I feel the destructive behaviour of bored kids is forgotten a bit.
Growing up in the late 70s early 80s we were kicked out of the house until dinner.
We did a lot of really dangerous things exploring.
Among these,
-Playing in storm drains. Inside the narrow tunnels I might add.
-Abandoned construction sites.
-Railway tracks. Putting things o the rails waiting for the train to see what happened. Everything from rocks to toys to coins.
-Dumpster diving in large dumpsters. There was a soap factory near us and wed dive for schampoo or hairgel.
-Jumping in the biohazard pond looking for frogs eggs.
-Throwing things off bridges.
-Climbing various constructions, houses and dubios trees.
-Competing in who could jump from the highest roof.
Kids not only could get hurt. We did. Legs were broken.
No one died fortunately.
Bored kids outside is not really as romantic as many would have it.
Not arguing against boredom, constant stimuli is not healthy.
That being said, unsupervised bored kids can lead to some very dangerous outcomes.
Yet over these experiences you socialized, bonded, explored, got scared, risked and got away with it, promised not to tell parents, had general fun and discovered things you would have not otherwise. Any of these beats becoming a rotbrain in front of YouTube kids for hours.
We’re also looking at strong survivor bias. My grandfather played in the fields after WW2 (Eastern Europe) and had friends who died or had limbs blown off by undetonated mines from the war (preschool/school age). You likely never heard their stories since they didn’t make it to present day.
There are definitely many benefits to socialization outside, but let’s not forget the tradeoffs. Mental health can be repaired (I.e. ozempic for the mind?), permanent injuries - much less so.
(I picked an extreme example to prove a point, I’m not suggesting the risks of playing outside today are equivalent. But the risks are real nonetheless)
What? I think the point here is not that minefields don't exist it's that there's a huge jump from wanting kids to play outside to having them play in a minefield. There's plenty of Ukraine left that ISN'T a minefield.
> Any of these beats becoming a rotbrain in front of YouTube kids for hours.
Technically, the jury is still out on this. I don't think anyone's done any kind of study of how childhood YouTube brainrot affects their long term outlook during adulthood, simply because YouTube brainrot is too new. For what it's worth, if I had to bet money, I'd agree with you that "socialized, bonded, explored, etc." is better than YouTube, but I don't think this has been proven yet. It's just a gut feeling.
I used to chase kites barefoot as a kid in India. I swear there was a time when I detected, while running with my eyes towards the sky, that I am stepping over a large piece of broken glass, like a fragment of a bottle of Coke, and I instinctively twisted my ankle so that instead of putting pressure on it, my foot and the bottle would just roll sideways. I just regained my posture, stepped hard to the side, unscathed, and continued running after the kite. There was not even a scratch on my foot. I still think about that incident. Maybe it was because I was so thin and lightweight that I managed to escape uninjured? What if it went horribly wrong and resulted in permanent nerve damage?
IMHO, a lot of these analyses suffer from survivorship bias; the ones who died don't get to tell you it was a bad idea.
I would argue that what you were doing was actually good though because you were going maximum risk in an environment that was definitely dangerous but not to the level of adult life. When you got hurt it informed your learning brain and you likely adjusted your risk taking going forward. I see this skill missing a lot in the kids that grew up in the 2000's and later vs the early millenials/gen x. It's way better to learn your risk limits in an environment where the probability of permanent harm or death still exists but is actually a lot lower than doing adult things like driving a car. The way I usually describe this is a lot of the younger people I talk to weren't punched in the face enough by their peers growing up because that's the other social risk side of this equation.
> The way I usually describe this is a lot of the younger people I talk to weren't punched in the face enough by their peers growing up because that's the other social risk side of this equation.
My problem with current fights in canada, where school shooters exist but are rare, is they seem largely gang related (read business related) which doesnt have a chance of providing the right lesson because the lesson from a business fight is the same lesson from bullying fights: come back with a bigger weapon to right this injustice. The lesson we are looking for requires the kid know the social norms roughly and be in a testing situation that crosses the line, is corrected with a mild amount of violence from the other kid but leaves the situation such that they could repair the friendship in the future with the right words and realizations. This happened at least five times in my youth and atleast two escalated to a bit of violence and it was informative. I dont see it happening at all in my kids or my neices and nephews youths and that c(ncerns me a bit.
