Hello all,

My husband and I are looking into buying our son a computer (possibly a pad) and would like some input on what to get him -- or if we should get him a computer at all. Our main goals are to introduce him to computers and provide him a way to write (since his motor skills don't allow that yet, and he loves typing on our computers).

To give you a bit of background, he's 34 months old, can read (Frog and Toad books without difficulty, for instance), can count with 1-1 correspondence up to at least eight (at which point he wandered away), can do a little simple addition and subtraction, and can spell out some words using the letters on the fridge ("milk" and "ear" for example).

Has anyone else bought their young child a computer? If so, what issues did you consider (and which did you discover after the fact)? What do you like and dislike about it? Is durability an issue? Or is a computer at this point simply a mistake?

Thanks for any input!

DD6 just got her first computer for Christmas, a laptop. Before then, DW and I let her have some highly-supervised time on our machines. And even at 6, her computer is being heavily managed by myself.

At 3, she could very easily, inadvertently click the wrong thing on the computer and render it nonfunctional, so that was our chief concern. Then there are all the ways she could render it nonfunctional from a hardware perspective... dropping, spilling, etc.

There are some simple, cheap learning "computers" at Toys R Us from companies like Leapfrog that DD seemed to like at ages 3-5.

iPhone/iPad/iPod are easy for 3yo to maneuver. DS3 knows how to use once since he was 1.

I do find laptop mouse pad to be easier for kids to use than traditional mice.

DS6 received his own desktop at age 2, and a small laptop at age 5. The main issues I considered with the desktop were safety, processing power, and graphics power. We solved the safety issue by keeping it off the web, and in fact even off of our network, and letting him use a restricted user account that couldn't uninstall programs etc. I bought some lower-case thin keyboard vinyl stickers and a small Microsoft travel mouse, and he was in business. Early on he used to play at typing a bit, but mostly used a few educational software titles and simulation games like Zoo Tycoon, Crazy Machines, etc. Later on he used all sorts of software on it.

The main issues I considered with the laptop were safety, size, battery life, ergonomics, and again good enough power to run his programs. I wound up considering a netbook, but instead gave him my old Thinkpad X100e, which is a perfect size for his hands and which has a wonderful keyboard. Once again he uses a restricted user account, but he has web access now, which we control using Windows Live Family Safety. The laptop's build quality is very solid, and it has a solid state drive to further reduce the possibility of damage due to a fall.

A netbook might be a good choice, because of the size, lightness and long battery life, but they are fairly underpowered. Durability is always an issue with expensive electronics that are designed to be carried. I'm partial to ThinkPads, but of course you may not want to spend many hundreds of dollars (though there are small models like the X120e that regularly dip below $400). If money is no object I'd buy something with years of in-home service and business-class build.

(And I think a tablet might be a good option, too, but I just don't like them. I just prefer something with a keyboard built-in and more storage and upgradeability options.)

I just noticed this Inspiron 11z deal for $299.99-- it might be a good option for you:
http://www.dell.com/us/p/popular-laptop-deals

(you have to click the blue bar)

We got Mr W his computer before he was 2. I bought a cheap desktop from Frys and put Ubuntu linux on it. He needed a trackball until he was 3.5 and now he uses a laser based mouse.

I've let him use my laptop but he has dropped it a few times. I would not get a laptop until they older. Maybe 6.

He likes to play games, time on starfall and other sites.

I'll be the dissenting voice here. DS3 does not know how to use a computer and is not really given access. DD7 was not given much access till about age 6, and even now we limit screentime quite a lot. I just think they have a lot to learn in the nonscreen world at this age, and I don't feel they're missing out on much they couldn't get another way. I have zero concerns that my kids will not be computer-literate in this day and age. It's all coming soon enough.

Agreed, computers certainly aren't necessary. They are fun, educational and useful when used the right way, but the vast majority of the great minds of the 20th century and before certainly didn't have them as children, and they turned out all right. I also wouldn't give a child a computer early on out of a worry that they would otherwise turn out computer illiterate in the end (though I don't think it likely that the OP has that worry).

Now, if you're answering in the affirmative the OP's question about whether a computer for a youngster is a mistake, I'd have to disagree.

I second that.

Sort of like books?

Prior to the printing press, books were very very rare. And prohibitively expensive.

Gutenberg changed that. The Reformation and the Renaissance were sparked as much by the printing press as the political events in the Low Countries. Knowledge became available to many more people.

The internet has made the cost of obtaining knowledge almost zero. A computer coupled with the internet allows anyone to educate themselves once they can read and at a far faster pace.

The Kahn Academy and Starfall are two very good sites. ALEKS is another.

As far as computer literacy goes, I define it as being able to program. I learned to program when I was 12. I see no reason why a bright kid cannot start doing this when they are 7.

My kids have had access to computers since about age 2, but DS8 was just given by my father this summer his own laptop (albiet a slow one but it works none the less for the time being). Our 5 year old twins have access to my old laptop. As of recently we have instituted a time earning system for electronics though to readjust entitlement attitudes and get them outdoors in the fresh air more often.

I don't think its a bad idea, but I'd think at 2 an ipad would be a good choice, or tablet with interesting apps. All our kids love the ipad, iphones, and itouches and have for many years. There are so many great apps! I do have to say the laptop was the main reason I survived DS8 as a 2 year old, while I was pregnant with twins...I don't think computers are a mistake as long as they don't become the childs only reason for living.

My kids have always had access to computers. Here are a few pointers as you consider what to get:

Macs have parental controls built into all of their computers. You can decide how many hours a day your child can use it, what programs can be accessed, what is the earliest it can be turned on in the morning and what time it automatically shuts off at night. You can filter contacts - if any, websites, etc. For a toddler, this will be imperative if you plan to allow your child to use the computer without you sitting right there.

IPod Touches are a good size for little fingers and not horribly expensive if it's dropped, cracking the screen. iPads are a better viewing size but are a bit wieldy for a toddler to hold or carry. If you go this route, invest in a heavy-duty case that will absorb the shock of being dropped. One other thing to consider is that less software is currently available for an iPad than a computer, but the tactile interface is user-friendly.

iPads & Touches have some parental controls in the form of restricting the browser and a few main apps as well as whther multi-player games can be accessed, but it is not by specific users on the device, it applies to the entire device. To my knowledge Kindle Fire has no parental controls although a recent software update does allow you to add a password to access the device.

My kids have had access to computers since they were born, and other than making sure parental controls protected them from inappropriate content and setting up opening and closing hours so the youngest didn't stay up all night, we've found they've moderated themselves time-wise because it wasn't forbidden fruit.

Off-topic: I lost exclusive control on my iPhone when DS figured out how to unlock it.

We've also never restricted our DS6 to our computers either and DS6 has had limited access to computers since he was born as well. We've got a Mac laptop and desktop but don't even use the parental controls yet. I haven't bought an iPad yet for our ds, but might do in the foreseeable future. I was actually using the Mac laptop and various YouTube videos with my DS around 2 yrs to get him to do various therapies and as a reward system.

I'd agree with some of the pointers from the above poster. I'd also add that you might want to ensure clean hands when using any technology.

One of the benefits of having a laptop or desktop (or iPad) in a family/living room in the open is that you can monitor what videos or websites your child is on without helicoptering. I have found that my son is more interested in the genuine Cyberchase videos than a fake. If he somehow stumbles across an inappropriate site, I ask if that's what he wants or question whether he should be somewhere else online without trying to make a big deal about it. Unfortunately, even with YouTube videos on Cyberchase, your child may be exposed to inappropriate language posted by someone, which I try to ignore and pray my son doesn't notice or care about.

