We've been 'screen-free' for a month

How it's going. And in the words of my four year old: will it ever end?

Jul 26, 2024

turned off black television — Photo by Ajeet Mestry on Unsplash

Let’s be clear: I am the first to admit that I have been heavily reliant on screen-time in the past to do much of the heavy lifting when it comes to parenting. Not in the sense that I would plonk my kids in front of the TV from dawn until dusk—but in our household, screen-time as a concept has never been something that’s been an issue. We’ve never had hard and fast rules around it and it’s always been something that has been a part of our daily lives, rather than separate from it.

With two very young children in tow, we’re also still (thankfully) in a period of innocence when it comes to devices and the types of content they’re consuming. It’s more Elmo and Disney movies than online games or YouTube doom-holes. But still, if my four year old asked to watch something on TV while he was eating his breakfast, I’d happily oblige. For me, the reward was that he ate without a 30 minute negotiation and I was granted a few minutes of peace and quiet to myself to do super fun stuff like empty the dishwasher, put on a load of laundry or answer an email…

But once our second bub joined the party, I found that our reliance on screens for distraction and ‘quiet time’ escalated as my bolshy bossy toddler began to demand her own screen. So, while our four year old watched something on Netflix whilst noshing his toast, our 18 month old would stand at the breakfast bar, scoffing her own breakfast with an iPad blaring Elmo songs at her on repeat. The ‘quiet time’ I had hoped for was now becoming ‘loud time’ and as our youngest has become even more bolshy, even more bossy and even more determined to get her own way—I started to feel as if we were turning screens on and off almost constantly. Even when they swiftly lost interest in whatever godawful show they were watching, the steady hum on Blippi, Wiggles or Lion King would often be running on a loop in the background.

While I’ve been ‘screen-free curious’ for some time—recently I hit breaking point. Enough was enough and I began seeking out content myself that illustrated how other parents had made the leap to ditch devices cold turkey. Quick to point out the incredible shift in their children’s behaviour, general mood and even sleep—it didn’t take much to convince me that my gut instincts were right.

So, one morning, I simply woke up and didn’t turn on the TV. There were certainly questions—mainly from our four year old as to why I was intent on torturing him—and a few screams from our toddler confused about why the iPad was ‘gone? gone?’, but I dug my heels in.

At first, I just wanted to see what would happen—I kept my expectations low and placed no firm rules around when or if we would reintroduce screens. But I was honestly shocked at the shift. Within about 48 hours, the questions simply stopped. Our 18 month old seemed to forget entirely that screens even existed and I found that books were being pulled from shelves, puzzles were being scattered across the kitchen table and most remarkably, I found myself sneaking into bedrooms to find both our kids playing happily—together.

And so… we continued. Every now and then Ziggy—our four year old—would fall into a puddle demanding to watch something. But usually this was post-preschool when he was exhausted and you could tell he just wanted to kick back and relax. So after a little while we loosened the parameters for him—allowing a ‘special’ movie night with us once or twice a week after his sister was in bed where he could choose something to watch for 20 minutes or so.

But beyond that—and a quick sojourn to New Zealand to visit family where he was allowed to zombie out on the plane and watch some movies with his grandparents—it’s now been over a month and I’m definitely keen to see where this experiment takes us next.

With every age and stage presenting its own challenges, I’m certainly not placing any pressure on us to avoid devices forever. And in fact, I think in many ways this can be detrimental once kids enter preschool and school where learning online is much more dominant than it ever was when we were growing up—but what I have loved more than anything is see their imagination take centre stage, rather than the television.

Instead of sitting on the couch, they’re now dismantling it bit by bit to makes caves and rivers of lava—jumping from one side of the room to the other and linking furniture with blankets to make tunnels. Sure it means we have to pack everything up again at the end of the day in order to actually use the couch for its intended purpose, but for now, I’m happy to lean at the kitchen bench and watch their imagination take flight.