I'm 60+, Australian, and (eventually) went to a high school with a lot of physicality, mixed groups, and seething undercurrents - a mining town with global migrant workers on traditional indigenous land.
We had fights, they could be brutal, the social mechanics allowed a needle to be threaded which myself and a number of others largely managed to do; stand your ground, don't engage physically, don't run .. if someone calls you out and starts smack talking, don't rise, just reply and confound. If they take a swing dodge it and don't respond, if it lands, suck it up and don't respond - in the rung climbing of high school and elsewhere this makes the other look a fool.
There were lessons learned from that and I can still my grandchildren benefitting from phyical encounters (not just fights, engagement with big waves, steep hills, solid animals, bicycles and motorbikes) that can hurt but largely don't kill them.
Boys will be boys, we all did these things back then and the extreme vast majority of us survived, I'll take that over 10 hours of screens per day from age 3
I shudder to think of my kids doing the stuff I did as a kid, and sometimes wonder what angel was looking over me that I made it to adulthood.
I don’t worry at all about my 8yo boy however, as he’s very cautious and risk averse. My 6yo girl though already scares me to death with the stuff she does when she slips out of sight. I can’t wait for the teenage years! <sarcasm>
When I was a 6 years old girl I found a rusty machete in a forest I was not supposed to be in. I managed to find my way back to the group of adults frantically looking for me in the parking lot nearby, realized they were looking for me, and decided I did not want to get angry/panicked adults all over me. So I discreetely went back in the forest to build stuff with my new machete. Adults soon found me running down a forest hill full of dead wood and poison ivy; while holding a rusty machete. I panicked when my mom yelled at me so I tried to escape by JUMPING down the slope with the machete in my hand, before deciding to keep running away through the creek that cushioned my fall - because now that I was covered in mud and water I figured they would kill me.
During all of this ordeal, I thought the issue was that I went in the forest and got dirty. The "disappeared for a long time" and the "holding and using a rusty machete" did not register as issues.
Goold luck with your daughter, it did not become better for my parents until I was...Until they stopped knowing what I did. And just as you they were unprepared because my older brother is mostly into being alive and safe.
My IT school changed since I was there. Talking to my old director he told me about the power of the environment. The premise is that we had a smaller school before, and it was not optimally planned, (student's cables running around, trash not exactly at disposal nearby, etc...)
It seems obvious there is a direct link between environment and behavior, but what he started doing was like "programming the environment" in order to trigger behavior changes.
Why would we litter if the trashcan is nearby ? Why would we go out of our way with cables if power-socket is on every table ?
The same way I wonder if we cannot "program" the environment for kids, in a way that allows us to let them get bored out, but in such a situation that is not dangerous but also productively interesting for the kids.
It is not the same to get bored out outside nearby a train track or in the industrial area, than in a somewhat controlled area ?
What do we want to expose them to ? We already know it might want to try crazy stuff ; but I guess we can reduce the danger factors and increase area for more interesting activities ? Also, this is all linked to age and I'm not sure we can make generic rules.
Growing up in a farm is much different than growing up in the streets, and ultimately, my parents and I think a lot of parents, decide to live where kids are safe to grow with somewhat nice activities and people around them.
(Note that I also met a couple that completely cut themselves from the world and they really had to come back to society when the kid came to age, just because a kid requires social interactions with people it's age)
Some of those things are terrible and dangerous to others. But parents need to be so much more measured in their responses.
Yes, you find out your kid was throwing stuff off bridges or being a vile bully, you come down like a pile of bricks.
But that doesn’t mean a full safety-rail environment. That means kids will jump off high places and break into others and we slap them on the wrist and carry on. That means lots of broken bones and the very occasional tragedy. Because a whole generation prone to mental illness and incapable of autonomy is infinitely worse. I think we’ve learned that by now.
It’s part of life. Helicoptering your kids is as bad as letting them run around after midnight with “the wrong types”. There’s a middle ground. We have swung too far into safety. It’s fine to push your kid to find a hobby or interest but a kid with half hour to half hour schedule every day is going to be miserable. They aren’t small adults. I’ve seen too many young adults with low self esteem, overthinking and afraid to socialize, waiting on texts or emails for hours or days for an answer instead of knowing their value and just calling after giving a reasonable response time; or simple saying “well f that, I’ll call somebody else”
This is literally my childhood / teenage years, and I was born in the 90s.
