The pitter patter of rain drops serenaded our conversation.
“I think it’s your turn to pick our family movie,” I said to my 5 year old son.
“Okay! I know exactly what we should watch. We haven’t seen it in ages: the Goonies!”
He was so excited he was practically bouncing, and I lit up, too. I couldn’t help it. What a great choice for a family movie on a rainy day! We had come a long way from the short episodes of animated shows he used to watch. We had come a long way from Paw Patrol.
On purpose.
There was a time a few years back when I got sucked into way too much screen time. It started off as I just need him to stay still for 5 mins while I do this chore, so I gave him my phone. Then it turned into It’s 5.30 in the morning and I’m so tired… I’ll just let him watch some Paw Patrol so I can relax a little bit and before I knew it, he expected to watch something every morning when he woke up and whenever he was bored.
And not only was the expectation there, the sort of thing he wanted to watch seemed to affect his behaviour. They were very fast-paced shows, with a lot of characters, with a lot of scene changes, with a lot of everything! Nothing like the old Postman Pat and Fireman Sam I used to watch at the same age. And when the shows ended, he was not a happy chappy. He wanted “More! More!”
I simply realised one morning that I was trapped in a screen-time cycle, and I resolved to do something about it.
Toys were lined up ready for the morning, as a handy distraction from the TV. I no longer handed over my phone when things got rough. Instead I blew bubbles and gave kisses and made funny faces and sometimes we just struggled through together with no coping mechanism other than a cuddle.
And when we had “watchies”, it was much more intentional and enjoyable. I picked things that were older, and required a greater attention span. The first movie he ever sat through was the 1999 gem Stuart Little. From there I basically only played movies from before 2010. I cut YouTube altogether unless we were intentionally looking up a video on how something worked, like how toys are made. I made sure all screen time was on the TV so he was never holding a device super close to his eyes and looking down with terrible posture.
And the results were exactly what you’d expect. He became calmer, happier. He no longer had a meltdown when the TV was turned off. In fact he became quite happy to watch half a movie and save the rest for the next day. And he enjoys movies that I think other kids these days would find too slow-paced and boring, like The Sandlot and The Mighty Ducks and The Goonies.
I did briefly wonder if this result was not really down to anything I did but was really just by virtue of him growing older. But after our second child, who has only ever known screen time the way we do it now, I think my rules have actually had an impact. What other toddlers happily sit through the entire High School Musical movie?
Or maybe he’s just a huge Zac Efron fan, who knows?
Recently he saw a bit of Paw Patrol when at someone else’s house though, and the way his eyes got all wide was kind of freaky. Like he was taking drugs. Which isn’t surprising considering these bright, fast-paced shows light up the same areas of the brain as cocaine.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ll still whip out a tablet for the plane and I allow the odd show or movie from this century, but I’ll never go back to daily Paw Patrol.
As my 5 year old and I cuddled up on the couch to watch The Goonies, my toddler sped over to ensure he was getting cuddles and attention, too. My partner joined in the fun and we immersed ourselves in Goonie time while the rain gently rolled down the windows. This is how I like screen time, I thought to myself.