I believe instilling some time limits with computers (and television) and have found this more problematic than protecting my son from inappropriate content.

The good news is that there are tons of computer programming, games, etc. online now for early ages. If interested, MIT has a ton of stuff for the kindergarten - http://llk.media.mit.edu/projects.php

We haven't tried Scratch or other computer programming stuff yet, but I think my son's school uses it or is trying it out this year. I should mention that his school is a private/gifted one from pre-k to 8th grade with an emphasis on technology. The kids Skype and use the Macs every day for math, reading, programming, or etc.

I know Starfall, ixl math, and many others are good for the early ages. My son's been using them at school. PBS Kids (http://pbskids.org/) is good and safe too.

I certainly didn't set out to teach my son digital technology or plan anything formally. My son started off watching YouTube videos while I tried to get him to do therapy and then over time he's been teaching himself how to use the laptop/desktop and navigate the Internet himself.

Make sure the hands are clean before using any technology though !

Khan Academy is awesome--a fantastic resource. As for Starfall, though, I never saw a need for it. It was fun, but nothing I couldn't provide myself.

I certainly feel that computers and the Internet are amazing resources. However, I think a child who had no access till 5-7 wouldn't miss much, and I also think a child who was unlimited access CAN overdo it quite seriously. I was at a relative's house recently where the kids are on YouTube and various junk sites almost constantly and I was struck by how little actual playing these kids were doing.

We enjoy an occasional YouTube video and DD sometimes plays on Webkinz (eh) or educational sites, but I still feel my kids' lives are very rich without much of it, at this age. Later, they will need it and use it. Although--this year DD has started using Google in earnest for school research projects, and I am generally unimpressed with what is available for kids her age in terms of good, nonjunky, curated, factual content.

My daughter (34 months) loves her i-pad. We have a lot of educational apps for her to play with. Unfortunately, it doesn't run flash, so it wont do starfall. She is able to navigate the menus of the apps just fine, and exit apps, start new ones, etc. We haven't taught her how to use safari nor youtube on her own.

She can also use a regular laptop with a touch-pad to a limited degree. She knows about getting the pointer over something and clicking, and dragging, but she is much better with the i-pad. Still, if I bring up starfall, I can leave her alone with it for a while.

IXL is better on the i-pad than a laptop because of the zoom capability.

Softschool is another site similar to IXL that's good for practicing things you already know, but doesn't really teach.

Of course, tablets are kind of fragile. My daughter is very calm, and understands that it's breakable, but I still worry. Children make mistakes, and aren't really known for taking good care of things.

I have thought about getting an old tough-book that would stand up to abuse. I'm not sure what the future holds. For now she seems content with her apps on the i-pad, and having someone set her up with games on a laptop.

Ultramarina: On the topic of what 5-7yos might miss, you might find it interesting to know that my state has some Grade Level Expectations around the use of technology for those ages:

<snip>

Pre-K

- Identify a computer mouse and its purpose (i.e., to navigate the screen)

K

- Use a computer mouse to navigate the screen
- Identify that a computer has a keyboard to enter information
- Use technology to produce class work

1st Grade

- Locate information using the organization features of various media, including:
� the keyboard to enter information on a computer
� a picture dictionary
- Use technology to publish class work such as research questions and answers

2nd Grade

- Locate information using the organizational features of texts, including:
� URL addresses from the Web
� title pages
� glossaries
� indices
� tables of contents
� chapter headings
- Locate information about a topic from a variety of sources, including children�s magazines, children�s encyclopedias, and electronic references
- Use technology to publish a variety of works, including simple research reports and book summaries
- Tell and write about the sources of learned information

Sorry. I am just not worried. DD didn't learn to use a mouse till probably late 4 or 5. It took her like half an hour. She is 7 now and navigates Google just fine, thanks. She can hunt and peck just fine and I will give her a keyboarding program sometime soon. She knows about URLs--you can't not know about web addresses by 7 if your parents use the computer around you. I mean, the laptop is out and in use all the time, but not by her, generally. She is allowed to use the desktop for a half hour or so a day if she wants to, but she doesn't ask very much.

Again, I am not not not not NOT worried that my kids will not be highly net-literate in good time. They are surrounded by it.

And as I say, she's started using the computer for school research projects....but I think it's a pretty lame source for a lot of kids' research, at this age. So much time gets wasted, though I suppose that's a lesson in and of itself.

DD also has access to various educational sites for school--she has a username and so on. They are almost worse than useless, IMO. Partly because they're too easy and she has to complete the grade-level stuff to advance, but really--slow, buggy, menh. The reading texts are dull as dishwater and the comprehension questions are classic regurgitation.

Again, I do think there is some great stuff out there, but there is also SO much stuff that is kind of substandard and is also laden with ads. We accept it and even encourage it because it's fun and colorful and the kids enjoy it. But great educational content? I haven't seen all that much of it. Some, but it's a small percentage. You're welcome to prove me wrong. I'd actually like to have some better sites for DD to go to. We like some Nat Geo and Discovery content, freerice, some of the cool animal and bird sites. I do agree that learning to program is great and that some of the creative enablers (video software, etc) are great tools. OI just downloaded Scratch because that also seems like a great one.

I'm with ultramarina on this. We have an iphone, ipad and computer all of which DS 5 is allowed to use - but they aren't his. And he knows this. He knows he has to ask to use it and that the apps he is allowed to use are chosen by me. However, he has never been addicted and unwilling to stop so this hasn't been too hard to manage. When he asks we rarely say no because its only one option among many.

He also has never chosen to surf youtube or online by himself. I have not forbidden it but I have not encouraged it either. He knows there are a ton of bookmarked webpages for him to go to. We also get websites from his teacher occasionally which have been enjoyable. I have treated it like TV, he isn't allowed to go an turn it on and just plop down in front of it - he has to ask. Conversely, everything in his room he can use whenever he wants, no restrictions.

So I am not worried about him being net-illiterate - he gets some of it in school too - I am more concerned with him thinking its the only way to get new information. At this point I would say his focus is much more on books as a source of information, he might place apps as a higher source of fun, but he might not.

And we started this with him using Starfall at 2.5 - he loved it and sometimes would not want to get off - so we decided how we wanted to approach it then and have pretty much stuck with it.

DeHe

I actually block YouTube on my son's computer. Just a personal choice - not making a judgment on anyone else's choice. Because of the crowdsourced viral content, I don't like being dependent on YouTube to remove offending content, so it's easier to block it and let him view it when I log my password and can see what he's viewing. I have Hulu, Netflix, etc. blocked as well so that we can discuss what he wants to watch and whether his homework, etc is finished before he gets bonafide vegetable time.

My son spends the majority of his time on Garageband and Scratch.

And, you know, it's really about personal parenting style. For us, computer time is a part of the family rhythm and doesn't replace sports, music, or family time. For others, screen time is a disruption. Our kids are gifted, so not being exposed to a computer in the early years isn't going to necessarily mean they're behind on skill sets when they enter school. By the same token, I'm pretty sure my kids weren't damaged from their time on the computer when they were little - and I'm pretty sure the break of them exploring and learning on their own was a massive gift to me. With three gifted kids, their drive and inquisitiveness completely exhausted me some days. When they could play games like Nancy Drew, etc., and have fun together, it was a gift to all of us.

Thanks for all the thoughtful replies!

