Ok, be honest: When was the last time you went a day without a screen?
When was the last time your children went a day without using a screen?
The reason we’re so nosy is because, a couple of months back, a headline ran in the UK that said, “One million kids spend more time on screens than parents’ working week.” Yes, you read that right. British children are spending more time scrolling than their parents spend working.
“Ahh,” you say, “but that’s Britain!” That’d never happen on OUR shores! … or would it?
Well, we looked it up. According to the CDC, here’s how much daily screen time our children get here:
8-10 years old: Six hours
11-14 years old: Nine hours
15-18 years old: Seven and a half hours
Wow…
That means your average 8-year-old is spending 42 hours a week (i.e., a full 9-5) swiping and scrolling. And the scary thing? This number doesn’t include screen use in school!
What impact is all this screen time having on our children? Here are a few things we see happening already.
Who (or what) is actually educating our children?
How long children spend in school varies by state and grade. But for simplicity’s sake, let’s say that children spend 1,200 hours in school per year (6-ish hours a day, across a 180-day school year).
1,200 hours. Remember that number.
Now, how many hours are children spending on screens? Well, 6 hours a day (minimum!) multiplied by 365 days, comes out to… let’s see… nearly 2,190 hours!
What does this mean?
Well, a rather uncomfortable truth:
Schools work really, really hard to give children the highest quality of education they can. But, for every hour of high-quality educational material that schools fill students’ minds with…
YouTube, social media, and video games are putting in 2!
Along with the thousands of ads—many by junk food companies—children see from their favorite content creators on YouTube or Instagram. (If you ever need an argument for providing enrichment program that give children fun, wholesome alternatives to scrolling on a smartphone, it’s this!)
Screens become their escape
If the only way children can feel positive and have fun is a screen, screens become their escape. This is why it’s so important to equip children with ways to feel positive and enjoy themselves that are offline.
Like, for example, cooking.
Screens destroy grit
Have you ever watched a really old movie, like Casablanca or Citizen Kane?
One thing you’ll notice:
They’re very, very slow. It takes effort to pay attention.
But here’s the thing: when they were released, they weren’t slow at all. We only find them slow because we’re used to modern fast-paced media with lots of camera cuts.
Why is this a big deal?
In order to capture our attention (or our children’s), media is getting faster and faster. Technically speaking, it delivers more and more dopamine per second. Watch your average children’s cartoon or a YouTube video aimed at kids. Compared to old movies, they’re very fast! And the faster modern media becomes, the harder it is to pay attention to traditional media. Like, say, reading a book, or a teacher giving a lesson.
Fast media kills grit.
The Internet, as argued by Nicholas Carr in his brilliant book, The Shallows, is the fastest medium of all. Unlike a movie, it actually rewards us for being scatterbrained, because every time we stop what we’re doing and click or scroll or swipe on something new, we get a hit of dopamine.
Wondering why children struggle to pay attention?
There’s your answer.
But here’s the good news
Brains, especially children’s brains, are flexible. They change all the time. And while screens can change children’ brains for the worse, it’s just as simple to change their brains back for the better. Simple, but not easy.
The way forward, for adults and children alike, is this:
You build habits and hobbies that make real life more rewarding than a virtual one.
And that’s why our afterschool culinary program is one of the best things you can do for the health and happiness of children. Yes, you’re setting them up with a life skill that might keep them healthy for the rest of their lives. But also, you’re teaching them that fun, rewarding, and social activities exist without using a screen.
Speaking of which…
If you’re wondering how an afterschool culinary program might work in your school, along with the government grants available to fund it, you can book a free call with one of our team by clicking the link below:
Previous Newsletters:
The almost magical benefits of “ordinary” family dinners, Behind the scenes of filming recipes from LIFT Enrichment’s cookbooks, LIFT Enrichment and New York schools are teaching hundreds of children how to cook