Part III: To screen or not to screen that is the question: teenagers and screen time

Our context

Put another way the title of this blog could also read 'to do or to be, that is the question'! I have blogged on screens and screen time for kids twice, 4 years ago and the time before that was 2014 though I think about it often and live daily the rapid evolution of all things internet and my children's interaction with it. I realise that engagement with a screen is a very active 'doing' practice not at all a 'being' one. It is very busy for the mind, and this stands in contrast to what kids might otherwise be engaged in which is 'being'; hitting a tennis ball against a wall, football with friends, lying in the sun or swimming, building with bricks, riding a bike, imagining with dolls, cars, alone or together in person with someone else, whatever... an activity known as Playing!  I have 2 boys, now a tween and early teen, their lives are being messed with; its time to update. 

I'll throw in a contextual caveat early because it has an effect; we live internationally, currently in Myanmar, before that it was Nepal, before that Ecuador, before that Lebanon, before that... you get the picture. We don't live stable lives where we can measure annual height progress against the doorframe or where we can run to the grocer and say hey because he's the same guy who sent a veggie plate to your first born's baptism. Sadly we don't really live in community, old friends and relatives are far away spread around the world, we visit them on holidays and not often. Locally the 'hood isn't very accessible, I mean its friendly enough but few people speak English and in this country newly opened to foreigners we are regarded with curiosity, still a novelty and treated with suspicion by some... it means aside from a few friends from school who live close by, we don't have community. And online community via social media pales in comparison to having thoughtful friends and wise elders living around the corner.

The other notable difference for us is that my sons go to a British curriculum international school rather than a public school. Burmese parents who can afford it strive to get their kids out of the public school system not known for it's progressive rigour in the education sector though it is reforming. The boy's school is well resourced and the kids there have all the toys, they wear a uniform (gasp) and across the board I'd say they want for nothing. This year, the 5th in its young life, the school, (I like to think) listened to parent-feedback and to their own good sense and have not sent home Macbook Air's for Secondary and iPads for Primary kids. It was making life screen-hell at home, the boys felt entitled to be on screen the minute they came home, the concept of screens and screen time being a privilege rather than a right was degraded by this school policy.  The policy was almost transparently a marketing ploy and that they axed it must have had a financial angle... 'nuff said they came to their senses and for that I am grateful.

Online life is different here in Myanmar. Internet is slower than in neighbouring Thailand but then it is much younger. Only 5 years ago a SIM card cost $200 and only 7 or 8 years it cost $2000 for a government monitored manky 3G data connection. Now it costs $3 for quite zippy 4G data. You can imagine the implications the sudden access to information and opinions combined with the low level of 'net literacy' has had. Imagine how much influence what appears online has to someone who has not had the benefit of living the evolution as information now delivered literally into their hands. Fake news for example, fools even the savvy e-content consumer; for those new to the medium and who didn't have access even to TV... hmm, you can see quite a problem developing. Facebook sees some of its highest penetration rates in emerging markets like Myanmar.  Some providers in Myanmar only give access to Facebook and very many people think FB is the internet (shock horror). And while more internet-evolved countries have moved on to Insta, Twitter, Snapchat, Reddit, etc away from Facebook, we are still in it deep, so much so a recent UN Human Rights report indicated FB un-vetted posts influenced public opinion and fanned the flames of hate during the Rohingya crisis of the past 2 years.

WiFi is not as prevalent here and often the signal is not strong or the band-width too narrow. By contrast 4G (and I fear soon 5G) is easy to get though not as cheap as in neighbouring Thailand and pretty fast. At my residence I can use Skype and Zoom easily and stream Netflix nearly without pause with pre-paid 4G and use my phone as a hotspot. Also, as parents we are not heavily invested in the virtual reality fad (we don't have the hardware), so I can't comment on this innovation or how it is problematic or not. Neither of the boys are into PS4 or X-Box mostly because we thankfully opted for the Wii and Nintendo's Switch, it has to be said though the unique hand-held option for this gaming platform is a mixed blessing; portability can be a curse.