Seems like everything changed when our dopamine systems were highjacked by handheld screens.
Started to see the first glimpses of this, everyone crowding around my IPod in shop class to watch a crazy Aphex Twin music video I put on it, or even watching a movie on the Ipod, hooked up to my car speakers with my gf sitting in the school parking lot
Reminds me of finding a portapotty and using it to tumble down a hill, or visiting the local quarry when I was 8 and playing around near huge deep pools of strangely coloured liquids. Mid 80s were like the wild wild west.
Most of the things you describe are part of a good childhood and learning boundaries and limits, and testing yourself, and growing harder, and having fun.
Sorry, but we had been living like that for ages before helicopter parents became the norm. Kids didn't die in the streets by the truckload, or jump off of roofs to their doom any any number to statistically matter, as this alarmist comment implies.
Compare that to the sheltered, all-wishes-granted and no minute spent w/o distractions like social media, kids. Started with Gen Z who get all angsty, with panic attacks, when they have to start performing, i.e., during final exams and the like. And never learned to deal with emotions and free-floating thoughts, handling themself, keeping calm.
(all observed from multiple coworkers being parents, some had to bring their offspring to psychiatric therapy - of course, driven, as taking public transport on their own would be too much!)
Due to our normal childhood, we could handle situations later in life where today's offspring inevitably fails.
- The parent who grew up in the <more rugged years> self-identify as a tough rugrat who had fun and was fearless; not a wuzz like those modern kids (“kids” here excludes their own)
- But the parent would rather that their kids be safe than to have to pain themselves worrying about them constantly
Perhaps the modern parent must learn the difficult task of slowly trusting the unsupervised child the same way the unsupervised child must learn to trust themselves.
This seems a difficult ask, but it's possible and probably very healthy for all involved.
> When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.
I wonder what the equivalent is for knowing how to be the perfect parent until becoming one yourself.
You can learn to take good risks and handle hardship without taking stupid unnecessary risks. One important life lesson is that the only risks worth taking are those that offer corresponding upside - else the expected outcome is ruin. Education wise this means you give them necessary or low-impact risks to take - and let them endure outcomes such as failing a difficult but important project, failing to find love, losing a basketball match, or losing friendships. Of course, sometimes you may need to do something even if there is no upside for yourself directly, but that is outside the scope of this topic.
We obviously aren't going to achieve 0 unless we lock every kid on earth up in a padded room, which we aren't doing, so "more" or "less" is fine if the reward is worth the risk. Which is exactly the discussion being had right now.
I am not saying current US tradeoff is necessary ideal. But, when people argue by "human history" they should not ignore what actually happened during that history. Because as of now, kids ARE better off then they generally were for majority of human history.
The gooses thing was memory of my grandmother. It is not some kind of distant medieval history, it was the norm around WWII.
No one here is saying the 1880's are the goal. We're discussing if kids not going outside and messing around and getting hurt sometimes is good or bad.
I brought up "human history" as the logical extreme of the counter argument, not to argue that's the goal.
The problem with that logical extreme is that kids died a lot by our standards. They also had no protection against abuse. You had more of them due to non existent anticonception, which made their "value" go down.
It was actually both. The accident rate was significantly higher, it was just dwarfed by the other health problems so it didn’t seem so bad in comparison
I think the problem you're describing is not due to distractions and social media.
I think the fault there is that school has changed, kids aren't taught to be allowed to make mistakes. If you're not taught that failure is part of learning, then you're just teaching kids to build anxiety because they are not allowed to fail.
I often think that a lot of people are depressed and/or in a burn out because they don't give themselves a moment to do nothing. A moment were the brain can get up to speed with all the bombardments of information.
In the past we had moments we were bored. Now, we always have a phone or other screen were we can indulge on dopamine.
Dopamine isn’t something you indulge in. It certainly isn’t the pleasure itself.