One of the happiest days of my life was when my son was about 3.5 and learned to use google! No more incessant questions 24/7. He could look it up, then ask for further explanations if he needed them. DS8 is VERY time consuming. That hasn't changed. The difference is that he now looks things up then explains them to me. I have learned so much from him about things I never would have even considered.

There's a tremendous amount of free stuff that's educational and appropriate for a gifted 3-yr-old on the Internet.

http://watchknowlearn.org/default.aspx - offers free educational videos from ages 3-18 with a filtering tool to avoid inappropriate content, comments, or ads on YouTube.

www.livebinders.com - offers you to share or post resources from preschool+ on nearly anything educational (free ebooks to read or write, videos, activities, games). It is aimed at teachers, librarians, etc., but it's got HUGE potential for gifted children.

To start, last night I actually created a livebinder.com folder on free books for kids to create on their own; I haven't made it public yet. I wanted to make a folder so I can find these resources for myself and my son.

Children born 2005ish or later are digital natives; my eg/pg son was born in 2005. It's going to be an entirely different world for them as I'm discovering.

There's so much free, interactive immersive Web 2.0 stuff now that the way we learn, retrieve, think, or process information will change tremendously. Children who learn faster from visual information or by doing will especially benefit from the Web 2.0 tools.

Well...because there are some issues/problems associated with excess screen time that are not associated with those things. Now, do the problems (obesity, delayed language learning, disturbed sleep, attentional issues) happen for GT kids using screens at the same rate as for typical kids? I have no idea. But it's worth keeping in mind, unless you feel a fair weight of science (correlational, yes, but a fair weight) is to be discarded.

I am not anti-computers at all. But I don't consider them 100% benign, anymore than I consider TV 100% benign. I don't think we have evidence yet that computer use is any better or worse for young minds and bodies than TV. It may be better--but nothing is showing that so far.

Television viewing is completely different than using Web 2.0 tools online. Television viewing is a passive activity; creating your own online book for free is an active activity.

With television viewing or watching a video, users cannot physically change the content or what's presented (unless you switch it off). With Web 2.0 tools, users create the content (your own virtual book, newsletter, cartoon, binder, video, game, computer program, etc.). It's totally different.

The world is about to take a great leap from the current static Internet where websites are fixed to an interactive, immersive Web 2.0 Internet, which is more conducive to learning.

There are some studies on digital technology with young people.
http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0016/001631/163170e.pdf
http://www.pearsonfoundation.org/downloads/EmergentLiteracy-WhitePaper.pdf

Digital technology is providing learning for children who are unable to attend school, have learning disabilities or attention issues, are gifted, or for many others who would benefit from them. For some kids, digital technology engages their minds in way books or television cannot.

Active minds learn better with exercise (this includes physical exercise) but kids also need limits. Everything in moderation, but Web 2.0 can really help some kids find their passion and be a gateway to lifelong learning.

And, of course, there is this study which says we literally love our iPhones even if we're not addicted to them. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/01/o...r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=thab1

Love it!!!

I don't think that it's helpful to extrapolate from statistics related to TV viewing habits of children who are likely somewhat educationally neglected by their parents, when one is considering the effect of educational use of computers. I've never seen any statistics showing a negative impact of educational computer use (have you)? It seems to me that error may lurk in the aggregation.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19560-too-much-screen-time-is-bad-for-active-kids-too.html

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19403489

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090803173127.htm

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/19/health/19babies.html

Okay, this is something!
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,253360,00.html

But overall I don't think we have the science yet to distinguish between the effects of apps and educational games and TV/DVDs/vidoe games, as is admitted here:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/201...tphones-and-ipads-mush-my-toddlers-brain

I can see how active creating seems different. But how much time do kids actually spend doing this, vs. the other "junkier" stuff, and how much might we justify a lot of junk with some (not much) educational stuff?

This is an interesting piece:

http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/11/more-screen-time-for-kids-who-create-instead-of-watch/

I guess there is and probably always still will be a part of me that feels the flat world of screen creating is inferior for most things, too. DD is very artistic, but we haven't found anything online that gives the thrill and result of real-life materials. My observation is that these programs limit you or cookie-cutter you in all sorts of ways.

Just read this:
http://www.essentialpublicradio.org/content/ipad-storybook-apps-and-kids-who-love-them

I guess my bias is showing, but that bugged me. So many of the beautiful kids' books we love and have loved are surely not available on the iPad. There are likely a few good ones, but I bet a lot are junk, written to make money by people who are likely not even really authors but programmers and designers. This kid is going to increasingly prefer it, though, I'm sure, and I bet paper books will be a harder and harder sell. Why not, when things jump off the page and talk to you?

My take on this is that immoderation in any form is bad for you. I mean, few people would argue that reading is bad for you, but spending an excessive number of hours with a face in a book limits ones exposure to the real world, and more importantly, other people. Few people would argue that exercise is bad for you, but excessive exercise, particularly the repetitive kind, leads to injuries. Sunlight helps promote positive mood and vitamin D production, but too much leads to sunburn and melanomas. I could go on and on.

All things in moderation... including moderation.

For anything dynamic, the screen is superior to clay, stone, paint, or pencil, and for me, that makes the screen the more thrilling option.

I posted something on the section Big in Education about how television and Sesame Street relate to your points on screen viewing and addiction.

Joan Cooney Ganz created Sesame Street to help children learn using television. She saw how television caught a child's attention and how children were hooked on moving images. Her idea was simple. If she caught a child's attention, a child could learn. Generations of children have learned how to read, write, or do math from it.

Today, this generation has the Internet.

Yes, a computer screen can not replace a tactile learning experience. You cannot replicate thumbing through a physical book with an e-book.

There is a lot of creative stuff on the web. Yes, some things are pre-formatted. Keep looking if you haven't found what you like, I say. It's there but you might have to hunt for it and really dig. Go on livebinders.com. There's plenty of sources posted by teachers and librarians that have what you're looking for FREE.

http://drscavanaugh.org/ebooks/libraries/ebook_libraries.htm - is one source for FREE ebooks but there are many others.

iPad storybook - that's sensationalism. This is going to happen when parents are not using the best judgement. It's like going to bed with the television on. Stop and think.

Here's an alternative - http://skypeanauthor.wetpaint.com/ - skype an author for FREE!

Yes, I agree with you on programmers, designers, and businessmen being more interested in profits and revenues. Non-profits are on the web but Google's retrieval system is aimed at advertising and generating profits. So you have to enter terms like free or non-profit or create into your search terms. Otherwise, you'll get the companies trying to make money and sell you a product or service you don't need.

What is your daughter trying to find? Can you be precise in words? That's a tip and trick.

My daughter honestly isn't trying to find anything in terms of art stuff. She's happy with her 3-d materials. She likes to design avatars and fashions online sometimes. I don't mind her doing this occasionally--we all need time to have fun--but I don't consider it high-quality creating.


Do you mean you find the screen more thrilling than real-life artists' works? Or that you find it more thrilling to screate on-screen?


With all due respect, why? When we have so many other things DD enjoys and that excite her (Legos, art materials, outside play, books), I can't get motivated to dig for the good stuff. I have some things bookmarked that look nice, but as yet we have found nothing that really excites her and is educational and has staying power. She likes birds, and there is some nice bird stuff, but as with so many other things on the web, I find it isn't curated all that well. There's a site with videos of birds from all over the world, but many are not that great and so you sit there and spend time watching 5 enh 2-minute videos and one good one. It doesn't feel like a good use of time. Same with YouTube and stuff for my ocean-obsessed 3yo. I have to watch a lot of enh stuff to find something really good.