In the USA particularly there is much concern for online safety for children and certainly teens are surfing far and wide so this is a well-founded fear though has to be seen in context; given the pervasive atmosphere of 'fear' and the incessant fear-mongering by media and government in the USA it is not surprising that there is a near-obsessive focus on it.  Online safety shouldn't need to be the centre of attention, it serves as a distraction from the main issue, the problems central to the internet and screen time with kids are deeper and more pervasive affecting their psychology, the integrity of their participation as responsible citizens and their individual wellness.  (As an aside it is an interesting analogy for USA society, where the focus on personal safety and national security in general distracts people easily and erodes community building, family values and social order, fodder for another blog to be sure.) All being said about teens on screens it is wise to be cautious and this website unpackages it for you. Please take the bits relevant to your context: https://www.wizcase.com/blog/a-comprehensive-cyberbullying-guide-for-parents/. 

Well-heeled international schools like the one my sons go to are quite savvy teaching the kids about the various traps inherent to being online, I believe (and pray) that this is sinking in with them and that they become discerning internet users. I advocate for everyone with children to go to https://www.commonsensemedia.org/and take time to peruse the 'Advice for Parents' tab. Take your time. And with your youngster vet their games or video choices and teach them to be informed consumers.

What has changed since 2015?

My kids have aged! Now 12 and 14 year old boys they are no longer children per se, they are tweenager and teenager. Their needs have changed, their interests have diversified, their skills have honed both in terms of knowledge of coding and what games and resources are high quality. Their ability to maneuver characters in online games is truly astounding; if you thought it was cute watching your 3 yr old swipe up and down, left and right check out a 14yr old's skills with a gaming mouse!

Content (games, websites, apps, anime, etc) they are able to access has widened, most have ratings that are 12+ or 13+ acknowledging the shift in cognitive understanding as kids mature and grow. Its a bit scary when you look at some of what the various sites have to offer to your 13 year old. Lately I was checking out Civilization 6 add-on packs with my 14 year old, it is very interesting weaving in climate change as a factor in building your empire though the final statement in the orientation session says 'Learn how to control the elements' quite the wrong paradigm to be encouraging... we know we can't control the elements, we should all be better off learning how to 'work with' the elements right?

Add to this the boom of online websites, like the .io games available on any device and they are often free. We used to filter access saying we only would look at free games, etc, now much of what was once 'pay to play' is free. What developers have figured out is that 'if you build it they will come', get the players on board and then bring in the dosh through the sale of accessories, cosmetics, add-ons, upgrades. So clever and kids unschooled in the wiles of marketers are rather open to the opportunities. Cosmetics are interesting, as they don't affect game play much but kids susceptible to the 'cool factor' who want the newest skin or what-have-you will have to pay for it much as they once needed the newest cool high-tops, or haircuts or fashion accessories.

YouTube is incredible now, I mean it always was but now, simply WOW. According to YouTube at the time of writing they have over 1.3Billion users, one out of two internet users views YouTube. Imagine how many channels there are available to your child. I'm told by he who knows (my 14yr old) to comment more about how content on YouTube has changed. Very popular are older Tubers (those in their 20's and 30's) who post instructional videos of themselves at gameplay on popular sites like Fortnite and Minecraft. Reality tubers are bigger than reality TV. Theres a whole culture going on out there, as evidenced by the BeautyYouTube tiff and that of pewdiepie vs t series... (seriously if you've never heard of these you gotta check it out). Often these Tubers were tech savvy screen teens who are now making a bundle (millions!) adding masses of content which can be pretty good stuff but when you consider the sheer mass, much of it is crap. Often content is delivered with questionable language, misogynist messaging, violent undertones and who knows what other less than desirable modelling behaviours. Suffice it to say there are also movie previews galore, and a ton of distractions and its not that they are all bad, some are great but there is no filter, only the brain of your growing child. Who monitors what their teens watch? YouTube Kids is for 8 and under, if you put the adult content filter on your browser it blocks out YouTube completely so is overly limiting for teens; over-restriction builds resentment and encourages finding ways to get around the restriction so is counter-productive.

