Screen time for kids
Photo by Emily Wade on Unsplash
In today’s episode we’re discussing how we manage screen time with our kids
During this episode we’ll discuss:
Screen time during remote learning
How remote learning affect screen time rules
What are the acceptable uses for screen time in our homes
How much screen time our kids get
What is off limits
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Resources:
Kids are spending more hours on screens than ever. Should parents worry?
As Kids’ Screen Time Surges During The Pandemic, Here’s What Research Suggests
TRANSCRIPT
[music]
Dave: In today's episode, we're discussing how we manage screen time with our kids.
[music]
Dave: Hey, everyone, welcome to the Papa est Fatigué podcast, the podcast for dads, by dads. Screen time has always been a big issue with kids and with virtual learning. There certainly seems to be an increased level of awareness of how much time kids are spending in front of the screens. Today, we're going to be discussing how we handle screen time in our homes. First off, here's my deal. I'm Dave, I have a seven-year-old girl and a four-year-old boy.
Jim: I'm Jim, I've got a seven-year-old girl and a five-year-old girl.
Dave: Let's kick off with just a little bit of data here that we've found. Here are the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations for acceptable amount of screen time. No screen time for children under two. One hour per day for children 2 to 12. Two hours per day for teens and adults, and just some other stuff. [laughs] It's a joke, right?
Jim: Two hours for adults. Yes. No.
Dave: Pass. [laughs]
Jim: It's just not possible.
Dave: Right. Between the work and then the downtime, I don't think anybody gets two hours, but [chuckles] there's the recommendations.
Jim: [chuckles] That's the recommendation, right?
Dave: Some other things that we found, Axios found that children's screen time during the pandemic surged by as much as 50% to 60% more. These numbers are a little bit off because they're comparing two different baselines, but they found that children 12 and younger were spending upwards of five hours or more on screens a day.
That's probably at this point when the pandemic, that's not super surprising. As we're returning to "the normal", a lot of parents are trying to unwind this amount of screen time that their kids have been exposed to. The big takeaway from the research that I found is at least that as long as you're able to return to that more limited screen time, as we're returning to "normal", your child should be fine.
It's not the end of the world if they've got a ton of screen time over the course of the year. However, the idea is to slowly start unwinding that. Also, to remember that not all screen time is going to be equal. Educational apps and videos, it's not quite the same thing as video games and the mindless YouTube videos that my kids love to watch.
The first thing, let's tackle the big driver of screen time this year which is remote learning. Jim, can you talk a little bit about what does/did remote learning look like for you and your girls, and how much screen time per day they got?
Jim: The pandemic was a big one. Thinking about this topic, the screen time is really in three categories. One is maybe the interactive screen time on the iPad. The other is in front of the TV or watching videos on the iPad. Then the other is the video conferencing or talking to mom or dad or to grandma and to grandpa on a FaceTime or something like that.
They're all screen times, right? They're all times that the kids are in front of the screen, but they're very different. I think the one that was most concerning for my family was the passive activities. Screen time was probably four to five hours a day, and frankly, I just lost count. When she was in a remote school, I wasn't sure if it was the entire time or if they took breaks or log in. I
know that they were using a lot of apps in between their classes. I'd guess that it was four, five hours maybe, of screen time combined with interactive education, interactive learning, plus watching videos, playing other games, doing other activities, playing apps, and stuff like that. It was pretty complicated. It was a lot of screen time. Then unfortunately, for me and my wife, for mom and dad, we were frankly just exhausted.
We had to get things done both for our jobs and around the house. We ended up relying on the TV to keep them pacified. That's slowly, not even slowly, very abruptly bled into a lot of screen time and it became overwhelming.
Dave: Yes, we found that too the screen time as the babysitter, as we were all just stressed out and just trying to get this one thing done. Like I just need whatever 10 minutes to just watch this thing. I just need you out of my hair for a little bit. It is absolutely a slippery slope, or the next thing you know, you're like, "It's been like four hours. What happened? I took a nap and they're still watching the thing."
Absolutely. I think that is the challenge. These days with I think people having so little free time to themselves, as we're all cooped up in-- Again, this is a little bit different right now as the country started reopening, but certainly having gone through that experience and just being like, "Look, just sit here and watch some TV so I can have a little bit of peace and quiet," was certainly a thing that I think we felt as well. Did the remote learning piece change how you guys looked at what the normal screen time rules were?
