During the four or five years I worked in a healthcare field, I’d see all kinds of parents.
Managing their small and bored kids as best they could, in all kinds of ways.
As these moms (usually moms, but sometimes dads) managed to squeeze my medical place of employment into their day between PTA and soccer practice and work, I always found it really considerate when they also managed to bring in well behaved kids who knew how to STFU for the hour mommy was repairing the body damage they were probably responsible for. But part of me always wondered, as the kids would stare hypnotically into the screen of an ipad (which they knew how to work worlds better than I ever will), how good that shiz could possibly be on their still-growing-eyes. Which led to my next question: if it is bad, when IS a good time to start using it? And what are the other ramifications of screen gazing too early in life?
Apparently the answer is: age two.
And the reasons are more than just turning into Mr. Magoo before their third birthday.
“Yeah, bish…. This is what a Peek-A-Zoo champion looks like. I think.”
For example: when you’re all of one and witnessing screen events unfold, you don’t have the background knowledge yet to know you’re just sitting in Plato’s cave and that none of it’s real. Not being able to differentiate between reality and non-reality might make whatever you’re seeing lasting, traumatic, or just a false-perception delusion-version of reality you’ll have trouble shaking later on and not know why.
Then, there’s the apps.
If mom or dad are outsourcing story time to Wall-E robot every time, then you’re spending your prime human-habit imprinting time learning how to talk like Ben Stein. Even if they’ve upgraded from monotone (which they likely have), there’s no gesticulation, smiling, micromovements and expressions which little ones are especially good at picking up on. Kids need a face full of expressions and a whole bod gesturing them through a story and getting involved. That way their mirror neurons know what to pick up on and use later for important things.
Like shade throwing.
Finally, there’s the tactility element.
When I was a kid, my godmother sewed me the most epic quilt-book ever. It had buttons and felt and Velcro and zippers. To this day, it’s still in my top Goodreads.com section as the most majestic motherfccking thing I’ve ever read. And I’m pretty sure it had zero words in it. The point, however, is that the tactility of that was much like when I’d play with plastic legos or wooden Lincoln logs or smell the vanilla aroma emanate off the page of an old hand-me-down book while feeling its brittled pages. I can recall the diversity of all those things I’d experience and read and enjoy because of the entire sensory experience that came with it. You don’t get that so much when you’re only ever swiping over a screen. Something gets lost without a sensory buffet of touchables.
Like glee.
So, I suppose the rule is:
Wait to say “yes” to your kids’ technology demands.
Until they hit the infamous “no” age.