Content they want to access has changed. According to Reuters online gaming for example has blown wide open, Gaming is now the number one entertainment media out there for kids, even surpassing television!  With games like Fortnite they can play with their friends and a plethora of others. There is live-chat during the game and they can chat with people they don't know as well as their friends and be exposed to any language. These aren't new games but there are many more now, Fortnite for example can be played on most common platforms (X-box, Switch, Playstation, etc) and it is available on all mobile devices IOS or Android, this is a new evolution.

Boredom is the anathema for teenagers; you have to ask yourself, before handheld screens, WiFi or 4G  what did they do with 'free time'? What did you do? Was there not significant value in day dreaming on long car or train rides or while waiting for a friend to show up or your turn at the dentist office. No value in watching the rain fall down the windows or the snow blow around trees in a blizzard? Did you not have more conversations, learn something from that person on the bus you saw everyday or just get into more mischief, have more adventures with your friends?  Share a smile, a chuckle or a frown on the subway, bus or plane? Did you happen to meet your partner because you were looking dreamily around you and caught the eye, instead of down isolated in an artificial domain? 

There has been much written lamenting the loss of 'boredom' particularly now operating from within an active 'doing' paradigm rather than a more passive 'being' paradigm; the distraction available is ever-present and taking us to who knows where but definitely away from within ourselves. Where has the time gone for self-reflection, for inner growth and realization? As this article points out Newton was simply sitting under an apple tree when the idea of gravity came to him and who can say how many other innovations emerged from people simply being instead of doing.

Necks and eyes with kids as tweens and teens I'm checking out their neck bent posture (and pronation) and thinking too about the state of their eyes evolving a focal length closer than if you were reading a book. I'm a Wellness consultant and am aware of how structure affects function. Surely there is a deleterious effect with a permanent kink in your brain stem though it isn't clear how or when this will manifest. I'd posit it already is showing up in behaviour and how kids think... their attention span for example! Certainly I wonder about evolution and whether people will start to evolve a closer focal length. From an energetic point of view it is more than that. It's about the isolation and the energetic distance you put between yourself and others when there is a screen involved. You see 1 in 2 people on public transport everywhere (even where I live in Yangon) on their phones, no one interacting, no communication even though you are easily within their energetic comfort zone. Somehow, having earphones in, or focused on your chat or reading on the screen you have shielded, distanced yourself from those around you.

What up? What can we do!

I set out writing this intending to provide some experience driven advice for how to manage tweens and teens and their screens. But what to say, each parent has their own take on it, each youngster has their approach and interest... and excuses for why they MUST be on screen NOW, or why they CAN'T go off-screen or there will be some excuse... 'my friends are online, they expect me to be there' is the newest one in our house.

Fostering a digitally minimal life is probably the best way forward, setting the example is critical and likely the hardest part; so limiting your own screen time, especially in front of the kids. It also means not buying into the latest innovations, getting the fastest connections, seeking the 24/7 online solution... It means finding perspective on this, a perspective that works for you and your children's futures. For example right now and in our school community, it seems that being digitally connected and keeping up is a priority. Can we step down, step back, not participate? I'm not so sure. I have maintained a digital footprint and use social media mostly because my nomadic world community is global, friends in many time zones. And partly because I do not want to get left behind my kids and not know what they were doing. I am anyway getting left behind in gaming, I am not a gamer at all, no time for it. Blood sport games are still off the menu at our house, but gaming apps have figured that out so you in many games you don't kill people but you do kill the opponent in whatever form they take, often humanoid. What to do!

The disconnect as we live increasingly urbanized, mechanized, automated lives is a disconnect from the natural world. How far can we get from nature sitting in an concrete and steel apartment building, electronics all around us and our heads bent over a screen? We are only now learning that electro magnetic radiation from modems, 5G, phones likely has quite a harmful effect on cell structure.

