“My idea is make a video game poster and tape it on the TV and pretend to play video games.” – Violet, 5
“Prepare for the apocalypse and make signs for your funeral.” – Verick, 8
Screen-Free Week is over, and we have slowly been breaking our digital fast.
Looking back, the challenge led us to spend more quality time together as a family, as I outlined in my previous blogs. The kids enjoyed playing outside and having friends over, and we found plenty of other things to do like art, crafts and board games.
Still, it was harder than I thought it was going to be, especially when my daughter got sick and I snuck on a movie for her.
Going forward, we hope to be more mindful of the ways we use media, but it is really hard – seemingly impossible – to go entirely screen-free as more and more everyday tasks involve technology.
My husband likened Screen-Free Week to a crash diet. After a pattern of overindulgence, we went to the opposite extreme and attempted to cut media out entirely. It’s ambitious, but ultimately can’t be maintained. The families in Metro Parent’s screen-free challenge all agreed a week was too long and proposed weekends, days or at least media-less meals in the future.
My husband suggested that we treat screen time like calories, calculate how many hours we should reasonably consume each week, and leave it up to each family member to decide how to use them.
I think it’s a good idea.
In the meantime, I wanted to sign off with this video, which sums up the reasons to turn off digital entertainment and turn on life better than I ever could:
I hope you’ve enjoyed sharing our screen-free journey. I look forward to your comments …