The more appropriate common vernacular is “instant gratification” IMO. (And interestingly dopamine is associated with expectations of things like pleasure. But if you pull out your phone immediately when nothing is happening then there is a very small window for expectation to happen.)
While I was younger and before the social networks I often looked puzzled when someone told me he/she is bored. How could that be? Usually there are much more to do or to think about than the time we got. I had to utilize all I got including sitting on the toilet or falling (trying) asleep at night. I may be mistaken but the maniac way of feeling ourselves good when we go out together may be a related matter. The having a schedule 20:00-24:00 or later Saturday night when you WILL feel good because it is the time for feeling good! Not only good but very good! Party pooping is not allowed! Quiet conversation or just being together quietly sounds more genuine most of the times. But all depends on the mood. Spinning around on the head may occur of course if the mood allows. But rarely on fixed schedule.
It is about the same now but I genuenly have much more to do, miss the times of doing nothing. Whenever I have to travel that is the time of reflection. Instead of pushing my nose into the mobile I stare outside or try to observe others without being creepy. It is easier nowadays, 90% of travellers use mobile. They don't know what happens around them. Luckily this mobile and tablet revolution passed me by, likely because of my occupation. I have all day at the computer I can use 30-60 min away, it is not enough actually.
Anecdotally, I just took a long vacation in a country without much cell connectivity, and had a great time. It was very eye opening. But ever since coming back, I've been extremely unmotivated to work. I'm not sure if this counts as work burnout, but I'm sure the vacation had an impact.
Jokes aside, computers (all kinds, handheld incuded) cause as many problems as they solve. They are a trouble relocation device. I feel demotivated working on and for computers.
Where's this. My first thought was North Korea, I wonder if people there are hella creative, but I guess sadly they're too busy doing things the medieval way to have free time.
Second guess is Mongolia, where the steppes go on and on forever...
You don't have to go to such extreme places to be forced into being disconnected from the Internet. I'm sure you'll find such places much nearer to your home.
Parts of California suffice! : ) 10 years ago good part of the four corners states was also good for bad reception, I recall 1.5 days spent in Page without any connection.
This is absolutely true, though perhaps hard to understand just put simply like this. Sitting in silence is not the solution, but it will cause a solution to occur within you.
Sitting quiety will make you self-reflect. Self reflection will reduce stress and fear. Reduction of stress and less fear is a reduction in problems caused by human error, and negativity towards eachother (due to fear).
People will say things like this, and then miss how many people immediately become uncomfortable with sitting quietly lest they face the risk of self-reflection, and how many social tools for avoiding it we have.
This is true. I practice it for a long time now, and still struggle a lot. How well it goes depends totally on the context of my life. It's hard, and honestly led to being very depressed a long time. But now I do feel like a better person, a lot of insecurities are gone, and with that, a lot of things that i did which were ultimately negative, also are gone (mostly). (lot of things still to work on :D).
I did go to therapy after a while for a few sessions, that's definitely something i'd recommend when depression hits. it's totally worth it, to get some confirmation or guidance on psychology.
One of the things for example for me that was an issue:
I became super indoorsy after a bad injury. That also caused me to excersize less. This both led to a loss of anti-cortisol production, which is a hormone that reduces stress. That ultimately meant, that no matter how long i'd sit in silence, i'd still be stressed because my physiology lost the ability to produce that by itself. Now i go for lots of walks outdoors, and do some minor excersize. It helps a lot to reduce stress again, but I do still need to meditate / sit in silence to reduce fear.
Nitpicky, because I get what you mean, but "self reflection will reduce stress and fear" is by no means always true and I'd argue it's probably not really true for most people in practice. Epictetus said (paraphrasing!) that people are rubbish at self-reflection and you need to practice it to be good at it, like anything else. Lots of people approach it in terrible ways and it leads to really bad outcomes - giving up immediately, doom loops, too much self-criticism - so it really does need to be done (to use a more modern reference) mindfully.
Seconded. I hear a lot from psychologists that some people are so afraid to be alone for even short amount of time and self-reflect, that their whole lifes are chasing activity and partners
i do agree. it takes a lot of practice. i got guidance by someone who was already practiced and i can highly recommend. its a personal experience though, so its hard to find someone who fits your inner.
for the record. i am really bad at it still. learning every day :)
I agree, however why is that small issues are so large when trying to sleep at night? A little thought we can reflect on becomes a big problem late at night while trying to sleep.
