Checkup Newsroom

It's the kids' turn

Fri, 15 Aug 2014 12:02:29 -0500

The summer is coming to an end and so is our time blogging about reducing our household media time. To finish up the series, I thought I would interview the kids and ask them what they thought about our summer experiment. The answers are very real and brutally honest. .

What was the best part of our screen free experiment this summer?

Max, age 11.5 years – “Hanging out with my friends at the pool more.”

Morgan, age 10 years – “In Michigan, it was like fun because we weren’t always on the screen and stuff, and we had more things to do with the world.”

Matthew, age 6 years – “Nothing at all.”

What was the worst part of being screen free?

Maxwell – “I couldn’t catch up on all the things I was missing on my games and less time playing with my friends (online).”

Morgan – “When I wanted the electronics because there was literally nothing to do, you wouldn’t let me have them, and that really annoyed me.”

Matthew – “I couldn’t play with anybody (online).”

What can we learn from our screen free summer?

Maxwell – “I learned that I play with my friends more online than I do in real life during the summer, not during the school year, but during the summer.”

Morgan – “Video games aren’t the answer to happiness.There are other things you can do besides electronics.”

Matt – “It (the computer) will make you mad if you watch it too long.”

Would you do this screen free experiment again?

Maxwell - “No.”

Morgan - “I don’t know, maybe, if we go to Michigan, or a different state.”

Matthew – “Um, no.”

What should our family work on next?

Maxwell – “Playing more sports. That would be so much easier.”

Morgan – “Manners. Our family should work on being nicer to each other (siblings fighting). Being more serious about the screen free thing because we still played it a lot.”

Matthew – “Clean the house.”

The answers made me pause and think that while we actually had some pretty great screen free moments this summer, we still have some work to do (and we need to clean the house).

I am so incredibly grateful to Dr. Mangham and to Cook Children’s for this unusual summer experiment! Although we were not “screen free” and did not manage to “go dark” very often, being asked to write about our efforts really opened my eyes to just how much time we do spend on the screen, how much we depend on it and just how capable we are of living without it. We are a family that is “off” more than we are “on” now, and will continue to strive to use it less and less every day.

Thanks so much everyone!

Previous media free stories:

About the author

Aubrey Conklin, moved to Texas from Michigan via Chicago almost 10 years ago. She’s been married for 14 years and is the mom to three kids ages 11,10 and 6. A huge sports fan who not only loves all things Detroit sports but spends her own free time playing soccer, volleyball and softball. Aubrey is a part time preschool teacher as well, a volunteer for her kid's school.

Going media free (part 4)

Fri, 01 Aug 2014 12:01:20 -0500

We attempted to go media free and wouldn’t you know? Nailed it!!!

Just kidding. We far from nailed it.

Ok guys, this is HARD.

The Conklins are not taking to going screen free likes ducks to water. Like. At. All.

You know the ancient proverb "fall down seven times, stand up eight?" One of my favs.

Well we have fallen down 7,000 times with this project, but we keep trying to getting up. We are at 7,001 at the moment.

The exciting news is that we have learned a healthy balance exists. We have learned that we do great without it. When we are unplugged, we are awesome! Unfortunately, it's just a bugger of a habit that is soooo easy to slip back into. This has been a frustrating experiment, but that fact that we struggle means we need to be doing this.

Going media free really is just as simple as removing the screens from the family. After simply telling the kids, “no,” you have to listen to them belly ache for a short time before they go off and find something to do.

I am going to be honest, I enjoy my screen time just as much (if not more) than the kids! I like texting people, playing Words with Friends and reading news articles online. I even do a bible study with a cool app on my phone!

Almost everything I do can be done on my phone! So when I want to get on my phone or watch a TV show, I then let the kids jump on their devices. I think my own personal enjoyment of screen time may be what is keeping us from being truly successful at this (oh my gosh, did I just admit that?)

We have worked hard to make sure the family is “off” the screen more than “on” during the day and that seems pretty manageable. The kids are getting it! They know our goal is to spend more time doing other things besides being on the screen. They don’t argue as much when I declare, “We are screen free until X, Y and Z are complete.” We are doing pretty well decreasing our screen time. Having said that, I would really like to fulfill my pledge to this blog and get to a point where we are just “off” all the time. We are working on it.

I am excited because we are going to Michigan this summer. For part of the trip we will be “Up North” where it is pretty hard to get cell phone service and I plan to ditch the hand- held games before we go.

The Conklins will be screen free before the summer is over, even if it means we have to hang out in the woods for a few days to do it.

Previous media free stories:

Going media free

Fri, 11 Jul 2014 10:24:59 -0500

My family consists of five media junkies. I am not even going to pretend we aren't. When our kid’s pediatrician, Dr. Kim Mangham, called to ask me about blogging about media this summer, I couldn't hear her because our TV was too loud.

I thought we had it under control. My family is very active. The kids play sports and swim. We go to different events and activities together all the time. But despite being so active, with all the hand-held games, TVs, computers, laptops, smart phones, tablets and video game consoles, we still manage to cram in A LOT of media time during the day.

The week before Dr. Mangham called, I had taken all my kids (11, 10 and 6) to their annual well check appointment. (Taking all three kids at the same time to their well check was either my most genius or dumbest idea yet. The jury is still out. It was crazy.)

I did give myself props because I remembered to charge everyone’s device of choice before the well check. So while everyone played on their devices, Dr. Mangham discussed with us summer safety and attempted to explain the importance of reducing media time. Dr. Mangham also mentioned that two of her patients’ parents were considering going media free for the summer. I allegedly said something agreeable to this statement and by the next week Dr. Mangham called to ask if I wanted to blog about my attempts to go media free.

I panicked. I didn't mean like really go media free. How would we go screen free? How would my kids talk to their friends? What about FaceTime with the grandparents? Use all those educational apps? What am I going to do if someone calls and I need to talk? Just not turn on the TV to their favorite program? Those Minecraft houses don't build themselves you know! How am I going to tell them? We are flying in July and I have a big meeting tomorrow!! How do you do this? Cold turkey? Reduce but not eliminate? What would we all do if we are not connected to the world?

The more questions I came up with, the more I realized that in our house media is a crutch.

We are going to try it. And our goal? To simply try and find a healthy balance when it comes to our media consumption on a daily basis

I am not sure how our journey is going to play out. Plan A (because plan A always works right?) is to reduce. We will limit our media to one hour a day, with a chance to EARN up to another hour. Hey, maybe my baseboards will get cleaned this summer!

First things first. I have to break it to the family. Screen time as they know it is about to change!!