How I Teach My Kids to Balance Their Screen Time

 We've all been there.  The kids have a week off from school and they expect to spend the whole week playing video games and watching shows and Youtube.  That was the dilemma I was facing as Fall Break approached this year.  I knew there was no way to take away their electronics without a fight. I am so tired of fighting that battle.  So I stopped to think, what am I really trying to achieve when I limit or take away screen time from my kids? 

Balance. 

The simple answer was balance.  It's not that I don't want my kids to use electronics.  I know the value that being technologically savvy will have in their lives.   What I want is for them to balance out how they spend their time.  That means I am not the one planning out every minute of the day.  For me, it also means I don't have to tell them what to do or when to do it.  I've seen blogs about making a list of things they must to do before using their devices.  I tried that over the summer and though it works for many families, I found that my kids were still spending most of their day in front of the screen. 

As a teacher I used Fred Jones Preferred Activity Time to motivate students. I wondered if this could work at home as well? I sat down with my kids and made a list of things they like to do that do not involve electronics.  I added to their list some chores that I wanted them to do 😉. I told them they could have one hour of screen time every day.  If they wanted more they had to earn it by doing the things on our list.  I made cards with pictures for each activity and a chart for them to keep track of what they chose to do and the time earned.   

I've spent the last few weeks strictly enforcing our one hour of screen time limit.  I discussed with the kids that they can earn more time.  Though they still don't seem excited to do chores , they are excited to get more screen time.  We'll have five days off for Thanksgiving, so that will be our first go round.  I promise to update you on how it goes.  I expect it will need some tweaking, but I'm excited to get started!

If you would like to try our system, you can get it at my Teachers Pay Teachers Store.    I'd love to hear from you about how you are teaching your kids to balance their screen time.