This immediately brings to mind the Seinfeld episode where Ellen's boyfriend stares blankly at the back of the airplane seat in front of him on a long international flight.
That being said, I generally agree with the sentiment.
> good faith or bad faith, doesn't matter; as long as we have the faith that can get skeptics to rewrite their firmware without actual violence
I prefer my faiths justified, but if you lack that constraint, the wheel in the sky keeps on turning, and so the Age of Aquarius ought to be rolling around within your ~250 year timeframe?
This is such an Internet response. Perhaps a bigger problem than not being able to sit alone is not being able to cope with a single sentence that doesn't cover every contingency in the universe.
No. And that's the entire problem. People use this quote as some kind of truism, and since you couldn't ever get all people to sit alone quietly in a room, it also cannot be disproven (much like my anti-meteor stone that I carry with me).
It then gets dressed up as some kind of mystical wisdom when it was never intended to be that big. It's become an easy way to believe oneself wise without having to actually think.
Wish there was more rigorous studies on this. Yesterday I got stuck waiting for a train for 3 hours with a dead phone, so I walked around Boston and an old lady sat down at the park to talk to me about her dogs. I got back to the station an hour too early and read the beginning of a book someone left behind.
When waiting for lifts, instead of focusing on my phone in the vain hope of finding something useful and enlightening, I have a quick chat with those around me.
Unsurprisingly, the security guards and other neighbours now say hi to me regularly.
“should be allowed”, in practice, means “should be forced”, since it means saying no to the huge collection of devices (TVs, computers, tablets, nintendos etc) that prevent boredom.
You could argue by providing those things you’re forcing them into perpetual stimulation. It’s a matter of perspective. The difference is that like sugar, unless we’re using our rationality to override the impulse, we’ll always pick stimulation though that’s not necessarily healthy.
I’m a geek. My kids are geeks. To not provide them access to a computer because there’s bad addictive things on computers is like not teaching kids to read because there’s harmful books.
In reality, things are never so black and white. When I tell my kids “no youtube, no gaming, but you’re allowed to use Scratch” there’s a risk they’re just browse scratch’s endless catalog of games made by others, plenty of which are impressively fun. So then I gotta say no to that too. But then my youngest wants to use Scratch with a youtube tutorial. That’s fine right? Well yes it is but it also means there’s the addictive recommendation cycle right there on the screen too. He’s not allowed to click on them but that’s hard to resist etc etc. It’s all solvable but it’s all very nuanced and makers of apps and platforms (including MIT) actively work against you at every step.
My theory is that every person in this thread who thinks this is simple doesn’t have children. It’s simple in the abstract and super messy in reality.
> My theory is that every person in this thread who thinks this is simple doesn’t have children.
As always. "Why don't you just..."
Minecraft has been great for my 6 year old, learning fluent English etc, but I have to be very active in enforcing rules, especially around Minecraft YouTubers (only British, they tend to build advanced machinery and explain well).
But anything can turn into an addiction. Recently he wanted to do Duolingo to learn intermediate English, but now I get the sense he does it to get "allowed" screen time and doesn't actually learn much.
It's very nuanced. I want to provide screen time because we're nerds and you need to spend time with technology to learn about it, but there are way more distractions than when I was a kid, and our home computer didn't even have internet.
I don't have children. That being said, my impression from looking after my brother's kid is that a lot of things are simple and also difficult. "Sit down with your kids when they use the computer like you're pair programming" is not complicated, but it's a heavy burden that most parents can't meet. Uncle strken can't do that over three days, let alone 15 or so years.
I mean, it's a bit like saying: "why is cocaine illegal but not glue sniffing? It's even worse for your health". Yes, but it's not as much fun, so in practice not a big problem. If a kid refused to go outside due to their pen-and-paper addiction, then that would need to be limited as well.
Words means things. If I ask you for something again and again, you then provides it for me as a gift for christmas, using the word "forcing" is massively inappropriate.
It is not just a question of perspective. It is quite literally a question of what word means.
