Isolation and Your Child
Children are faced with many challenges we didn’t have as children and I feel for them. They have the temptation of near-perfect graphics luring them into wonderful fantasylands. Games that interact with them – they don’t even need a playmate. Unfortunately, this good fun comes with a price. The price is isolation. Across the nation and across the world, the actual world around them is being tuned out. The virtual world of your child is viewing becomes real. Social skills are underdeveloped and physical fitness and mobility has also become impaired. I look at the games they are playing, and if I would have born in the last ten years, I also would have been tempted to jump into a screen and lose myself. But I wasn’t. I was born in a time when after I finished my homework, I went out to play. I played with the kids in the neighborhood and we played running games, hide-and-seek, sang songs, and danced dances. I had an amazing childhood. I won’t be so arrogant as to say my childhood was better, because I believe every time and culture is different. But, I can say we were more social and mobile. The challenge is how do parents and caregivers today balance out technology and reality. I think limiting it is the best solution with only educational games during the week and fun games on the weekend not longer than an hour per day for kids 10 and under. (I only allowed my children educational games, but each parent or guardian must decide for themselves.) Electronic games are here to stay. Learning how to live with them and profit from them will teach your child how to be the master of technology and prepare for the technology of the future.