Jim: Like I said, with the three different types of screen time, I think we kept pretty regular with the watching TV and the apps. Obviously, regular and that it expanded and became a little bit more than it was before. Definitely, the video conferencing and the remote learning, that was obviously picked up a lot.
I think the problem is that the screen time, sitting in front of the screen, jacked up by four or five hours a day, and we really didn't adjust or really didn't pare back any other screen time for the passive stuff or the educational apps and things like that. It ended up being a lot of time during the day. There's some things in here, and you and I have talked about how it increases obesity and things like that, and I can understand.
The kids were just sitting still in front of a screen for hours, much more than they had before. They're not interacting with each other. They're not playing outside and all those things that the pandemic took away from us.
Dave: I've noticed certainly with my daughter, once that screen is on, if you have to interact with her, it's like the world doesn't exist. They've just like completely-- They're focused on whatever it is they're watching, and the world disappears around them, which is I think among the more frustrating things, and I'm like, "Hey." [crosstalk]
Jim: Also a little disturbing.
Dave: Yes. They're so engaged. Also, if you don't know what they're engaged in, even more disturbing when they're-- YouTube, in particular. I think YouTube is the big thing there that they can just go from thing to thing to thing to thing, and you've--
Jim: Yes, that's a rabbit hole.
Dave: You start off with like, "Hey, you can watch some educational stuff," and the next thing you know, they're watching something that has nothing to do with anything because they just clicked on "kids who like this, like that" and-- Again, the four hours later, they're on something that has nothing to do with where you started off with, which is super problematic for us.
If we set aside the COVID and the distance learning stuff, all that virtual stuff, what generally are your family's acceptable uses for screen time? Do you have any favorite apps or any favorite websites that you visit when they're allowed that screen time?
Jim: We started using the iPad when my older daughter was learning how to read. There's an app called Epic, which I think you're familiar with. There's Storyline Online where there are picture books read by actors. It's a Screen Actors Guild, so it's entertaining to have these very well-trained actors read the books. Those felt like acceptable iPad activities.
There's quasi reading. It was like somebody reading a book to them, even though it was on the screen. We let that go. Then Kodable and there's another-- Osmo, that's what it's called. We have some Osmo apps that are pretty sophisticated. Sometimes the older one will start to play around with it and get frustrated and will leave it alone.
There are other times when she gets really engaged and it's fascinating to watch because it's very sophisticated, high-level, problem-solving, coding, things like that. Those are the ones that I absolutely, I will encourage that all day long. Some of the other "educational apps" really are just games, are junk, but they got the thin veneer of something educational, so they get to watch that.
Dave: It's funny, actually, all the apps that you mentioned are ones [chuckles] that we use, too. Our daughter does use Epic. Epic is a combination of online stories that can be read to you or you can actually just read through them. One of her favorites is Ninja Cat that she follows. We actually bought the book because I'm like, "All right, you like this thing so much? We're going to take this thing offline. We're going to read this book."
That's a fun one. She also uses Kodable and Storyline Online and GraphoGame. GraphoGame actually one that helps you learn to read. Osmo also. I think we're also in line with those educational games. Even with the educational games, though, I do like to limit their screen time, but I think Osmo does a pretty good job in terms of that tactile feeling to the games because they all have this peripheral type play to it. There is some level of--
Jim: It's the real world. Their presence is in the real world.
Dave: Yes, they're actually physically engaging with the game and there's like tangrams and stuff like that. I remember when she was younger, she'd say, "Hey, I want to color." I'm like, "Great, color." She brings me the iPad and I'm like, "What are you doing?" "Coloring this." "Get a pencil, get a crayon and color. That's coloring." Touching the screen and touching the color, that's not coloring.
For a while, we had that app, and I just was like, "No, that's not coloring." Also, it was at a point in time too when coloring was useful for her motor skill development. You're basically getting nothing out of this other than the fact that you get to change all sorts of colors easily, but no, we're not going to do that.
I think in as much as there are some ways to encourage that real-world experience and I think Osmo does a great job and there are a lot of good games that they have. The other thing that we do allow her to do is FaceTime with the grandparents, certainly at the beginning of the pandemic when we wouldn't see them at all. Still to this day-- Actually, they just finished reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory remotely through Facebook.
They banged it out in a week, I think seven days. It was great for me because I didn't have to handle bedtime routine [unintelligible 00:11:05]. She was super engaged with the story. I think they're moving on to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the next series they're going to tackle, which is great.