Sure. But it has nothing to do with ridiculous argument that "kids are forced them into perpetual stimulation". No they are not forced. They want it and they are either allowed it or not.
While I agree with your overall point, it's also worth asking where the desire for a new belonging comes from.
There may be more obvious stimuli like established hobbies, or peer pressure, but ultimately a lot of the desire for a new belonging is likely driven by marketing from the companies selling it.
Kids always wanted to have what other kids have, you do not need special marketing for that. It is just how human psychology works. Likewise, kids always wanted what they seen adults to have (phones).
And kids who have seen marketing to find nintendo or tv fun. If they seen it in their friends house, they found it fun.
> Kids always wanted to have what other kids have, you do not need special marketing for that.
And yet, much money is spent marketing things to children. What a waste this must be!
> Likewise, kids always wanted what they seen adults to have (phones).
While a mobile phone may be a simple and useful (even vital) tool, huge amounts of money is spent on marketing to drive desires for particular brands, or new models/features. This influences adults, and also probably children in turn.
> If they seen it in their friends house, they found it fun.
So where did those kids discover or get the desire for the item? And/or where did their parents get the idea to buy it for them? Why (e.g.) Playstation rather than Nintendo, or vice versa? At some point, it likely tracks back to marketing, creating the desire.
You are being intentionally obtuse. Yes, marketing works, because companies fight among each other who will be the winner.
"The desire for a new belonging" is present in kids who dont see ads nor have access to screens. They see what other kids have, they see what adults have. Kids wanting the same thing as other kids is nothing new or revolutionary.
Trying to pretend that kids wanting things is somehow a change against any time before is absurd.
> Playstation rather than Nintendo, or vice versa? At some point, it likely tracks back to marketing, creating the desire.
Small kids do not know playstation vs nintendo. They still want games. They want same games as their friends have.
Yeah, that's intuitively not a fate I would want to wish on my own kids. I'm just old enough to have spent the first ~14 years of my life without any personal computing devices, and I remember the boredom being agonizing.
Now, the kind of device I would provide is another story. Unfettered access to the Internet at large, including social media, is probably not well advised - access to Wikipedia probably is. Questions of degree.
Right. But if we interpret parent charitably they probably agree with you. The device itself isn’t evil, and the internet isn’t either. However, 7 second videos tailor made to hijack our reward systems could very well cause developmental issues simply by taking attention from one place and moving it elsewhere.
There are adults that can’t handle slot machines. Many more seem to be unable to handle social media. I’m very seriously recommending friends and family to limit it. With children it’s more hands-on, so as a parent it wouldn’t just be recommendations.
Boredom can be filled with... books! I think that going for a "personal computing device" first is in general a bad idea and I'm really glad for the first ~14 years of my life I also didn't have any because I'm not sure I would have had the self control to avoid just getting suckered in, and I feel lucky I developed a reading habit instead.
Nah. I had plenty of books, and I was a pretty heavy reader as a kid, but I still had way more boredom than I was happy with. As soon as I got access to Wikipedia, though, the number of words I read per day skyrocketed.
Sometimes it seems to me that many of us are in a state of
permanent entertainment. It has become our default mode so
any break from it may trigger even anxiety..
In my life I find that what works the best for my kid and for
myself are physical activities such as climbing, swimming and
walks in forest.
I'm trying to find ways to replace dopamine with serotonin
(replacing pleasure with happiness) and it seems that usually
involves some form of physical activity where mind needs to
focus on the movement and surroundings, so that there is
simply not much room for thinking and desires.
I'm not saying its evil or anything, but on demand TV is IMO not a good thing for kids. It can be a real battle to get my daughter away from Bluey. Back in my day, we had to wait at least a day for the next episode, or often a week, or more! TV was actually "seasonal", which it no longer is.
I firmly believe that humans need seasons, i.e. periods of time that are different from each other, either summer, winter etc, or periods where a TV show is simply not accessible.
What almost always works to get away from TV, though, is if _I_ start a project, and within minutes my daughter will have picked up her own project, and we'll be companionably working on something.
But I also think that current ability to see the series at once and then be done with that is strictly superior over past "episode once a week" schedule. First, it leads to way more interesting shows, but also it affects my life much less.
The tv schedule used to rule peoples days, they would try to be at home for the show, they would stop socializing and what not just to see the show.