It's not that I don't appreciate a really good website or really cool tool. I am extremely grateful for Wikipedia and Khan Academy, believe me! But I think sometimes that people love this stuff BECAUSE it's on the computer and is pretty and shiny and multi-colored and bells and whistles. That isn't enough for me.

My guess is that when she's older, she'll find her own challenging info online - at least that's what has evolved with our ds12. (Sorry, I can't remember how old your dd is). Our ds is *really* into Legos - he's been building things since before he could sit up (or so it seems lol!)... and eventually got into Lego robotics etc. Starting sometime last year he started looking at other people's Lego creations online. My first thought was, this isn't all that intellectually stimulating, but he spends enough time everyday studying etc, so it was ok with me to let him spend time googling Legos. This fall he asked for a Lego train set for his birthday. We almost didn't get it for him because he seemed to be getting a little old for a train set, but hey, I'm his mom and he's not going to be home for all that many more years and yep, I got him that Lego train set for his birthday. Sooooo... it wasn't long before he was online checking out other Lego train setups and suddenly he was spending all his free time contemplating the physics of trains... and I'm not talking simple physics either - I'm a phycisict by profession, and he was genuinely using a heck of a lot of brain cells on the concepts he was applying to his train set. All inspired by and benefiting from a chance to google and look at other people's creations.

He's moved on now to building a Lego robot he's going to house in a bubble, also an idea that came to him after googling. Who knows what he'll be doing next week. But whatever it is, being online seems to have helped him explore his creativity in a good way. I have an artistic bent, and I never could have developed it by living in a bubble (ie, not going to museums or looking at other art). Seeing what other people are doing, being exposed to other people's ideas, doesn't make us less, it spurs us on to think more creatively ourselves. And that's an area that I think the internet has really opened up for kids like my ds.

Anyway, I got a little off-track lol... my original point in replying was that I haven't really had to ever seek out much for my kids, they tend to find it on their own. We watch, and we have parental controls, we aren't letting them run wild online, but we've given them some freedom to roam and in return we (parents) have found a lot of cool things also

polarbear

Yes, she is young--just turned 8--and not given a ton of access yet. I would say that she likes the computer but isn't really extremely jazzed about it yet. I'm sure as heck not worried that she won't be into it eventually, though.


Yes, I see this. I wouldn't have a problem with my kids using the computer like this. I guess the issue is that there are so many ways to use it and a lot of them seem empty-ish to me. Even most of the educational games I see seem light on content and long on noise, gimmicks, and arcade-style stuff. DD isn't terribly into the arcade-style click and pop and shoot and catch stuff, so a lot of it seems boring to her. Anyway, she picks stuff up so fast that I am pretty sure she'd rather get a pen and paper math lesson and pick up a new skill in 20 minutes, then go play freely, than spend an hour clicking about and registering and learning how the game works for what equates to a smaller piece of learning in the end. I remember her K teacher commenting with vague bewilderment that DD "wasn't into the computer like the other kids were." I asked her about it and she said it was fine for a bit but got boring and she would rather go read. It was probably all grade-level stuff.

I don't know--do we know they "all turned out okay"? None of them had ADHD, or obesity, or depression, or aggression problems, or anxiety? They certainly turned out SMART--but gifted does not, of course, equal "okay"...

Totally anecdotal - my kids - all gifted - have had access to computers since they were born. We never limited screen time, but we did filter content. The two older kids are both adults. Neither are obese, aggressive, depressed or anxious. Both kids have ranked as youths in the top ten in the nation in their sport and served as team captains and coaches, both have held down part-time jobs while attending college (my son works for me creating mobile apps for businesses) and both have received awards within their own creative interests. And I've recently discovered that my older son is in the top 100 out of millions of players on Call of Duty, yet it's never inspired violence or inappropriate behavior in real life.

Computers are a tool. Each of us as parents get to choose what fits best within our parenting style and lifestyle choices, but it isn't black and white that we should all eschew computers or that we all must adopt technology at a vigorous rate.

Like you say, though, anecdotal for sure.

FTR, I absolutely do not believe we should all eschew computers. I'm just not as impressed with their value to children as many, and I especially think that very young children (under 6, say) would do better to have screentime very limited. I don't know if I've made it clear, but my job involves reading a LOT of the studies on this subject. I find it a little odd that this group seems inclined to be so skeptical of scientific evidence on this particular subject.

I think ultramarina's fears are understandable, and am convinced that the type of activity matters greatly. Still, I don't think there's something magical about holding something in the hand versus manipulating a virtual object on-screen, and I do think that using the computer as a creative tool is bound to be non-harmful as long as there's no "junk" in the mix.

I've let DS6 play games like Axis and Allies, Warcraft 3, and the like on the PC. To me, that doesn't seem much different from using a set of army men-- except that I can't buy him a set of tiny robotic army men that look and behave like orcs and build things on their own, or roam around a countryside firing miniature toy shells complete with simulated explosions. Nor can I buy him a set that lets him build a tiny robot city, like Sim City, or control a galactic empire. I think that these sorts of computer activities can have a lot of aspects of good board games and building sets about them, except that there's the extra aspect of simulation involved, and of course a great deal more of detail.

There are some educational activities, like computer programming, that can't be done or would be ridiculous to teach without a computer. For the best of those, I refuse to believe that there's anything negative about using a computer-- even for an extended period of time, if so desired by the child-- except possibly eyesight degradation, where I wouldn't be able to have an informed opinion without further reading.

Probably the only thing where I'm not so sure about the long-term effects is our movie watching. I have a two-year-old who loved sitting through the entirety of "2001" (and at the end said "Again!" though we didn't comply ), and who attended his first theater showing before the age of two. While the example of "2001" is a work of art and intellectually stimulating, watching a long movie is indisputably a physically passive activity that lasts for hours (and intellectually passive in at least some ways, as not involving much creative thought during the watching).

All I can say is that DS6 has watched a ton of movies starting from a young age, and I think that the particular movies I picked have sparked or accentuated a lot of creativity in him. I have some powerful symbols from my youth tucked away mostly in my subconscious mind, and it's been fun work remembering and trying to locate them as an adult.

I remember being terrified of a particular scene of the Nautilus from the old Disney "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" movie, which from the glimpse I got as a child seemed like a house lit by eldritch light tearing along the sea bottom. I had nightmares about it for years, and there are plenty of other examples. But I agree with people like Maurice Sendak who feel that children shouldn't be shielded from intense emotions, and that they usually know that death, violence, etc. exist. I think that scary movies, books, etc. (within reason) give a safe way to think and imagine such things, and may drive emotional growth-- and certainly creative growth. In my experience children typically are enthralled with the macabre if given the chance.

I could well be wrong about the effects of the movies on DS6, though-- maybe he would have been different and better in some ways without the movies, and maybe even more creative. (I doubt it, but it's possible.)

One aspect of the movie and TV watching that I'm fairly sure about is that it spurred DS6's capacity for thinking about more and more involved plots, characters, etc. He can recite every twist and turn of his favorite movies (including a lot of the lines, usually) and I wouldn't have had the time to read such complicated stories to him early on. Now he's showing a tendency to prefer books unless there's something he wants to watch, and what he prefers to watch is either a movie with some redeeming qualities or an educational show.

I guess my skepticism comes from this - I do not automatically accept that studies that are done on the "masses" necessarily hold true for gifted kids. I'm not doubting the stats are out there; I'd just be curious whether any of those studies target high IQ children.