When the distance grows between us and the natural world, we fail to understand the impact of plastic consumption, of burning fossil fuels, of the value of friendships and community; we fall out of the natural rhythms of the earth and forget that to live successful fulfilling lives we need to be in harmony with the elements, we cannot control things like the weather, we must learn to work with nature as a part of eco-system and find the balance that will serve us and that will serve our children best.

I leave you with the commentary below from Clay Skipper in GQ magazine, and Richard La Flower. Jenny Hill also penned this great article recently affirming all of the above... its out there folks...pay attention: 'Smartphones, tablets causing mental health effects on kids as young as two'.

Passive screen media writes onto our subconscious just like reality, and creates triggers and habits. Be mindful of what you visually ingest, because it literally puts you into a textbook hypnotic state. You will become what you watch the most - Richard La Flower

You write about digital distraction as a way we can avoid ever having to be with ourselves. What's the value in having to turn inward?

You have to actually confront yourself and engage in self-reflection: thinking about your life, what's important, what's working, and what's not working. And this process of self-shaping is absolutely crucial to building an impactful and flourishing life. That's when you shape yourself. That's when a life of focus and value is built.

The second thing, and maybe this sounds a bit more trivial, is that through time immemorial, the way that people dealt with this void—whenever they were lucky enough to be in a time and place where they had some leisure time—was to seek out high quality leisure activities.... usually highly social, highly skilled activities. As Aristotle used to write, these activities you do just for the sake of the activities—just for the quality and joy of it—gives you this resilience that makes it much easier to deal with all the other hardships of life. Your life is not just all hardships, there's these things that we do that are intrinsically full and joyful.

If you can taper over the void with a constant stream of distractions—make it just comfortable enough that you don't have to confront it—you're in a really bad situation. Now you're avoiding that self-reflection that you need to actually grow up and to build a life worth living. Also, you can distract yourself enough that you never have to answer that drive to actually fill your life with the quality activities: getting engaged with your community; picking up a skilled hobby; art and poetry; these type of things.

I think it's actually pretty dire. Yes, it's scary not to be distracted, but I think it's even more scary to avoid all of the deep good that comes from having to just be there with yourself, and confront all of those difficulties and opportunities that entails.

https://www.gq.com/story/cal-newport-digital-minimalism?fbclid=IwAR1CR_tywEvMBKde6nIqlYiO7APUfikRepndacgFSpPQJk8-f8jIqbr8N0A

The Screen: Part II The Strategies (or the Yoga of Screen)

There are many approaches to managing our children's screen use (TV, computer, phone, tablet, etc). It would be great if it were easy to have blanket solutions but the fact is that strategies apply differently to different children and to different cultural and family culture dynamics, so there is no fix-all solution. Well, unless you throw the damn things out the window which is tempting at times but then I realise I'd have to throw out my smart phone as well and a revealing conundrum emerges (to be discussed in a later blog).  The take-away lesson is to strategically set a good example in your own screen management and this will pave the way for easier management of your children's access to screens; get your own screen under control first, visibly and transparently before embarking on any campaign to help the kids. Where there is a Mum and Dad or live in relative or friend... its helpful if all are on the same 'setting a good example' page and if their School is on board as well... it is much easier! We are blessed to have the same philosophy as parents and here in Nepal to have neighbors with two same age, same school, sons who share the same 'screen philosophy' as us. By contrast if they didn't, it would be a nightmare.

