so intrinsically better than an iPad.
> We use crayons and paper, but I don't think that's so intrinsically better than an iPad.
Maybe not intrinsically, but what I see kids doing handheld computers at restaurants (and sitting in a cart at the grocery store, and getting pushed around town in a stroller, and on public transit, and sitting in their car seats, and at the playground, and at the airport, and on the plane, and at the doctor’s office, and waiting at government offices, ... and I can only assume at home too, though I have a smaller sample of kids I can see at their homes) is playing computer games or watching videos.
I don’t think computer games and videos are inherently evil or anything, but they can be extremely distracting and addictive, and some very small kids are dramatically overexposed to them. For many kids these have crowded out a great deal of social interaction, reading, self-directed free play, ...
Paper and crayons have none of the problems of videos or computer games, in my opinion. Especially if they are being used in a social way with multiple people interacting.
I have found that usually my 3-year-old doesn’t have any problem at restaurants unless the adults are talking to each-other and ignoring him, in which case he gets bored and starts running all around, etc. If we are talking to him, playing little games, drawing with crayons together, reading a book aloud, etc. then he is just fine. YMMV.
This is the whole thing. Don't assume that. When my kids are at home they're inventing elaborate games to play with eachother. When we're in public somewhere where they don't want to be, they're doing whatever gets us through peacefully.
I should be clearer. My point in that sentence was that what I observe kids doing with iPads is not drawing or writing or coding or making music or reading books or ..., which might be meaningfully comparable to drawing with crayons. Almost everything I see is games and videos, and I am not an expert or super careful observer but it seems like the tendency is toward games and videos that require little thinking and are designed to be maximally addictive.
I don’t mean that every kid who is sitting on the subway with an iPad also spends every moment at home doing the same.
But some of them unfortunately do spend lots of time at home glued to screens. I have multiple friends whose older kids have serious problems with TV, video game, social media, etc. habits, which start crowding out many other activities, with the parents not really knowing what to do about it because they don’t want to have a fight every day.
And some young kids who might not be on their video / game machine at home are doing it a lot in contexts where kids would have in the past either been engaged with the world or entertaining themselves. There is a vast difference between a 3-year-old riding around in a stroller looking at a smartphone vs. a 3-year-old walking around on their own feet looking at the world and talking to the adults walking with them.
These devices seem fine to break out occasionally when the parent desperately needs a break from demands on their attention. But there are kids using these devices for extended periods every day.
P.S. The same goes for adults: people should trade their smartphones for a book or a conversation with the person next to them or just some daydreaming from time to time.
That's fine, when it never becomes the all-purpose go-to pacifier.
I remember being at an NHL game where a kid was immersed in his device the entire night, despite being in a $148 seat to (IMHO) the most attention-maintaining of all sports. Having never been taken to a major league sporting event for my entire childhood, seeing this saddened me.
My parents took me to sports events and I despised it. When I was able to persuade them to leave me home to play on the computer I was much happier. As an adult, I don't attend sports events either.
I have nothing against people who enjoy watching sports, but it seems strange to me to consider sports viewing as inherently virtuous. You could be doing anything with a computer and a network connection. Even watching sports.
> I remember being at an NHL game where a kid was immersed in his device the entire night, despite being in a $148 seat to (IMHO) the most attention-maintaining of all sports. Having never been taken to a major league sporting event for my entire childhood, seeing this saddened me.
Having been taken to professional and high-level college sports many times in my childhood, starting with an NFL game as a toddler, I'm not saddened by it: until I was a teenager, most of the games were either overwhelmingly far out tediously slow, and in either case only weakly engaging. But my being there meant my parents could be there and I could be with them; I invariably had something else to engage me; I never regretted it and I don't think my parents did either.
You fool, you mentioned sports! The one example guaranteed to make the Hacker News crowd rush in and defend the child watching Youtube!
Try this simple modification to get them on your side of the argument:
> I remember being at a TED Talk where a kid was immersed in his device the entire night, despite being in a $148 seat to (IMHO) the most attention-maintaining of all events. Having never been taken to a major thought leader event for my entire childhood, seeing this saddened me.
In my view there is no qualitative difference between those two activities. Both are just different modes of consumption. Actually playing the sport would be something different, though.
Some people, like me, just don't like to watch sports, even I do a lot of sport by myself. I almost never ever watch on TV, I almost never went to watch a live event. The only reason to watch was if I knew somebody in a amateur event.
NHL is horribly boring for small children, as are most professional sports. The rules don’t make much sense, the games last way too long, the seats are not child friendly, etc.
What you're missing is many people in modern society have decided that kids are solely the responsibility of their parents and no one should ever suffer any inconvenience or displeasure as a result of them. However slight it might be. This means anytime your kid decides to act out in any way in public, including occasionally make a sound above speaking level, you are disrupting other people's experiences and get dirty looks by these people.
Also, don't think to do anything when there are fewer crowds, because this is when these types of people tend to congregate the most - they like their empty, quiet, orderly spaces and your kids' presence is most definitely not welcome at this time.
But children here are generally expected to behave well when in company or public. At least they are where I live in Norway. Children here are generally self reliant but also quiet and well behaved so one rarely sees animosity to children, partly I suspect because the trigger rarely happens.
Our son (4) was diagnosed with ASD. He struggles to sit still and that makes eating at restaurants really difficult because he just wants to run all around the room, climb the tables and chairs, take things off other tables etc.
Putting his headphones on with his Fire tablet helps keep him calm so we can enjoy our food (and so can everyone else). And we get plenty of sideways glances, like we're doing parenting wrong.
People don't see how many hours he spends running around the park, drawing, reading books, playing with toys etc.
>I worry about young kids whose parents give them an iPad at all times, to the point that they're not even without it during a meal at a restaurant or other occasions.
I mean, as a child in the 80's and 90's when we went out to eat my first question was "can I have crayons and a maze" and once I had a Gameboy...
During the meal at restaurant is the exact time where you bring up iPad even if you normally dont. It is so that a.) other people in restaurant eat at peace b.) parents can talk to each other about adult topics (work, family etc).
