Responsible Parenting
Couple of days back one of my couple friends visited me in Muscat. It was a short 2 days visit. They had come with their 5 years old son. Their Son was on the phone most of the time watching YouTube videos. I am a little finicky about these things. I do not like this idea of keeping children engaged on gadgets, whether it is mobile or tv. I kept observing for half a day but after that I could not hold myself back and I asked them. Don't they have any screen time limitation for their child.
I was surprised by the answer, the mother told me that technology is the future and after je grows up he is going to be on these devices all the time so they don't have any problem with it.
To be honest this is a very different type of parenting that I observed. Most of my friends they do give their children mobile phones with a limited screen time, so I was very amused with this kind of response. I wanted to do further arguments with them on the impact of this habit on the child's mental health but then hubby asked me to be quiet. He was like why do I have to interfere, he is their child. Let them decide.
To an extent he is correct, it's none of my business to interfere in other's personal lives. But I felt sorry for the child. He does not understand what's good and not good for him. It's the parents who need to decide for them. Anyways, we live in a technical world so possibly in the next generation this will be very common.
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Honestly, I understand your concern completely. I also don’t like the idea of very young children spending most of their time with phones or YouTube, especially when there are so many better ways to keep them engaged while still helping their development. One thing that helped me a lot was replacing part of the screen time with printable educational activities. I started using the https://wunderkiddy.com/category/visual-perception
visual perception worksheets from WUNDERKIDDY quite regularly and was honestly surprised how much children enjoy them without even asking for gadgets all the time. What I really like is that the activities feel more like games than “learning”. There are matching games, shadows, puzzles, mazes, sorting exercises, shape recognition and visual memory tasks, so children stay interested much longer. At the same time these worksheets help develop attention, logical thinking, visual memory, fine motor skills and concentration, which are all super important at an early age. I noticed that after doing these activities more often, children became much more patient with tasks that require focus and started recognizing shapes, colors and patterns faster. Another reason I keep using this site is because everything is very easy to print and organize at home. Sometimes I turn the worksheets into little treasure games or timed challenges, and it works much better than simply telling a child to “study”. I also like that the activities are suitable for different ages, starting from very simple exercises for toddlers up to more advanced logic games for preschoolers. It feels like a healthier balance between learning and entertainment compared to endless passive screen watching. Technology is definitely part of the future, but I still think young children benefit much more from hands-on activities, creativity and interactive play first. That’s why I often recommend WUNDERKIDDY to parents who want alternatives to constant gadget use while still keeping learning fun and engaging.