I remember a kid in school who had an alarm set for 1750, so he would have time to run home from the park to catch The Simpsons (which was shown daily at 1800 for years, with two episodes on a Friday!)
It sure beats having “seasons” and essentially having 6 months of the year being a complete waste because it’s too cold to do things outside the house.
A generation that cannot endure boredom will be a generation of little people… unduly divorced from the slow processes of nature, in whom every vital impulse withers, as though they were cut flowers in a vase.
Screw getting bored and “fixing” it with a screen. I’ve been seeing a new trend: Parents with kids on the backs of their bikes (something everyone does here, but now) with the kids glued to a screen… So, instead of learning (without getting bored at all!) about the reality that they are one day going to have to navigate by themselves, they watch some cartoon, blaring annoying audio to people around them in the process.
It’s a huge missed opportunity for the developing brain to learn about the world, its sights, its sounds, its interactions, its physics, its rules. Everything.
Yes it is. It's teaching the skill of being able to cope with mundane routine without mindless phone scrolling as a distraction. This is the whole point of OP's linked article.
This is what the comment quite literally claimed: "instead of learning (without getting bored at all!) about the reality that they are one day going to have to navigate by themselves". Later added in comment " missed opportunity for the developing brain to learn about the world, its sights, its sounds, its interactions, its physics, its rules. Everything."
It is opposite of what you say. It claims it wont be boring, but that it will teach them to navigate themselves which they wont learn otherwise.
No, my point is that you dont have to turn every little mundane thing into a teaching-something-important moment.
Overall, it is absurd, someone getting outraged over a kid not having a trip to preschool or whatever turned into as educational enriching character building exercise as possible.
Perhaps it is absurd, and indeed loosing a small amount of time for neural development is negligible, but I find it at least equally absurd that the kid needs to be sedated with a screen when riding on the back of a bike.
I can’t imagine anything good coming from that bored=grab-screen-attitude that people have. Moreover those screens are also used to silence kids. Like pacifiers, but with worse side effects and with habits formed for the rest of their lives.
Also, why use the screen on the bike? I bet that is not the only screen time. Kids have been behaving on the backs of bikes for 100 years with 0 issues. The value of the screen is negative.
This article is not about "allowing" kids to be bored.
It is to force kids to spend their time like this person that has a romanticized view of their childhood wants them to fill "the void".
I believe there is a point there, we live in a society where we must be entertained well! Not being entertained is shame. Allowing is fine enough word here I believe.
Rather then taking kinds their media away and in turn making this media even more valuable for them. I would suggest trying to establish attention as something valuable and that is important to direct yourself rather then having it directed by someone else.
I agree with this advice. But know there’s always an expert somewhere who says something when it comes to parenting. Most parents really are trying their best with the skills they have. Hang in there.
All these "should be allowed" are basically "children are people, too. Let them have everything normal people do/have/experience/feel". This applies to all "children should be allowed to play/go outside/be bored/be not bored/...." expert takes
But the younger parents are of a generation who may not know that's normal and who have grown up glued to TVs, consoles and phones. They may need it spelled out
It is also not just electronic distractions. I have seen parents who are wealthy enough so they can afford to fill their kids life with a regiment of after school activities. Monday French tutoring, Tuesday/Thursday basketball practice, Wednesday math tutoring, Friday swimming and German tutoring, Saturday basketball game and piano, Sunday sailing. And of course homework crammed into every free time around these. Not much time around that to experience boredom ever.
Naturally not everyone can afford this kind of pace so this is not a problem which involves everyone. But the insidous problem is that these parents are convinced that they are doing everything right for their kids. They are the most likely who can change course and incorporate such research.
This is not about not allowing kids to be bored. This is about them wanting parents to create situations when kids are bored (by preventing their access to electronics specifically). As in, boredom nowdays requires additional work on the side of parents.
My kid usually wants to know how I make decisions and never settles for a single "no" or "because I said so". I can tell them "because I want you to find some other stuff to play with", which might result in complaining for a while. Saying "not hard" is definitely not true in many cases. It's doable, but it's still hard.
Whatever works for your family. The more you set the boundary though the better. I guess the ideal parenting method is to reinforce good choices and not reinforce bad ones.
