Are parents today just too afraid to let kids entertain themselves?
That’s certainly one conclusion to draw from a new product on the market. As The Post reported last week, Fisher Price released just in time for the holidays the “Newborn-to-Toddler Apptivity Seat for iPad.” It’s a baby seat with a plastic case designed to hold an iPad right in front of a baby’s eyes. As the product description explains: “Lock your iPad device inside the case to protect from dribbles and drool. Play and learning are at baby’s fingertips.”
Hmm. A study this year by Common Sense Media tells us that the average 2- to 4-year-old spends about two hours a day in front of screens, whether computer or TV. Now, a child this age is only awake for 10 to 12 hours a day — so that screen time amounts to about a fifth of their waking hours.
But God forbid we leave them to stare at the ceiling for a while or play with their toes.
I recall another new mother telling me, soon after I had my oldest daughter, about how she brought her baby’s bouncy seat along into the bathroom when she took a shower.
OK, the first few months with a newborn are filled with chaos and sleep deprivation. But I can honestly say there was no day that I missed a shower — and, more important, no day that any of my children have hung out in the bathroom while I bathed.
When they were babies, I left them in their cribs. When they were big enough to get out of the crib, I used a gate to lock them in their rooms. Those rooms were barebones childproofed — no live wires, but no padded walls either. If they wanted to yell for the six minutes I was out of sight, they were welcome to it. But even at a young age, they learned quickly that those were minutes when they’d have to entertain themselves.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no screen time at all for children under two. In guidelines released in October, the AAP cited a study showing that the average 8- to 10-year-old is spending more than 11 hours a day in front of some kind of screen, and suggested that it was time for parents to come up with a “media diet” for their children.
As with food, once we’re used to a certain amount, it is hard to dial it back. Amy, a Westchester mother of two teenage boys, finds the trends “worrisome.” “My niece watches VIRTUAL easter-egg hunts and hide-and-go-seek games on YouTube,” she says in an e-mail. Her boys were too old for the toddler iPad trend, but she says, “I completely regret the day I ever allowed a video game into my home. It has actively had a negative effect on our family life.”
But media isn’t the only problem. Last week, The New York Times reported on a new trend among well-off Manhattan parents: hiring artists to babysit their children.
Paid about twice the going rate, these struggling artist-sitters are encouraged to arrive with an “arts agenda” — elaborate projects they can do with the kids.
These parents presumably count themselves too conscientious to park their kids in front of the TV with some gum-chewing teenager for the evening. And who could argue that the art projects are better than endless games of Angry Birds? But in one sense, these sitters are having the same effect: They’re there to make sure that kids don’t have to entertain themselves — even for a few minutes.
Stephanie, a mother of four in Westchester, says that when she puts her youngest to bed at night, her preschooler and first grader “have a wild, swinging time in their room. It’s like a frat party, slam dunks with the indoor-basketball net, tackling, jumping on beds. They’re just having fun and I’m not needed to organize it — I’m not even invited. It’s more fitting that they know how to entertain each other than that I entertain them.”
“The two greatest generators of non-parental-unsupervised hang time in our house,” she says, “are Legos and colored pencils.” Her son spent five hours putting together a Lego project in his room the other day and didn’t come out to ask for food or water. She guesses that they have about 10,000 pieces.
Last week, my family returned from Hanukkah at Grandma’s house with a lifetime supply of Play-Doh, one of my least favorite ways to let kids entertain themselves, because of the cleanup. But, truth be told, letting kids play often results in a mess (don’t get me started on the glitter glue). But as my 6-year-old showed my 1-year-old the wonders of the toy rolling pin that morning, all was quiet. I could’ve grabbed a quick shower.