One thing that I've noticed too is she's young, but there is this increased desire to FaceTime with friends which that one I'm a little bit on the bubble as she's-- It's school now, and it's like, "Well, you can see your friend at school and I get that you want to continue this at night." I do want to encourage some of that, but at the same time, that's somewhat unnecessary screen time because she sees that child five days a week at this point.
I think in terms of the rough outlines for the things that we allow them to do, we're pretty much in line with you. Within these acceptable uses that we have, do you have any rules about how they spend their time, like, "You can have no more than X amount of time on this," or any limitations on how they use that screen time?
Jim: It's funny to think about that because we don't set a time, I don't even look at the clock. I've got a weird sort of intuitive sense about it, like, "It's been long enough," or we have this sense of, "They've been quiet for too long, it's time to shut it down." I don't exactly know what that time is, but certainly, no more than an hour. Maybe even less if they're doing the games and stuff. I want them to be somewhere where I can see them for, I guess, obvious reasons.
Dave: We've been a little bit more lax. When it's screen time, they're mostly allowed to do whatever they want. The only exception is no YouTube. We've gone down that path. We've seen some pretty- not crazy stuff but stuff that we're like, "No." The biggest thing about YouTube, and I'll blame one channel in particular, which is Ryan's World. Look, good for that kid. That dude made $20 million last year.
Jim: Is that the toy-unboxing kid?
Dave: Yes.
Jim: $20 million?
Dave: Yes. I think he's got a product line in Target and maybe also in Walmart. I'm pretty sure he's got one in Target. On the strength of his personality, he built that into an empire. It certainly makes kids ask for stuff that they absolutely don't need because they see how excited he is. That's the shtick. Long ago, we're like, "All right, no more YouTube. We're just not going to let it anymore."
I will say that sometimes we do limit it, if she wants screen time, and I'm not really wanting to give it to her, I'll say, "Okay, you can do Epic." I'll limit it to Epic because I know at least there's either reading or she's going to be read to. When they read to you, the words pop up. They just pop up, they get italicize, so you can follow along. That's her limitations sometimes.
Our youngest, it's a little bit harder to keep him in line. Sometimes when he gets screen time, he would actually prefer to play games. One of the companies I like is Duck Duck Moose. I think their games are age-appropriate, they're pretty good for the kids. They're not quite interactive as say an Osmo, because you're just touching the screen. I think within the realm of things, I think those are pretty good games.
We'll let him play those as well. Since we just briefly touched on YouTube, is there anything that-- It sounds like you also, that YouTube is off-limits for your kids. Is there anything else that is off-limits when they're online?
Jim: Just the internet generally. [unintelligible 00:14:52] come up with some made-up search terms and get into trouble real fast. General internet surfing, no and you're right, YouTube's out as well. Every once in a while, there's a video that maybe comes from school or something like that that's hosted on YouTube. For them to sit down and watch it like TV, that's not acceptable.
Dave: One thing that I was doing the other day, I can't remember how this came up, but I was talking to my son about volcanoes. Like I said, I don't remember how it came up yesterday, but I'm like, "All right, you know what? When we get into bedtime, I'll read you a story and then we're going to watch a video," because he doesn't know what that's all about.
I'm like, "We're going to watch some eruptions. I'll show you the different types of lava there are." I actually had some pictures when my wife and I went to Volcano National Park many, many years ago. I'm like, "Here, look. We're inside the crater of a volcano," and he's like, "Well, how can you do that?" It was interesting the kinds of questions because he's just seen lava, he knows it's hot, and he knows you're not supposed to be in the crater.
This is where YouTube is a teaching tool. For Christmas, he got a book. It's not quite a pop-up book, but it's one of these books that you can open windows. It talks about big machinery. One of the ones in particular was the Apollo, I don't know, one of the Apollo ones that went to the moon. It's this large image of the rocket and then you can open these little boxes and it says, "This is where the propellant is and this is the lunar lander."
I'm like, "Okay, this is another great opportunity for you to see what it looks like." YouTube without me is definitely [unintelligible 00:16:35] . It's funny because we actually never really thought about the kids getting online themselves. I think our oldest has never really launched a browser to start typing in her own searches, which is good because at that point, we're just going to have to uninstall the browser on the iPad. For now, it doesn't seem like she's doing that, so we haven't really needed to do it, thankfully. For us, it's just YouTube.