I want to add a caveat here that for the past 4 years TV has not been on the family menu of screen choices so we aren't afflicted by the problematic of TV addiction. We simply do not subscribe to cable/satellite or other connections to commercial television. This was not hard to do given our mobility and disdain and understanding of the distraction from real life that TV provides. It has been a great move for all. Gone is pervasive (sometimes intelligence insulting) television advertising, gone the insidious brain numb of cartoon crap and cartoon violence, the detached and detaching channel surfing, etc and yes, as adults we aren't passing time watching what are inevitably just trendy flash in the pan series or sitcoms. If there is a downside it is that we sometimes miss inspirational moments in sports or catching significant world events... but we can catch up with these with a quick bit of googling post event! The other day someone mentioned the Oscar's...I didn't even realise the Academy Awards had happened but now have bought Oscar winning films, Boyhood, Whiplash, Still Alice, Grand Budapest Hotel and Birdman. These days I don't even think the boys miss out on popular culture, I did years ago when Zaki came home from Montessori school in Malaysia asking who Mickey Mouse was, but those days are long gone.  They seem to catch up through friends and watch selectively on YouTube various series if they are curious. In Nepal where we live, we can't get Netflix with a Nepali credit card and so our aging flat-screen TV is used for viewing DVDs and the Wii only. Our boys are 8 and 10 have lived as expatriate children in Malaysia, Lebanon, Ecuador and now Nepal, they are multilingual, multicultural third culture kids and basically want for nothing such is their luck (or not)!

Worth mentioning here is that I am grateful for everything I have; perhaps living in a very poor country like Nepal having traveled and lived large and fully on different levels of the poverty-decadence scale from cold poverty in wintry Montreal (although I did meet Leonard Cohen because of it!) to prosperity jet-setting as a humanitarian emergency aid worker, perhaps I am less likely to take for granted what I have. I don't know, I just know we are very lucky to have all of what we have; our good health and the luxury to discuss things like screen time because we have that choice... How many zillions of Syrian or Palestinian or Congolese kids would die to have a tablet device? In the case of screens and the internet we express that gratitude through a principled approach to access. The boys know that their access to screens is a privilege and not a right. Zaki tried to convince me not long ago that screen time was a basic human right, they had been discussing human rights at school.... I said 'oh, like food and water? you can't live without it?', that gave him something to think about.

Back to strategies....it is good for children to realise that your efforts as caregivers to 'manage' their screen time is in their best interest, and that needs un packaging in terms they can understand vis a vis the whys and wherefores and it is useful to reframe this for them often where repetition can be a bore, saying it differently under differing circumstances can help click things into frame. Below are some links to help flesh this out if you had any doubts. Please be clear, no one is saying there isn't value in children's access to smart devices (children over 5 years old because they are not advised at all for kids below 5) and all of what they have to offer. The question is how it is delivered to them, with what conditionality and how to optimize it to their benefit. I used to say the same about TV... and now of web connected smart devices... ask yourself... would you just hand your kid the remote control of a TV without some restrictions and information on the potential hazards of use!

Sleep and tests.
Sleep and device dependency.
Smartphones and sleep
Kids, smartdevices and sleep

Never forgetting that children's brains develop in their sleep and they grow physically when they sleep, so sound, long sleep is a key issue in screen management.

Steve Jobs and iPads
Related article on the importance of Playtime

Next in strategies:  We find it useful for our children to realise that these limits on screen are not just their Mum and/or Dad's blahblahblah, they need to know that it is a 'global' discussion i.e. their friend's parents grapple with the same thing (hopefully) no matter what country they are from or where they live. Kids need to see the plethora of websites talking about this, show them this one! One of the best websites that is all over this is Common Sense Media and its new 'Parent's Concerns' tab which covers a range of issues from 'how much screen time' to cyberbullying to internet security, online learning and beyond. Well worth the visit. I showed this to our boys and they read the inputs from parents and other kids so they know that this isn't an issue only for us...its out there in the world.

Screening content is something we are very clear on. Family filters on browsers is a must and are easy to activate or install. Anything new that they want to watch, download, play, etc has to be 'screened' (filtered) and the best tool I have found online is again Commonsense Media and if it isn't listed there then http://www.metacritic.com/ critiques gaming and http://www.ipadfamily.com.au/ is also okay offering an age rating for IOS games. At the end of the discussion it is more about how you feel as a parent, how much 'cartoon violence' for example you can tolerate (I draw the line at those stupid zombie games). Its like movie ratings... the best judge of appropriateness is you, aligning with your own values and understanding of your child's maturity and ability to absorb content....and lets be honest whether a movie will give them nightmares and cause you to lose sleep or not!