I went to college to be a special ed teacher and spent my pre-kid years working with behavior disordered students, so I am very aware of the studies about video games and violence and watching TV and all of it, but I think that across-the-board assumptions don't always hold true for kids with much higher than average IQ's.

My kids were EXHAUSTING when they were toddlers, and their quest for knowledge was insatiable. Even their play was more intense than my friends' kids. They didn't do anything in moderation - it was all forces ahead from the time they woke up until they went to bed. And they all quit needing naps long before I did.

The time they spent on the computer let them continue to learn, explore, express, create, etc. when I was too wiped out to be fully engaged with them any more. I was a stay-at-home mom with all of them, and I wouldn't change a minute of the time I spent with them - but I also know that a lot more was demanded of me physically, mentally, and emotionally because I had three gifted kids. There is no way I could've provided the amount of learning they wanted in a day without having a nervous breakdown, so allowing them access to screen time let them explore until they were satiated. We did the baking together, going to the park, playing with friends, reading books, going to the library, telling stories, etc., but screen time let them go further on their own.

I wouldn't say endorsed. Two hours is their absolute max for all screen-based media. If you read the recommendations, they clearly would rather it were less.

That said, I actually think the kind of use you describe is okay. However, few families actually follow those guidelines.

"Today, 8-18 year-olds devote an average of 7 hours and 38 minutes (7:38) to using entertainment media across a typical day (more than 53 hours a week). And because they spend so much of that time 'media multitasking' (using more than one medium at a time), they actually manage to pack a total of 10 hours and 45 minutes (10:45) worth of media content into those 7� hours."

--from a Kaiser Family Foundation Report from 2010. It's probably more now.

http://www.kff.org/entmedia/upload/8010.pdf

from the same report:

"Only about three in ten young people say they have rules about how much time they can spend watching TV (28%) or playing video games (30%), and 36% say the same about using the computer. "

Meanwhile: " Over the past 5 years, time spent reading books remained steady at about :25 a day. "

So...25 min a day reading, 7 1/2 HOURS a day using screen media...

Maybe because we are rationalizing that what we do with our own particular kiddos is somehow different from what those studies suggest, so those of us who have given lots of extra screentime to our kiddos won't feel like we're bad parents.

And though I say the above in jest, it is certainly true that as parents of a kid who is HG+ we have not followed a lot of the standard parenting advice after discovering it didn't fit. We do what works for our family.

Are you referring to the book Exceptionally Gifted Children?
I'm not sure how that would work as the book was originally published in 1993 at the conclusion of the childhood for the sample group. Home computers weren't really available when this sample was little. Also, the take away I got from Gross's book is that a lot of the kids actually didn't turn out okay but that those who didn't have good academic options suffered greatly. http://www.amazon.com/Exceptionally-Gifted-Children-Miraca-Gross/dp/0415314917

This isn't something a parent can buy, but children can use their imaginations. Gifted kids existed long before PCs and many found incredible ways to create and explore the world. Leta Hollingsworth's portrayals of young gifted kids are a great example of that. These kids aren't just consumers of the worlds someone else created, they often created their own worlds with their own laws, languages, social systems.

Sure, and of course I'm not knocking using one's imagination, just pointing out that playing with simulations can be fun, stimulating and possibly even educational too.

If I remember, at one point after I first joined the site, you were advocating the use of coloring books, and I was stating that I don't think that using them is as good as freeform art, since the latter stimulates more creativity. My, how time flies.

BTW, I do agree that it's hard to know how some of the negative effects in the studies would play out with gifted kids. Perhaps it's true that some of the cognitive effects are not an issue. However, GT kids are certainly not immune to obesity, sleep problems, or ADHD.

I don't want to sound high-horsey here--DS has gotten rather more screentime than DD due to various family circumstances. But But I do have a very intense DD8 who is certainly a major asker of questions and whose mental wheels turn very fast. I have looked up lots of things for her on Wikipedia, believe me. But I have not found that screentime is needed to get a break. She plays outside for hours upon hours, she writes plays, she builds and draws and reads. The screens just weren't made very available and she manages to find stuff to do, though we certrainly have made a cool and fun yard, which helps. (I also send the kids outside to play even if they complain. They always have fun once there.) We are also huge consumers of books on CD in the late toddler/early preschooler years. They take the place of movie time pretty nicely.

I would see coloring books as occasional handwriting and fine motor practice for a kid who likes them and totally different from free form art. Many of my concerns about video games relate to the pacing and potential affects on the brain as well as acting as a captivating draw that may prevent a child from learning to deal with boredom or engage in play that requires more skill areas such as sensory, motor skills, etc. Can't say I've got that same concern about coloring books.

Yes, they are totally different from free-form art. They're coloring in someone else's art instead of creating art. In comparison, it's hard to understand how using simulated soldiers some of the time, instead of molded plastic ones, is supposed to be so harmful to imagination.

I actually think there is a difference, at least with kids under 6, I think i feel differently about older kids, but I noticed that with small children who watch a lot of television it structured their imagination much more than books do. Kids being Dora or the cars from cars. It's just not been my experience that kids read Olivia and then incorporate her into imaginary play the way kids who just saw her on tv did. Plus we're have been recent studies showing that very young kids learn by hearing and watching lips so tv is less effective at conveying ideas. Perhaps they get so stupefied because they are trying to figure it out.

I am definitely not in the all electronics is evil camp, more of a moderation believer. And i love my ipad and its apps. But I think it's more problematic when it dominates, in a way I would not say about a kid who only reads. Of course,I am now fighting that battle so i am being a bit of a hypocrite as i yank books away "forcing" my kid to do something physical, I am often saying yes you must put the book down now!

DeHe

I don't really see coloring books to have anything to do with art. I wouldn't say a child coloring in a coloring book is making art or experiencing art in any way rather they are most likely having fine motor practice while they wait for the entree to arrive at a restaurant.

It sounds on the other hand like people were suggesting that playing a video game is a way for children to have experiences or develop imagination. As in how would kids have the experience of combat or civilization building without them. My answer is that children for generations have had these experiences by using imagination and by creating with self created stories.

It has also not been my observation that coloring books are an activity that most children engage in for hours. I'm sure there are kids who have, but unlike screens they tend to be a pretty self limited activity for most kids.

Yes, that would be my observation as well. It is pretty obvious from watching play which kids have not spent a lot of time with screens.

Sounds like you have it handled. Guess I wasn't as together. Oh well. They're adults now, or at least two of them are. And they still seek out my company and advice, so I'm good with it all.

If they don't do anything in moderation wouldn't screens be more of a concern rather than less of a concern? I guess I'm not getting the logic for believing that the negatives of screens would apply less to highly gifted kids. If anything it would seem intensity may make it more problematic (though certainly perhaps more desirable for parents).

It would certainly be highly inconvenient to see that and admit it. Coloring involves happily filling in someone else's artwork, and involves putting one's creative imagination on hold while that's done. Why draw when one can color? Here's an interesting experiment to try: take a child who loves to color, buy her a new coloring book, and sit her next to a stack of blank paper and the coloring book, and see which she chooses.

They certainly aren't.

Everything we do involves "having experiences". I don't think anyone was suggesting that playing a battle simulation, for example, would develop imagination; someone suggesting that using creative tools would do so.

I wrote, "I think that these sorts of computer activities can have a lot of aspects of good board games and building sets about them, except that there's the extra aspect of simulation involved, and of course a great deal more of detail." I stand by that. One doesn't get the experience of actually managing a city using wooden blocks the way one does playing Sim City; one doesn't get the same practice in building strategic skills playing with plastic army men that one does in playing a battle simulation.