Jim: For the browser thing, the way that we found out about it because they're not supposed to be browsing by themselves. The older one was using her iPad for remote learning. One day, she asked to use her Chromebook because it's got a keyboard. She felt like that was easier to use, yes, that's fine. She took her Chromebook. She was going to a school pod just up the street.
Then we had our parent-teacher conferences and they were like, "Where is your daughter? She's not showing up, she's not participating in classes. What's the deal?" We were taken aback because we had no idea. We went back and looked at the browser history. What she had done is she started to-- I think that there was a third grader that was in the pod as well. I think she probably knew about searching on the browsers.
What we saw on the search history was one or two searches during the day, she did some time on Amazon looking at toys and things like that. Then it became more. It was probably about three or four weeks this progressed. By the end, it was all day. She was spending all day online. It was YouTube videos, it was Amazon, it was browser searches, and really just out of control.
For me, that was disturbing because it showed-- I think kids just try to do things that they get away with anyway, there was something like that. I felt that there was that sort of addictive pull to it, that is just more and more and more and going down that rabbit hole of the games that are advertised next to the YouTube videos or the next YouTube videos.
She started to ask for some really trash things, those apps that have in-app purchases, that ring you up at $1.99 here and there. We had to shut that down, obviously. That was one of the things that led to a screen time hiatus in our house. It was good, it was a wake-up call.
Dave: I've got a similar story. Our daughter was-- I noticed that she was having a harder time waking up in the mornings to get ready for school because we've been back in school now. It was getting harder and harder and I'm like, "This is interesting because she seems to be going to sleep at the same time."
Then I noticed all of a sudden that ten o'clock, eleven o'clock, she'd come out of the room and go to the bathroom or something and she's wide awake. I'm like, "Okay, this is weird. What's going on?" Then she's sleeping in late. On the weekend, she'd wake up at 10:30, and I'm like, "What's happening?" Normally, she wakes up a little before 7:00 on her own.
On a good day, she wakes up before I have to wake her up, which is great. I'm like, "Okay, well, this is weird." One day, I picked up her at school, and the teacher's like, "Yes, your daughter was super tired in class today and I'm not sure what's up. She's never like this." I said, "Hey, I'm not really sure what's going on. There's nothing--." They say something things are going on at home, little things that change the rhythm of the child.
I was telling the teacher like, "No, there's nothing different that's been going on." One night, my wife went into their room and found that, I think, at 11:30, they were watching iPad. Here's the thing. That night, I asked her where the iPad was. She said, "I don't know." I wanted to make sure I had it or something. It turns out she had hidden it under the mattress.
My wife and I had a discussion. We were like, "That's completely unacceptable." For starters, it's the slippery slope of lying to your parents, but also the bigger issues, she's going to school tired. She's falling asleep in class because she's sneaking YouTube in. I don't even know what she was doing. She was sneaking in video. We had a discussion. That led to our current two month ban on video, and like, "All right, this is going to hurt."
Jim: The privilege is gone.
Dave: "You have lost that privilege for two months." One caveat is that she can interact with grandma because it's a little bit different. She can do some level of FaceTime with grandma. That's how they got the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory banged out. Then I caught her a couple of weeks later doing it again. I'm like, "All right, well, now it's three months." [chuckles]
We've obviously changed all the codes, but there are some after school activities where she needs access to the iPad, which is why sometimes she still knows the passwords and stuff like that. Yes, we're currently on a three month ban. Yes, I mean it's crazy to just sneak in stuff like that. She's a good girl, she just-- They're pushing the boundaries at this age.
Jim: I think about what would it be like for me at that age if I had access to an iPad. You were probably like I was. You've watched after school cartoons or you've started morning cartoons or whatever, but you had to be there at that time and there were commercials every like seven minutes.
Dave: It was different.
Jim: It was torture. If I could have watched those cartoons back to back to back with no commercials, I'm sure I would have [crosstalk].
Dave: All day long?
Jim: Yes, right.
Dave: You just sit there if you could. [laughs] Speaking of having to be there when the show is on. Back in high school, there's this show that I liked to watch, super old shows, Man from U.N.C.L.E, like the original Man from U.N.C.L.E, not the remake that they made a movie out of. It's like the 1960s version. I had in my room a black and white TV.