Now to the restrictions. Here everyone differs and the balance is between allowing kids the ability to make their own wise choices and learning about these and being a conscious and responsible caregiver. Screen time seems to be a determinant factor and so we limit it. Without limits what we have learned for our boys (is it different for girls?) that they will spend too much time on screen or at least not enough time playing outside or with lego or whatever else and their addictive behaviours increases.  This is perhaps the most annoying thing when you realise they are living for their screen time and manipulating you to ensure they get time to be on screen. Our boys are responding well to the following:

1hr/Friday and 2hrs/Saturday
Screen free Sunday
No screen ever in bedrooms
No screen ever after dinner (except family movies)
No TV (except DVD movies usually as a family)
No unsupervised screen at home or away

There are other strategies like minute banks, timers on devices, screen time tracking, etc. See here for other ideas. One method we don't use is screen-time for reward or punishment, or use it to bribe...that is going down a dangerous and wobbly way that is hard to sustain and sends wrong messages, the pros and cons are discussed here. 

As I suggest above, each to their own and their own priorities, considerations and thoughts on the matter. No judgement. My intention is to provoke thinking, encourage researching the issue to be able to make informed choices and to involve children fully in decisions taken. There is no black and white....only shades of grey and navigating the waters takes some time but mostly a connection with what for you and your family makes for a harmonious and harmless living situation that provides the best for your children. Maybe call it the Yoga of Screen: how to find balance.

Please post comments below especially strategies you might have succeeded with for everyone to see. Thanks. d

The Screen Part 1: the dilemma

Managing screen-time has become a full-time challenge in our house. My sons' now 7 and 9 years old have grown up in an age, in a place and they have been privileged with access to pretty much every screen known to humankind: TV, Videos, Wii, Game boy, tablet, computer, phone. They are at an age where they can fully grasp the entertainment value of hand-held devices like internet connected smart phones after all, everyone around them has one. Now, before anyone gets carried away with 'doh! no wonder you have problems' comments in our house screen-time has always been limited and touted as a privilege not a right for the little lads to hop on. In fact at this point we don't have TV per se, we have a flat screen monitor connected to nothing but the DVD player and the Wii. Game boys were only permitted for traveling and are destined for the bin having been eclipsed by the tablets (iPads in our family). Computers are only used for educational activities, googling, youtubing, music listening and okay, watching online videos has snuck in of late. Smart phones are parent property and I, at least, have sudoko and not much else in the recreational line on mine...although I am trying to figure out how to hide apps so they are not displayed on the screen (anyone?). Screen time is limited to an educational hour mid-week that now includes work with a meditation app and is not allowed to define the weekend, rather it is ok if it doesn't interfere with whatever else is going on.

We all know the down-side of screens, you can find credible research dating back to the criticism levied against too much Television back in the '70s to the clear issues related to advertising and its impact on our capacity to make good consumer decisions now to tablets, smart phones and computers being implicated in everything from ADD, ADHD, anti-social behaviour, losing creative ability, to obesity. I'd find these for you and add links but I don't have the attention span nor tolerance. Its true, I have to say as I write on my lap-top with 3 Windows open on Chrome, each with at least 9 tabs. I flip from one to the other to facecrack, email (3 accounts), bookmarking pages I want but may never return to covering interest areas including yoga and healing, nutrition, earthquake preparedness, a mess of political meanderings, holiday planning, etc, etc...loads of things crossing the radar. I have been here writing this and its a bit of a record.....going on 8 minutes now. The acute disconnect between the natural world and an artificial one is articulated in this technology. The therapeutic advantage of going for a walk in the greenery rather than staying indoors face inches from a glowing lump of tech does not really have to be proven...we all know which one is better for you. In human contact we distance ourselves with the overuse/abuse of screens. Having these silly devices out with us when we meet up with friends and then texting, tweeting, surfing and scanning takes significantly from the quality time we could have with our friends. The 'Look Up' video says it well. 

