Screen Time Battles? Here's How to Set Effective Screen Time Limits for Kids and Devices

So the first question I always get asked is how much time is okay, right? How much time should my kid have on their tech? And really, I want you to think about technology in terms of opportunity cost.

What do I mean by opportunity cost? It's the idea that every time your child is using a device or is on tech or on a screen, that that is a time where they're not doing something else.

Which is true of everything, right? While your child is sleeping, they're not doing their homework, right? While they're eating, they're not also moving their body.

There's always going to be opportunity costs for everything, 'cause we can't do everything all the time at one time.

But what I want you to be thinking about is what are the things that I should prioritize as a parent, and what are the things that are most important? Making sure your kids' time is balanced in the areas that are important, and then whatever is left over can be given towards tech or screen time.

So what are these priorities? What are these things that ne- kids need, right? We wanna create a balanced life where kids get all of their physical, emotional, cognitive, and social needs met.

And technology can play a part in some of those, but for the most part, it doesn't meet our kids' primary needs.

What does meet those needs is sleep.

We wanna make sure our kids are getting around 10 hours of sleep.

Between the ages of six to 14, they need about 10 hours of sleep, and that's a good guideline.

Maybe your kid needs a little bit less, maybe your kid needs a little bit more.

But we wanna have kids that are sleeping, you know, from 8:00 PM to 6:00 AM or whatever that is, right? So kids need to sleep, right? They need to eat.

We wanna make sure we're giving them enough time to have those balanced meals, and that the meal times are prioritized.

We want to make sure they're moving that body, getting 60 minutes of exercise a day, 60 minutes of movement.

Some kids get that done at school and some don't, so you wanna be looking at am I getting enough movement with my kids? Am I allowing enough time for their cognitive development? So are they having time to do their schoolwork? Are we ha- making time for any sort of tutoring or other educational therapies that you have put in there? Are they getting enough social time, spending time with friends, spending time with you as a parent, spending time with their siblings and as a family? When your kids are on individual devices in individual rooms, they're not hanging out with each other.

They're not hanging out with you.

They're hanging out with the internet, and that is a missed opportunity for them to get that social, emotional need met.

Kids need time for free play.

They need, you know, time with unstructured, no adults guiding.

It's not just like free play is not soccer practice, right? Because there's an adult in charge, and the adult's telling you what to do, guiding everything.

We want our kids to have a time outdoors, time inside playing with their toys, and when they play on a device, they not only lose the time for free play, but they also lose the skill of developing their own creativity.

And then, of course, we want our kids to make meaningful contributions to the community.

We want them to do chores.

We want them to be helpful around the house.

When they feel connected to the family, they're more connected to the family, and we connect them by spending time with them by, but also by giving them personal responsibility.

So the first question I always get asked is how much time is okay, right? How much time should my kid have on their tech? And really, I want you to think about technology in terms of opportunity cost.

What do I mean by opportunity cost? It's the idea that every time your child is using a device or is on tech or on a screen, that that is a time where they're not doing something else.

Which is true of everything, right? While your child is sleeping, they're not doing their homework, right? While they're eating, they're not also moving their body.

There's always going to be opportunity costs for everything, 'cause we can't do everything all the time at one time.

But what I want you to be thinking about is what are the things that I should prioritize as a parent, and what are the things that are most important? Making sure your kids' time is balanced in the areas that are important, and then whatever is left over can be given towards tech or screen time.

So what are these priorities? What are these things that ne- kids need, right? We wanna create a balanced life where kids get all of their physical, emotional, cognitive, and social needs met.

And technology can play a part in some of those, but for the most part, it doesn't meet our kids' primary needs.

What does meet those needs is sleep.

We wanna make sure our kids are getting around 10 hours of sleep.

Between the ages of six to 14, they need about 10 hours of sleep, and that's a good guideline.

Maybe your kid needs a little bit less, maybe your kid needs a little bit more.

But we wanna have kids that are sleeping, you know, from 8:00 PM to 6:00 AM or whatever that is, right? So kids need to sleep, right? They need to eat.

We wanna make sure we're giving them enough time to have those balanced meals, and that the meal times are prioritized.

We want to make sure they're moving that body, getting 60 minutes of exercise a day, 60 minutes of movement.

Some kids get that done at school and some don't, so you wanna be looking at am I getting enough movement with my kids? Am I allowing enough time for their cognitive development? So are they having time to do their schoolwork? Are we ha- making time for any sort of tutoring or other educational therapies that you have put in there? Are they getting enough social time, spending time with friends, spending time with you as a parent, spending time with their siblings and as a family? When your kids are on individual devices in individual rooms, they're not hanging out with each other.

They're not hanging out with you.

They're hanging out with the internet, and that is a missed opportunity for them to get that social, emotional need met.

Kids need time for free play.

They need, you know, time with unstructured, no adults guiding.

It's not just like free play is not soccer practice, right? Because there's an adult in charge, and the adult's telling you what to do, guiding everything.

We want our kids to have a time outdoors, time inside playing with their toys, and when they play on a device, they not only lose the time for free play, but they also lose the skill of developing their own creativity.

And then, of course, we want our kids to make meaningful contributions to the community.

We want them to do chores.

We want them to be helpful around the house.

When they feel connected to the family, they're more connected to the family, and we connect them by spending time with them by, but also by giving them personal responsibility.