The best trained dogs are those trained only by positive reinforcement so…
Here's a short story that I just quickly wrote that alludes to the title. It's also something I actually do.
__The Chair That Changed My Life__
There is the chair.
Sit on it. Tell yourself: this is my life now.
"But, but, I want to watch a YouTube video! I want to be on Instagram."
No you little media fueled thrill-seeker. You sit on the chair.
"But I AM FUCKING BORED! For the love of God please let me out!"
If it helps mister thrill-seeker, you can do anything on the chair that you want.
"Anything?"
Anything. As long as you don't get off the chair.
"I'm gonna sing!"
Go right ahead.
"I'm gonna dance on the chair."
It's yours to do so.
"I'm gonna... I'm gonna... Wait a second, I should file my taxes!"
Oh, taxes? Hmm, that sounds important. Alright then, feel free to get off the chair or whatever it is that you need to do to fill your taxes - such as using a computer.
"Thanks!"
But remember, when you're done, get back on the chair. And no, no secret laptop smuggling with internet! This is an electronic free zone.
---
This exercise has given me some success in allowing myself to be media free at the times where I need it. I invented the exercise by at one point being so frustrated by my digital media addiction that I just told myself "you'd rather live your life on a chair? Fine! Feel free to do so. See what it does!" Then I got bored and I realized there was a key to explore there, and here we are.
Same goes for adults. There's no way to get bored anymore, unless you turn your smartphone/tablet/computer off. There's a never ending stream of news, posts on social platforms, video streams, podcasts, stealing the time to think about things which could improve your life.
Possibly off-topic: my sister practices a developmental game with her son. She gives him a toy with some kind of defect. And he figures out how to fix the defect by himself. With his mom's help, of course, but still.
But that's exactly the point. The point is not because boredom is good per-se. The point is that our natural instinct to avoid boredom is what drives us to do stuff, to go places, to invent things, to dream.
The problem is not that eventually kids/people will find a way to not be bored. The problem is how easy and effortless it is to find entertainment these days.
The situation is similar to food. It's not that eating and enjoying food is bad, but the way modern society makes food available (and the quality of it) enables some quote suboptimal behaviours (to put it mildly)
For my own kids when they are bored there is a flow of requests. First they ask if they can watch TV. Then they ask if they play video games. Then they ask if they can goto a friends house that they like. Then they ask if they can see a neighbor kid who they are kinda meh about. If I keep saying no to all the distractions they typically will enter a complainy phase about how they are bored, but after a bit of boredom they enter a very imaginative state where we can end up with some top tier kid games, the kind you might see on Bluey.
Same exact thing with my 4 year old. We give him very little screen time but it is always the first thing he asks for. Once he (begrudgingly) accepts that he isn't going to get to watch TV and he has to play by himself (if we can't play with him for some reason like coming dinner or taking care of his infant brother) he goes into an amazing creative state where he will play by himself for hours, narrating and creating new games with rules. Or drawing on his easel.
Once he is in the creative zone, he takes charge of his time. He will ask us to help with something and then tell us to go away and then have us come see what he built while he tells us elaborate stories.
There is a kids book called the boring book that captures this process pretty well.
I limit their time with electronic devices (yt kids, games, etc) because it seems that the devices/services are similar to drugs including withdrawal symptoms.
So getting bored just means having to find something to play with. Lego is a good creative way to spend time. Going outside is also preferable to Minecraft ..
-Playing in storm drains. Inside the narrow tunnels I might add.
-Abandoned construction sites.
-Railway tracks. Putting things o the rails waiting for the train to see what happened. Everything from rocks to toys to coins.
-Dumpster diving in large dumpsters. There was a soap factory near us and wed dive for schampoo or hairgel.
-Jumping in the biohazard pond looking for frogs eggs.
-Throwing things off bridges.
-Climbing various constructions, houses and dubios trees.
-Competing in who could jump from the highest roof.
Kids not only could get hurt. We did. Legs were broken. No one died fortunately.
Bored kids outside is not really as romantic as many would have it. Not arguing against boredom, constant stimuli is not healthy.
That being said, unsupervised bored kids can lead to some very dangerous outcomes.