I know then that there is an effect of the screen on me although I can discern and focus when the need arises partly (I think) because I had the benefit of years of no internet distraction and book-reading through to University ergo I learned to focus. That said I have always been an A-class procrastinator so perhaps the theory on attention span being inversely correlated to screen time is null. As far as screens go, I first had access to TV in 1967, 3 English, 1 French channels and limited to family shows (Giligans Island, Mr. Dress Up, Hogans Heros, the Flintstones, Bewitched an dI Love Lucy, all familiar to my generation of watchers!). My first computer was a Mac laptop (somethings haven't change!) back in the early '90s and in the past few years tablets and smartphones are on my menu of screen choices. Aside from sudoko and the occasional visit to Angry Birds I don't game on screen at all. I do have a hankering for social media, especially Facebook*.  All that to say, if it affects me the way it does, it must be having a huge impact on the internal 'software' programming of my sons, even an effect on the development of their hardware, the wiring. In some manner affecting their mental capacities of the future. I see their ability to be adept at utilizing the screen for its positive attributes something that will aid them as they navigate our wacky changing world and so take on a parental responsibility of monitoring closely  screen and seeking recourse and remedies to ensure the impact is constructive and contributes to their well-being and ability to be 21st Century-capable adaptable, resilient young men. 

My sons are one of the early generations who have had access to internet-connected smart devices. As a 50 (something) yr old I am of the generation whose University had a computer room with a computer lab attached with monitors connected to the main-frame. My first year papers had to be 'word-processed' and the library was all about card catalogues and micro-fiche. My parents had no exposure to this situation and so really would have no advice to help guide me now. My mother marveled at the internet and without a computer, through our cable TV in 2000 she would email me when I was off working in the wild beyond of East Timor. So, that I call it a challenge, a dilemma sometimes even a problem is because it is a muddle of many things and there is no easy fix, the downstream effect is an unknown and we wait to see whether the kids will grow up well-adjusted or social basket cases or gadget geeks. Who can say?

Moving on...I get fed up with hearing about the problems of too much screen and suggestions that 'how to handle it' simply means limiting it, clearly people who say that don't have kids! My interest  these days has turned to finding solutions for our screen dilemma.  The little boys have their saving grace: they are avid book worms. Zaki, at 5 yrs old just started reading it just sort of came to him and I am sure nightly bed-time storytelling paid off...now at 9 he got the 1st Harry Potter book for his birthday and in the ensuing 3 weeks read the entire 7 book series. Seven months later he is a Harry Potter encyclopedia and has read the series several times. Kasem too loves his books, perhaps not with the same zeal as his older brother but he is a written word consumer of high proportions. In the next section of 'The Screen' I will turn to some ideas for remedying this challenge with screens. Perhaps I approach the screen dilemma with too high a conscious concern and should let go a bit but something tells me no, that to be concerned is to be a good parent and we need to figure it out ourselves....what to do about screen time.

*I would self-diagnose Facebook as easily the most damaging of my screen moments and yet the most magnetic... and like my chocolate addiction I am always trying to cut down on it. Quite simply I let it take time from my day but also the multiple mental diversions on offer splits my attention. Facebook offers up a multitude of distractions, it takes your mind off in a zillion different directions every time you open it and see posts from different groups, friends, etc. If the best thing to do in the morning is a quiet meditation or qi gong practice ;-) then a glance at your facebook is probably the worst, if your sleep is influenced most by the last things you did or said or read in the day...then again facebook is probably the silliest thing to look at just before going to bed...and yet, at both moments in the day...how many of us have a device in our hands? go ahead...admit it, you're addicted.

Screens are everywhere,
here the privileged are traveling business for the first (and only time) moving from KL to Beirut!
Loving every minute!