Kids and Electronics
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There’s an on-going debate about kids and cell phones/tablets. Some are quiet passionate about it. My biggest rule of thumb is- you let the hold it you take your chance on them breaking it. Don’t get mad if it happens. If your two year old gets mad at something and throws your phone across the room, it’s not completely their fault they didn’t know it was going to crack the screen. Oh, and obviously it’s not a babysitter (I feel like I don’t have to mention that but just in case.)
Letting the kids play on my iPhone or iPad helps me out sometimes in a store or at a restaurant when the kids are restless to let them hold my phone. Yes, I can see people judging me but if it wasn’t for letting my kids hold my phone then I’m sure it would be for something else. My favorite comment is “you know, their finger is going to turn into a stylus if they are always playing with that!” Um, it is?? Really? And you know this how? lol. I keep those questions to myself but one day I might ask if it comes up again.
Educational Fun
I have always tried to find educational type games for my iPad or iPhone that the kids can play with. There’s a peekaboo app from the iTunes store that they both love. There also a wheels on the bus app that is another big favorite. They’ve learned a lot from these apps and it has the added benefit of keeping them quiet when needed too.
One of my favorite apps and one that grows with them is ABC Mouse. I had seen multiple Disney Jr advertisements for it and my sister had downloaded it for her kids. They year my daughter would have started pre-school we received the notice that my company was closing our office and because I didn’t know exactly when my job would be over so I wasn’t sure where to send her to pre-school. My mom and sister watched the kids while I worked and I would either send her somewhere close to me or take my chances and send her somewhere closer to them so they could help with picking her up. The issue being that when my job was over whether I’d have to go further to get her to preschool and pick her up. On top of, where would my next job be?
In the stress of everything I winded up not sending her and making it a point to work with her at home as much as I could. I decided to try ABC Mouse, after all there was no obligation to it so what could it hurt? It offers it all…education, music, ‘pets’, and I can configure it to fit where they are at and what they need practice on.
As lessons are completed they get tickets that allow them to buy things such as a pet, things for their ‘room’, outfits for their avatar. I found with my daughter it was a big incentive. I was able to login to the parent side and check her progress as well as change her path if needed at any time. A lot of times we’d sit together while she did the activities. Can I tell you that she’s been absolutely on par and above with where she should be when she entered Kindergarten this past fall? I’m not saying it’s all due to the app, we put a lot of work into helping her learn but ABC Mouse gave us direction and made it a lot of fun for her. My three year old has recently gotten in on the fun to and is practicing letters and numbers with the app.
Kids still need outside time, and to play with blocks
and Play-Doh 
along with other sensory enhancing items. I don’t think we should discount electronic things merely because they are electronic. Moderation is key. I do believe you should monitor the screen time your child has, but I wouldn’t say that banning it totally is the perfect answer either.
Tell me your thoughts!
What do you think? Do your kids play with your phone and/or tablet? Have you ever had your child throw it or dunk it in their drink?
If you are interested in trying ABC Mouse you can use this link to get your first month FREE!
My kids do play with my phone. They are older now and each have a kindle. The best thing I can do is try to balance it with quality family time and try to monitor the time they are spending with devices.
I agree, I think that as long as you have some balance that there isn’t a problem. Thanks for commenting :)!
We don’t even own a smart phone or tablet, so can’t argue about anything there. However, we do have a laptop that our daughter uses for watching and learning, usually she is good about limiting her own time as she says she has “work to do”, which is drawing, cutting paper or sewing things together.
That’s awesome! Mine tend to be pretty good about limiting themselves (most of the time) and thinking of it as their “homework.” Thanks for commenting!
We love ABC Mouse. My 2-year-old has learned so much already. She loves going through the learning path 🙂
It’s so much fun especially at that age to watch how they take it all in and pick up on all of it! Thanks for commenting!
We’ve always been super lax about “screen time.” In fact, my 4 year old has learned SO MUCH from those Tablet games and from shows on PBS/Disney Junior. In our new-parent-routine, we kept kids YouTube on his Kindle Fire. It became clear that we desperately needed to remove it after he became addicted to silly YouTube channels. It was insane. So now we do pretty free and clear ‘screen time,’ but no you tube. He still wants to do things like play and run and be outside. It doesn’t seem to effect that at all.
Oh goodness! My 3 year old found YouTube and these channels where it’s basically people doing the voices of various characters not normally in shows together ( for ex masha and bear with paw patrol) lol. Yeah I had to ban YouTube. ??♀️
I give my kids the phone too! Like you said – sometimes it’s the only way to get through a meal at a restaurant. I am with you sister?
🙂 Thank you!! Yeah I’m sticking with moderation. And I know if given the choice those people wouldn’t want to hear my kid pitch a fit when it could be avoided by being entertained lol