I somehow found out that this show was on at 5:00 in the morning on a weekday. I would set the alarm, wake up at 5:00 in the morning to watch this show, and then go back to sleep for an hour to then get ready for school. My parents, I don't think that they knew that I was waking up to watch this TV show. I think that's the difference with our kids. I don't know about you. Do you guys still have like regular cable TV?
Jim: Yes, we've got the Xfinity.
Dave: We cut the cord. [crosstalk]
Jim: I never watch it. Maybe for Saturday Night Live. Everything else is all streaming services.
Dave: We cut the cord, but I think that our kids have grown up in an on-demand world. You want to watch this, boom, just turn it on. One show that they liked watching last year that I do let them watch was Lego Masters. The reason I wanted to watch Lego Masters-- [crosstalk]
Jim: That's a fun show.
Dave: Yes, it's a good show, and part of it was that my daughter was really into Lego, but she only ever wanted to build what the directions said. We had all these like just random Legos. Not necessarily coming with sets. She couldn't wrap her head around like, "Oh, I can just mix stuff up." I feel like that show will teach her how to take just random blocks and that you can turn it into this. It did.
It absolutely did and she started playing Lego, which is great. That show has commercials, and I think that was the first time they were like, "Wait a minute. What is this thing? Why is the show not continuing? What's this thing that they're talking about, like these hot pockets whatever?" For the kids who've grown up-- [unintelligible 00:24:30] there's a little bit of that on YouTube.
I think probably when they were younger, a lot of the stuff they watched probably the commercials ran pre your post versus like in the middle. I think growing up in this on-demand, with very limited- even sometimes the commercials are 10 seconds. It really is kind of on-demand as much as you want, whenever you want it. That has changed how they interact with video because they can- you could literally go all day long.
I know this because I just went down with my second COVID shot, and I watched video like all day long for 48 hours. You can do it. At that age, too, it's-- I think part of the challenge for me with the kids is saying, "Yes, I watch some video, but it's different because I'm older and it doesn't affect my brain."
Jim: Exactly.
Dave: "You're younger, it's affecting your brain differently than it is me." That's part of also what I'm trying to teach them. When I'm like, "It's time to cut the screen off, like we're done." That can be an issue with like, "Well, you're watching something, why is that?" I don't watch that much video. It's any time they see you doing something that they want to do, right? It's like, "Why can't I do that?"
Jim: "That's not fair." "That's not fair, I'm dad, that's why."
Dave: [laughs] Yes, pull that it's not fair, I'm the dad card. Speaking of that, with your kids, do you ease them into the end of screen times? What I've noticed especially with the younger one is you can't just say, "All right, turn it off." I give him like 10 minutes, 5 minutes, time to go. That tends to work pretty well with the younger one.
My daughter at this point is fine. I can tell tell like, "Hey, shut it off." She'll grumble about it, but she'll do it. She doesn't need that warning, but the youngest one who's four, that feels like it goes a lot easier. Do you do that as well?
Jim: Yes, certainly with the younger one. We did that with the older one, too. We did the same thing with, "10 minutes, 5 minutes, 2 minutes, do your last thing. We're turning it off." Otherwise, just trying to pry it out of their hands was like-- It was like a junkie. They did not want to let it go. The older one's figured out that it's a privilege.
If I can trust her to give it to me when I ask, when she's done, then she knows that she'll be able to do it again. The first time that I said, "All right, that part is over." She turned it off and gave it to me, "Okay, dad." That was fantastic. The older one's figured it out that if I can trust her with it, then she gets that and more. The younger one definitely- because as you described, there's that zoned in, kind of zombie in.
The whole world disappears, and if all of a sudden I come in and try to take it out of her hands, even if I've been talking with them for 10 minutes, 5 minutes, 2 minutes, 1 minute. "Sure, dad." That's not registering in that world. For me to show up, "It's time." Take it out of their hands, it's just a little bit too abrupt. I don't know how I get over that, other than keep doing the 5, 10, 2 minute thing.
Dave: In talking about expectations, one thing that I have noticed with this screen time, time out, they both have it. Even though it was our daughter that initiated [crosstalk] the boy gets caught up because he was watching too. They both know they weren't supposed to be doing it. I think that one really nice thing is that-- Our kids don't get any screen time during the week.
The weekend, it'll always just be, "Hey, can we watch video?" Like all day long. "Can we watch video? Can we watch video?" With the screen hiatus, they don't ask anymore, which is great. It's just not this constant like, "Can I do it?" "No, no, no." I've noticed like that first weekend when she was cut off, she just pounded out. She read two or three books.