I suppose that with plastic army men one is forced to imagine more detail because it's not supplied, but that doesn't mean that it's clearly harmful to play with things featuring detail, or we'd all have our children playing with cornhusk dolls in the closest Waldorf academy.

Playing a game is also different from moving dolls around; one involves rules and the other not. That doesn't make me worry about stunting DS6's creativity when we play strategy games. Learning to work within the confines of a rule-based system exercises problem-solving skills.

Children have not had the experience of struggling against an alien race to conquer a galaxy by creating with self created stories; they've imagined someone else doing them. One involves more strategic and tactical problem solving, the other creative writing or imaginative play.

Take my word for it or not, but DS6 is very highly creative. I can't imagine that playing games has stunted his growth, just as you can't imagine that your children's coloring has stunted theirs.

Good point. I guess I need to explain what I meant. When my kids got interested in something, it was never in moderation. When the little one decided dinosaurs were his passion, it was dinosaurs all day every day - everywhere. We were dinosaurs in the car, in the park, during supper, and in all forms of play. This lasted for probably 18 months until he moved on to space. When my older kids decided they liked climbing, they didn't just like it, they trained for hours every week until they were nationally ranked.

It isn't that they don't use the computer in moderation; I simply don't limit it so that it is a tool, not forbidden fruit. When the questions were beyond my capacity for the day (sorry, but it did get there on some days) the computer access allowed them to continue to explore their interests through research, videos, etc.

They are all very physically active and creative. One summer when the youngest was four, he wrote a play, composed the accompanying music and badgered all of us into performing it for him. But he did use the computer to write the play. I didn't limit the time he spent, but when he'd had enough, he got down and did something else.

So when I say my kids didn't do anything in moderation, I don't mean they spent 18 hours a day staring into a screen. I mean they're driven, highly energetic kids who don't take in any endeavor halfway.

I don't understand what you are saying. What would be inconvenient or difficult to admit? They have nothing to do with art, I can't imagine anyone thinks they do.

I'd say for us coloring pages or coloring books were waiting for the entree to arrive at a restaurant. Maybe three hours a year? I can't say I can work up a head of steam about three hours a year of screen time either. I don't think the research suggests that most kids are on screens three hours a year, more like what five or six hours a day.


Rules and strategic play have existed for generations before computers. Surely I'm not the only one who remembers childhood play involving endless hours of rule creation and negotiation.

Screens aren't the same as play in real life. They don't involve using gross motor skills, feeling the weight of objects, experiencing the size of objects in real space, having the sensory experience of objects, interacting and negotiating with real people - reading their facial expressions, etc.


It is odd to me to try to parse it out this way. My experience of kid play both as a parent and as a child is that it involved all of these - imagination, strategy, problem solving, conflict, cooperation, creativity. It is all there in kid play at least in kids who know how to play - something that is disappearing for some kids with more screens.


Funny. I'm not sure where the coloring book obsession is coming from. I don't think it destroys a kid's creativity to color while they wait at a restaurant and if Grandma brings a coloring book a couple of times a year. It is time wasting handwriting practice. I also don't think screens at a restaurant a few times a year or at Grandma's is a big deal either. Of course we know that the real issue is that for most kids it isn't a very rare experience but hours and hours each week.

They sound like fun kids.

My take is that parenting preschoolers is just really hard work. Gifted or not, they can be absolutely exhausting to be around, particularly if they are very physical active or they are kids who push boundaries. I'm not sure that either of those characteristics are exclusive to gifted kids.

My opinion is likely different from many here. I think the single best reason to use screens is as a babysitter. If it gets a parent a desperately needed break that's of more value than believing it is what makes kids creative or able to think logically.

That coloring books "have anything to do with art", despite the fact that they involve filling out the outlines of art made by others-- and skipping the ability to create art of one's own. Why not draw one's own art and color it?

It is an obvious advantage in this discussion for you to try to distance (or as lawyers say, "distinguish") the two. I'm just in essence saying, "I see what you did there". It's completely obvious that coloring in someone else's art has something to do with art, despite the fact that it's imaginationally completely passive instead of involving active creation (that's my point, actually).

I looked back at the previous discussion on coloring, and see I've partly confused you with PoppaRex, who was much more forceful in advocating coloring, so I'm sorry. I certainly think anything can be overdone, and three hours a year of just about anything would be seen as moderation.

... which isn't the same as playing a strategy game, some of which are on computers today. When they are on computers, they can offer greater richness of detail; but in general playing a strategy game on the computer is no more harmful in terms of curbing creativity than, say, playing a game of chess. And here you're engaging in the same sort of fallacy as before (i.e. "Just because computers didn't exist in the past, yet children existed, there is nothing new and positive about playing on computers today").

You're correct, those are actual differences between playing with a simulated environment and playing with real objects and people. The fact that they are different does not mean that computers offer no advantages. A child can practice flying a plane with software today, actually feel what it might feel like to look out of the cockpit (even engage with an enemy aircraft), etc., whereas almost no one ever gets that chance in the real world; that's just an example. I've provided others.

Playing a game on a computer, or playing with a software model, doesn't rule out non-computer-based play, and offers things that non-computer-based play does not. And you still haven't explained how playing a computer strategy game stunts creativity any more than playing a game of chess-- would it be ruling out the ability to imagine a knight actually forking a king and queen at once?

I don't personally let my kids on the computer that much. In fact, they didn't use them at all today. I agree that the main issue is that computers are seductive and can be passivating in the extreme, and so unchecked computer use could be bad for kids. I don't see that all computer play unavoidably is bad for children's imagination. I also don't think you've managed to distinguish playing a computer strategy game from playing a board game, etc.

I'm with you more on the video time. I do sometimes worry about the amount of screen time we allow the kids there, and have cut back on TV to the point that they are usually allowed one PBS show in the morning while getting ready for school. I continue to let them watch movies, but I'd probably cut that way back if, say, DS6's reading was flagging (it's increasing). With DS2 some of the screen time has actually helped him, for example early on I showed him "Baby Babble" DVDs to help get him vocalizing more (they worked) and the Leapfrog Letter Factory seems to have helped him memorize his letter facts better even than Starfall and reading.

Sorry, I'm totally confused. Filling in line drawings on the back of a kids' placement is not art. It seems odd to me that anyone would believe it is producing art. It is a time wasting activity with potential fine motor benefits. Just like when the kid practices handwriting by copying down a sentence they aren't engaging in constructing a story.

If the issue is that they are being exposed to unattractive versions of art as a consumer I wonder how you reconcile that with having the child consume any kind of kid media, like Leapfrog that you mentioned, that is full of pretty poorly done unattractive art.

I looked back at the previous discussion on coloring, and see I've partly confused you with PoppaRex, who was much more forceful in advocating coloring, so I'm sorry. [/quote]

Okay, thanks.


Kid play is full of incredible richness of detail, if you aren't seeing that in the play of kids you know that is a red flag. I've known kids with highly detailed self created games and worlds that have operated for years at a time. What's happening with the computer isn't just playing chess, but the illusion that the child is engaging in imagination when they are acting as a consumer of a world, story, and rules created by someone else. It is also acting devoid of an integrated sensory and motor experience.


They get to feel someone else's simulated version of certain aspects of that experience. That's not the same as their own imagined version, nor is it the same as the real experience. I believe your other examples were things like having a battle or building a city - both of these themes are pretty common ones in kid play.


