Less contact with nature

[Tuckervill]

I have very radical ideas about "screen time" (which I think is a ridiculous term--no one ever uses the term "book time", and if they do they're probably sucking all the fun out of everything for their kid).

I believe that in the context of a healthy, balanced, engaged life, no recreational activity should be off-limits, nor limited by extrinsic circumstances. (extrinsic=you didn't eat your broccoli--no guitar hero for you. intrinsic=you can't play guitar hero and go to swim practice at the same time.)

I believe that all children learn from everything they do, including video games (even the slasher ones), movies, television, and playing outside.

I believe that if a child is intensely focusing on one activity over and over to the exclusion of everything else, they are either very passionate about that one thing, or--in the case of overscheduled kids who spend most of their days in school or daycare and after-school classes--are likely escaping and avoiding something else. In the first case, who can argue with someone who's found a personal passion? In the second case, the activity is not the problem--something else is. A good parent would find out what that something else is, wouldn't they?

Karen

[Crankin]

Oh, there were plenty of things that I allowed my kids to do that other parents wouldn't hear of! One of them had something like 9 different "passions" before he graduated. When he was 12, we had to take him in a snowstorm, to watch the MIT juggling club on a Sunday, because he was obsessed with juggling.
I agree with the over scheduled business. They were allowed to do one activity in addition to Hebrew School, which was mandatory (and my kids actually enjoyed that). That activity changed frequently until each sort of decided what he really was into. For one it was music and luckily for me, for the other it was cycling. The reason I limited the video games was because one of them was extremely overstimulated by them. He just needed a lot more structure in certain areas.
I've said this before, but some parents need to lighten up (my observation from my own friends and years of teaching). They don't really enjoy their children and see them as projects to be completed. My kids grew up to be very good adults, despite the fact that they saw R rated movies, had to do chores, stayed by themselves starting at age 10, had a working mother who put them in various kinds of daycare...

[KnottedYet]

SKnot loves computers, Gameboys, video games. He programs his own animations, does stop-action animations, and took a computer animation class at Nintendo.

Oh, and he got into biiiiiiig trouble at school over computer activities.

I've bought him bikes his whole life, I've taken him to parks and beaches and on walks, I've sent him outside to play, I've offered every sports class and activity and equipment I could find. No enthusiasm. He loves animation and drama and music and computers.

He isn't me, and his interests/passions aren't the same as mine. Hard to accept, but he is his own person and I can't push him to be crazy about other things.

I'm starting to let him have screen time based on the idea that it's his passion. But I still set limits on it.

Edit: he's on the couch playing ukulele right now, after working on memorizing the guitar part from a song he heard in the sound track of a TV show, which he downloaded into his computer. Screen time serving a "higher" purpose, I suppose!