I'm like, "Great, more of that." I'm hesitant to let the three months will go by pass her that I wanted to, but I'm like, "How do I extend this concept when this hiatus is done that they're not going back to this like, 'When can I do it? When can I do it? When can I do it?'" Maybe part of it was there was no rhyme or reason to how much screen time they got and when they got it.
Other than, "You might get some screen time on the weekend." I think that's maybe one thing that maybe we'll have to look at saying it up afterwards is to say, "Okay, you get one hour on Saturday and one hour on Sunday and that's it." Maybe it's really a function of setting the expectations so they're-- That's maybe more helpful for all of us than the ad hoc way that I've been doing it before.
Jim: I have read that several times. That's one of the recommendations is have designated screen time, and obviously just limits, understood that there's going to be limits of certain amount of time. That just makes sense and is true for any habit to have that sort of boundaries.
Dave: Do your kids get screen time on a weekday?
Jim: They don't, no. Similar to your hiatus, that experience that we had with the daughter at school in a Chromebook, my wife and I, it made us realize that we had been really complacent with the COVID and with the shelter in place and no play dates, no birthdays, whatever, and us being together all the time.
As you said, just to put them on the couch and get a couple of minutes to do something, we had really started using a lot of screen time. The wake up call, the browser stuff that had been going on at the school pod, we just said, "That's it. No more screen time," other than we do a Friday movie night for the whole family. Then on Saturday, I set up another TV and then the girls get to watch that by themselves.
My wife and I will watch something else in the front room, so that's it for screen time right now. Like you, I stopped asking, which is great. You know what? They're in much better moods, too. They're happier, they're playing together better. They're not grumpy and whiny and begging to get the screen time.
Dave: It's a drug.
Jim: Exactly. That's where we are now, and frankly, I like it. That's where I want to keep it.
Dave: Do you have any differences in how you manage rules related to the kids, because yours are, I think we said, five and seven, probably almost eight. For us, again, it's a little bit hard with the younger one. I think you're part of his big challenges. I haven't been able to finish my one thing, but if you choose a two-hour movie, you're not going to be able to finish it.
Versus, the daughter that can bang out five or six short episodes and stuff. I think I've struggled with how to help him understand that. Do you have any different sets of rules for how you handle the kids, or is it both equal and your daughter is a little bit more capable of understanding the same rules that you have for your oldest one?
Jim: Yes and no. We do try to keep the same rules. They've got to be somewhere-- I'm talking about the iPad time. They've got to be somewhere where you can see them. They have to tell me what apps they're doing, or ask to do certain apps, and yes, that's fine. Usually, it's all acceptable. I just want to know what they're doing.
Then every once in a while, I'll come over and peek over their shoulder and make sure they're doing what they said they were doing and not getting distracted doing other sorts of things. It is the same. They're using different age-appropriate apps, but they've got the same rules just because- how can I do it differently, right?
Have the younger one put the iPad down first and let the older one keep doing it, that's just not going to work. Same rules, same plans, and just different activities and different apps.
Dave: To that point about asking the younger one put the- you can't. I do in my head go like the younger one's get too much screen time relative to his age, simply because the older one is the older one and she gets a little bit more screen time. I always do feel a little bit guilty that he's getting more than he should.
There's always that, oh, second child always gets it. The rules are different for them, but that is one where I do feel somewhat guilty when I see him on. I know that at her age, when she was five, when she was his age, I don't think she got that much screen time. She was the first one, and we were like, "No."
Jim: Well, it was easier, too. There's only one. It wasn't quite as time-consuming.
Dave: Yes. This is where I'm like, "Oh, he's getting more than I want, but that's probably still okay, but that is the one thing where I'm like wish I could pull some of that back. Them breaking the rules has been actually a nice excuse for me to be like, "No." Truthfully, as a parent, I should need the excuse to feel like there's no more screen time. I don't know.
I feel like there isn't, and I think the challenge, too, is that some of the shows that they like, they're clearly learning stuff from them. Even Octonauts is one. My kid was telling me something about a narwhal. I'm like, "How did you know that?" He was like, "Oh, Octonauts." I'm like, "Oh, okay, well, at least you're--" [crosstalk]
Jim: Wild Kratts?