Chess is a good example. If you play on the computer you play by the rules of the computer and only the rules of the computer. When kids play with a IRL physical chess set they may play according to the traditional rules of the game. That's always an option. Or, they may conceive something entirely new - what happens if we incorporate Lego people with super powers, what happens if we add an element of chance through incorporating rock paper scissors or a dice roll, what happens if we add bowling as a new game mechanic, what happens if alter the movements of the queen, what happens if we change the rules to make it so our chess game is epic and runs for weeks at a time. This process involves strategy, social skills developed through negotiating with playmates, experiencing and working with gravity, motor skills, physical space, etc.

This isn't to argue there is no value in playing chess against the computer. There's lots to be said for having an opponent at the right level always available. It is one experience though with a real chess set and playing offering a wealth of other experiences. It is good to know the difference.

I'm sorry you're confused. Coloring in someone else's art does indeed have something to do with art-- it's filling in or completing someone else's art, but subtracting out the chance for creative expression nearly completely. In a similar vein, doing touchups on Thomas Kinkade masterworks is undeniably art-related, but completely devoid of any artistic creative benefit.

The issue is that they're doing an art activity that discourages creative outlet, beyond the choice of color for a certain region. Watching a Leapfrog video is not an art activity, it's a fact-memorization activity that involves the consumption of information. Let's not get silly.

No amount of imaginative kid play replicates the sort of detail I'm talking about, which specifically deals with rule-based play in a strategy game. Playing with dolls is not chess, and playing with plastic army men is not a full-on battle simulation with real working parts. Playing a battle simulation of an actual WW II battle is simply different by design from freeform play with figurines (it's intended to heighten the realism available), and any comparison that decries the loss of imaginative possibilities is intentionally missing the point.

There's no illusion. I'm astounded that you keep trying to claim that they are one and the same. I never claimed that. However, one could imagine that one is a commander of a real-world army when one is commanding a simulated army, no less than one could engage in the same fantasy while playing with molded motionless plastic soldiers.


If I were to use your style of reasoning above, I'd be inserting a statement or question here suggesting that by your logic, we can't expose our children to any sort of story or media created by another, due to the risk that they'd just be acting as a "consumer of a world".

This doesn't hold water. Does one not reap the benefits of playing chess when one uses a board displayed on a computer screen, instead of holding the pieces in one's hand? (If you have a Windows machine with Windows 7, the game "Chess Titans" lets you do just this, for example. You can play against a human on the screen.) But what of the terrible loss of the "integrated sensory and motor experience"?

See, the main problem with the set of fallacies you're stubbornly trying to present is that you are suggesting without any foundation that just because something is on a computer, it's bound to be bad. And you will continue to fail as long as you so badly overstate the case.

... and there are scads of others. In fact, a child studying WW II can engage in a full-fledged battle recreation where they're right in the thick of the action.

Your baseless argument against simulation just doesn't make sense because it's, well, baseless. Mathematicians and scientists use simulations all the time because they're useful learning tools. You haven't presented any evidence that playing with simulations (or any other strategy games) is bad. You haven't presented any evidence that the loss of an "integrated experience", exchanging it for the "integrated experience" of computer use, is bad.

Here's another thing that can't be replicated outside of a computer: hypertext. Computers indisputably offer opportunities that can't be duplicated otherwise for learning because of the enhanced browsing and multimedia presentation options. How about learning about the forementioned WW II with an interactive atlas that lets one drill down into fine detail at each step of the war? What about using an interactive model of the human body?

Uh oh. We'd better recommend that people have their children avoid playing with the standard rules of chess-- and better stay away from those incredibly limiting chess tournaments!

While I have very much enjoyed this lively discussion and appreciate the original poster's tolerance of our ramblings here, the tone has changed from discussing varying points of view to personal and confrontational, so I'm bowing out of this topic.

No amount of imaginative kid play replicates the sort of detail I'm talking about, which specifically deals with rule-based play in a strategy game. Playing with dolls is not chess, and playing with plastic army men is not a full-on battle simulation with real working parts. Playing a battle simulation of an actual WW II battle is simply different by design from freeform play with figurines (it's intended to heighten the realism available), and any comparison that decries the loss of imaginative possibilities is intentionally missing the point.[/quote]

I agree it is different. I expect a kid is able to visualize and create detail. If kids aren't able to do that, play isn't going to be very complex, but I see that as a flag something is wrong. Imagining your own world and creating your own reality is different than being the consumer of the reality someone else has created. Even if your goal is a recreation of a historical even working from maps or written accounts to be able to visualize in your head and create your own reproduction, that requires a different kind of imagination than pointing and shooting.


We just won't see eye to eye. I love a pretty wood chess set with nice weighted pieces that feel good in the hand. It is a sensory experience. As I said chess software can be good in the way of providing a ready opponent at a controlled level of difficulty.


As I clearly stated, the real chess set offers the option to play standard chess and so much more. If kids want to play chess on the computer a lot that's great, however I'd also suggest getting them out to play in real clubs and tournaments though. Real kids are more unpredictable than computer software and require a set of skills you don't need on the computer including reading body language - and learning to lose gracefully and keep your cool.

I'm all backwards anyway. �I think pixels are fine for mindless entertainment and that mindlessness is fine.
Funny thing is, I heard a similar argument against early organized education, don't teach preschoolers phonics or your kid will be a skin covered robot. �And "you'll destroy your kid's creativity by giving him drawing lessons before he has time to develop his own style". � *

I have to agree that the statistics are taken of children and their screen time are probably involving children whose parents don't go above and beyond for their education like many posters here. �Also, we're not going to get this perfect.

My, how I love the way folks in this forum compare stuff to stuff, even if we disagree about the stuffs relationship. �Most folks just don't get it unless there's a premade phrase that compares the two objects they don't seem to cross-reference. �But folks here do it naturally, compare stuff to stuff automatically. �Yay!

(mommy confession- I sneaked the Olivia book into the trash because the writing was so poor compared to other children's books we have. �But I think Olivia the tv show is cute). ��

*and yet adult artists say that great art comes from knowing the rules and then deciding on when to break them�
And the HWT program says when your child has learned to form neat correct letters then, by all means, let them embellish flourishments to make their own style, but don't confuse untrained sloppiness for one's own style. �

** does anybody know about those wild claims that cellphones microwave your brains slowly and since there's no nerve endings there to feel it, blah blah blah... So don't give your phone to your two year old? Just somebody tell me if that's true or not because I think I really do love my iPhone.

Cellphones do heat up brain tissue,and cause increased brain metabolism near the site of heating. You can learn more here:

cellphones and cancer risk

Yes, this is where I am, too. I also agree that limited screentime is fine in its place as a break for the parents or as lightweight enjoyment. I do think it's possible to learn from some educational stuff, and some films are thematically and visually rich, but generally I don't count on it on to do any of that, though it might a little. I also have exposed my kids to some popular stuff purely in the name of social capital. (Which reminds me that DD is probably ready to watch Star Wars by now.)

I also have to agree about kids who do not know how to play. I have had kids come over to my house and seem not to know what to do in our backyard, which has a treehouse, swing and trapeze, tons of cool outdoor toys, sand area, chickens, and so on. They wander around blankly for a bit, swing for a few minutes, and come inside and ask to watch TV or play Wii (we do have a Wii, which spends a lot of time sitting). Oh, they do usually like the bikes and scooters, though--I notice those are still popular with almost every kid.


My kids drive me crazy a lot and are challenging little critters, but one thing they do not do is say they are bored or rely solely on me for entertainment. It could certainly be personality, but I have very deliberately cultivated this as much as I possibly can.

