@albert123 My kid has had an embarrassingly high amount of screen time since he was 2 (thanks, Covid) and he’s 6 now and can name every country’s flag, is reading on a 4th grade level, is doing multiplication, knows a ton about science and history and is an “especially abstract thinker for his age” according to this teacher. His teachers assumed we brought him to museums all the time and got him out of school tutoring. Nope, we just let him watch YouTube for hours with light supervision and a lot of parental controls. He has pretty reasonable behavior for a 6 year old and is willing to put the iPad away when asked. He doesn’t seek out inappropriate content (yet.) He also still loves to play pretend, soccer, hide and seek, and create elaborate art projects (including some pretty cool videos/video editing on the iPad!) If he only cared about the iPad/YouTube I’d be much more concerned.
All the things I was able to do for work during Covid to keep my job secure and all the rest I may get when I’m sick or all the time I have to keep our household running or god forbid, the time I get to sit on the couch and just watch a home design show while dinner is cooking without entertaining him has been 100% worth for MY particular family.
Everyone has different circumstances/challenges. You do what works for you and your family and while you might be worried that setting precedence for things is going to be a huge downfall, you’d be surprised how flexible kids can be when you lay down new ground rules if you really need to.
All the things I was able to do for work during Covid to keep my job secure and all the rest I may get when I’m sick or all the time I have to keep our household running or god forbid, the time I get to sit on the couch and just watch a home design show while dinner is cooking without entertaining him has been 100% worth for MY particular family.
Everyone has different circumstances/challenges. You do what works for you and your family and while you might be worried that setting precedence for things is going to be a huge downfall, you’d be surprised how flexible kids can be when you lay down new ground rules if you really need to.