Dave: Yes. Wild Kratts is another popular one. I think she's now moving into the space where it's less educational and more just straight entertainment, but he still is-- One of the ones that he watches is-- I can't remember what it's called, but it's a Jim Henson show, and it's an animated series. It's on Netflix. Again, it's age-appropriate. They're trying to teach about sharing and stuff like that.
I'm like, "Oh, he's getting something from it at least." Truthfully, I think that as parents, we shouldn't feel bad if-- I guess what it is is we shouldn't feel like the kids deserve screen time, which is where I am. Where I'm like, "Oh, he should get some," and maybe it's not deserved, but that all kids it's like their God-given right to [unintelligible 00:34:40] [laughter]
I think that's the wrong message. I think as parents, we should not feel that way. Even though, I know that our daughter come back sometimes. She's like, "Well, this kid's watching this." I'm like, "Well, that's them. It's a little bit different."
Jim: That's a whole other topic is age-appropriate films. My daughter said-- They haven't seen any Star Wars films. I know that the other kids their age have. There's a lot of things that the Marvel superheroes, we haven't watched any of those movies. Like you said, someone else is there watching it or they want to know about it. How do you explain that kind of stuff?
Dave: I think at school, it feels like it's the kids with the older siblings, because that's what happens. A lot of the boys also seemed to be getting things that I would consider not age-appropriate. It's a little bit hard to tell sometimes what is actually happening when our daughter's come back. My daughter is like, "Oh, yes. A bunch of the boys are playing Fortnight."
I'm like, "Are they really playing Fortnight?" Because this was last year. I'm like, "This kid's six years old." They could be. My guess is that's not quite the full story, but I don't really know. I feel like if I had a six year old boy, I'm not ready for him to be playing for Fortnight yet, nor a six year old girl. I don't know.
Maybe in a year or two when my son is six, maybe I will feel that way and maybe part of that is the pressure of fitting in. Oh, everybody else is playing Fortnight. Can I play? Can I play?
Jim: I don't want my girl to be the one that's left out.
Dave: I think we talked about this in another podcast. Was it you that had a friend who grew up never watching- didn't have a TV?
Jim: Yes.
Dave: You can't contribute at the playground to be like, "Oh, what was that?" It's funny. My friend's married to a guy who didn't grow up with TV. She's like, "Okay, we now have to watch all of these movies and all of these TV shows because you are a child of the '80s and you need to know what this stuff is. This is part of your education." He's catching up, but it's obviously different.
I think some of the screen time stuff is just a function of, in some respects, it's that fitting in. Eventually, it dovetails into the whole phones and social media accounts and stuff like that. I think we're at the very beginning of those larger conversations around social media, around devices and all of those things. This is just the door cracking open to go on what as parents do we feel comfortable with in terms of their level of engagement with these devices.
Jim: Speaking of movies and screen time and the social media and all that, this week, our Friday movie night was The Mitchells Versus The Machines. Have you seen that on Netflix?
Dave: No.
Jim: It's one of the most popular ones up there. First, it's great because it's a new animated movie that the kids can watch. It's something else on rotation, but it hits all these topics about families and phones and being isolated and family-time together. Well, it's one of the messages that you and I are talking about tonight, delivered directly to kids in an animated movie. As they grow up, hopefully they'll have more influences like that to help them be educated about what they're doing.
Dave: I'll have to check that out. Now that my daughter has just finished up Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, as soon as they finished it, I'm like, "All right, where can I get the movie?" Not the Johnny Depp one. The original Gene Wilder ones. It's got to be the original. I feel like this will be a great way for her to see it all play out.
I'm just curious, though. I think that's something that I want to watch with her. That's so we might do that maybe next Friday, although I think I've touched on this before. My son is a little sensitive, and I'm like, "Is there something that's going to be scary in there?" I don't know. There might be.
Jim: Yes, there is.
Dave: It's been a while. I don't remember.
Jim: It's a little kids horror movie. It's a sugarcoated horror movie.
Dave: Maybe it'll swear them off candy [laughs].
Jim: You know what? He should probably cover his eyes in a couple of places. [crosstalk]
Dave: I guess I should pre-screen it before they watch it.
Jim: You'll know the scene I'm talking about.
Dave: [laughs] Nice. Well, look, we hope you found today's episode informative. If you'd like to support the podcast and hear more discussions around fatherhood, please subscribe and drop us your view. If you have any questions for us, hit us up on the Facebook page. Facebook.com/papaestfatigue. That's P-A-P-A-E-S-T-F-A-T-I-G-U-E. Thanks for listening.
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