There is so much evidence--mountains of it, really--about the congitive and socioemotional benefits of free, unstructured play. We have very little showing benefits for screen activities. There may BE benefits, but right now there sure isn't a consensus.

Count me among the advocates for screens here. And the reason I'm confident I'm not having the same effect on my child as has been documented in large studies is because they're not studying my kid. If DD7 spent 7-8 hours in front of a screen and 20 minutes reading each day, she'd be MISERABLE. It's a rare day that she spends more than 2 hours in a day in front of a screen of any kind. My DD spent maybe a total of 4.5 hours of combined time in front of a screen from Friday - Sunday, and a good portion of that was spent on a homework assignment she didn't have to do on a computer, but she chose to anyway.

In fact, I'm guilty of redirecting her from a book to a screen this past weekend. I came home from work Friday and found her settled on the couch with a book she had picked up at our last library sale. She wanted to talk about what she was reading, because she found it so fascinating, and she showed me how it was talking about how crayons are made in the factory. I told her about the show "How It's Made," she expressed an interest, and I pulled up the TV menus to set a recording... only to find out there was some kind of marathon running right then.

That show accounted for nearly two hours of that 4.5 hour figure I presented, though not all on the same day. The overwhelming bulk of her weekend was spent in unstructured play time with her peers... with a few hours of unstructured play time with her daddy mixed in.

So yeah, I reject the findings of the Kaiser Permanente study as having anything to do with my kid, because how the AVERAGE kid consumes these things is not how my DD does it. My kid is exceptional, zero surprises there. I do not limit her screen time because she has displayed no desire to abuse it.

Furthermore, I reject false dichotomies as false. My kid has unstructured play time, my kid experiences multimedia, and she enjoys the benefits of both.

Sure, handling a well-crafted chess board is a pleasant sensory experience. You know what else is a pleasant sensory experience? A beautifully-rendered chess board in which the rook morphs into a rock troll, thuds his way to the queen, hoists her up, and stuffs her into his mouth. Then the bishop responding by strolling over, swinging his staff, and smashing the rock troll into a pile of bricks. Pretty soon you find yourself entertained by the various ways different pieces can destroy each other, and the game moves away from the structured pursuit of victory according to standard chess rules, and into the unstructured play of creating as much mayhem as possible. Try doing THAT with a well-crafted chess set, and you'll quickly discover how limiting real-life can be to the human imagination.

Of course, choosing one exclusively over the other would be a false dichotomy. They're both great, so enjoy.

And a final point... as much fun as nostalgia is, making our children live our childhoods just because it worked out well for us would be doing our children a terrible disservice, because our children are not growing up in the same context we did. The digital revolution is not over yet, and I would not want to raise an analog adult to compete in the world that is yet to come.

Well, but again I'd say that there is no keeping them away from it. It's unavoidable. I don't think you can actually raise an anlog child anymore unless you live on a deserted island. I just have no worries that I am doing my kids any major disservice by limiting screentime at this age. It's coming. School will reinforce it, and peers, and so on.

FWIW, though, I also have no particular interest in steering my kids towards computer careers. I know some people think this is the only thing for kids now, that's the main way to make money, etc. If you were focused on that, I suppose I could imagine how you'd want to create as much computer literacy as possible.

A child doesn't have to be an IT professional to require computer skills. There are still some jobs out there that don't require the sophisticated use of technology... but what do they pay?

I spent way too much time in front of a computer growing up.

Way, way, way too much time.

Focus on my children's future salaries is not really my thing.

That said, they are going to have computer skills, of course. Like I said, it's unavoidable. And they're very smart. They'll pick it up as soon as it's made available.

I didn't have my own computer till the age of 23 and I have never had any problems picking up the computer skills I need, though I don't work in IT or anything like it. Same with my husband, and he's effortlessly picked up things like GIS and SPSS. But am I starting them programming at age 4? No. I suppose some people could see this as a failing on my part. Enh.

I don't disallow computer use, anyway. But I limit it, and I certainly don't actively suggest it. Pushing computer literacy for these kids just seems utterly unnecessary. IMO, they'll be in front of screens all day soon enough.

Well, for patent law, you generally only require the following tools:

1) A word processor
2) A fax machine
3) A telephone
4) A technical illustrator
5) The U.S. Postal Service
6) An inventor

Nor is it mine... but neither is limiting her future options. I see my job as a parent as providing her with an opportunity to develop a rich set of skills, then standing by and watching what she does with them.


I don't see much value in using my experiences with technology as a benchmark for my child. She'll be an adult in 11 years, and in the last 11 years, the field has changed dramatically. I see no reason for that rate of change to decelerate in the next 11 years.

My DD7 did a writing project on her computer, which is a decision she made herself. But since her school experience is such a mess (she's in 1st grade, ready for 2nd grade, and jumped into a G/T class full of G/T 3rd graders) she needed a lot of assistance and some heavy editing. She was angry/frustrated/overwhelmed by the assignment enough as it is... it would have been 10x worse if she'd had to do all those revisions by hand.


I don't think anyone has to push computer literacy on children these days, especially gifted ones. I think that computer illiteracy can be pushed, though. Restricting screen time is fine if it's necessary... as I said, in my DD's case, we don't restrict simply because she's self-regulating pretty well. If her behavior were different, our policy would be different. But there's restrictive and then there's prohibitive.

If I understand correctly, a patent attorney requires a degree in the STEM field relevant to the individual patent, because they need to understand the invention. Here's where the patents are going: http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/ido/oeip/taf/cbcby.htm

Notice how particularly active the 700 series is, which all have to do with information systems, compared to the rest of the categories. Information technology advances are also embedded in a lot of the other patent categories, ex: surgery, internal combustion engines, photography, telecommunications, etc.

You just need enough STEM classes to be allowed to take the USPTO test. Generally, the inventor explains the invention to you. So, yes, a person with chemistry credits can be drafting that information tech patent.

There was a ginormous backlog at the USPTO after the dot-com adventure.

But the real money is in patent litigation, where your goal is often to confuse the jury.

Exactly. When it is time will pick it up pretty much instantly. It isn't like it is at all difficult. Here we went from zero to computer programming pretty much overnight.

Yes, they are totally different from free-form art. They're coloring in someone else's art instead of creating art. In comparison, it's hard to understand how using simulated soldiers some of the time, instead of molded plastic ones, is supposed to be so harmful to imagination.

A brief update (er, if anyone is interested):

We discovered that my old Dell Latitude was not in such bad repair as first thought, and I have spent the better part of the previous evening and this morning reinstalling WinXP on it.

There is space on my desk for K to work directly next to me. So although it is a laptop (which will be convenient for travel), it will function essentially as a desktop for him, and I will be able to supervise easily.

My next step will be finding software to help manage his internet usage, as I expect that most of the software he will be using will be online. I want him to be able to access information on and pictures of trains and rabbits, his two favorite things, without accidentally stumbling onto something he can't unsee.

We liked kidzui by Firefox. Hard to install, easy to love. It only offers sites that have been pre-approved by parents and teachers by hand. It's google-like & even has YouTube access.

Eta: now days he just has his favorites tab and doesn't poke around anywhere else so we don't need kidzui. But it really helped introduce the computer.

Fabulous, thanks for the suggestion!

There is also a program called Zoodles that you can use. They cant get to websites other than the ones on there but my children love it. It does youtube (age appropriate) videos and pbs, and a several other websites with kids materials and if you pay for it you can say when, how long, and what characters you want your child to see.