Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy I was chastised by the principal today

OOoooo-- yeah, classic no-win situation. It's not really all that important that you win this particular point, right?

If it seems that the principal has "the wrong idea" about your house AUP/screen time rules, by all means pleasantly mention that to him/her.

But, you know, casually... as in, in the context of some other matter.

Thank you so much for taking the time to share your thoughts with me the other day. I later considered why I was puzzled by your observations, and realized that you must have misunderstood; we already do __________. Just didn't want you to think that {child} spends all of his/her time in front of a screen-- nothing could be further from the truth! Again, I really appreciate your willingness to share your insights with us.

That sounds like parenting advice, not curricular advice. And, unless your principal is a gifted specialist, he's out of his depth on the latter, too. I wouldn't sweat it. Having an opinion doesn't necessarily mean it's an informed opinion.

Maybe he should gently be reminded of that if ever he chooses to cross the line into Conjectureland again.

I agree, casually slip it in. He deserves a wringing out, but you don't want the backlash

Re: your original concern, it seems to me the obsession is going to be self-limiting. How long till he finishes Dreambox -- a few months? It's not like this is a long-term lifestyle choice that has sucked up his entire childhood.

As for the principal, I wonder if he is feeling territorial, along the lines of "don't try to teach your kid, that's our job, you'll do it all wrong." (A position I find laughable given the general success of homeschooling, but a lot of professional educators hold it.) But he didn't want to come out and say it, so he fell back on the "too much screen time" trope. So, another reason not get into this with him. If I'm right, any attempt to address what he said (e.g. "this is a parenting issue, not an educational one") won't accomplish anything, because what he said is not what he meant.

Dbat: reading on an electronic device shouldn't count as "screen time." And that doesn't just mean e-readers, it means reading a newspaper on the web, or browsing Wikipedia, or anything else where you're basically just reading. Your brain is processing written text, which is very different from interacting with the three-dimensional world, but which our culture has agreed is extremely important and worth the time investment.

In contrast, the negative effects of "screen-time" are about the effects of watching video rather than watching (and interacting with) events in the real 3D world; and "playing" in a 2D screen-based environment (e.g. video games) rather than spending valuable childhood play-time manipulating real 3D objects and moving your body around.

Hmm, interesting perspective, and definitely plausible.

My take is the principal made two errors... jumping to the conclusion that the kid is getting "too much" screen time, as mentioned already, but also reacting to Dreambox as a threat, because he knows that the further your DS progresses in math on his own, the more problems it'll cause him to try to meet DS's level. So, he chose to "advise" you on what's easiest for him... unplug DS so he stops learning.

Even if you clear up the rushed conclusion, you still have no interest in helping the principal out of his problem, and he's still going to be upset about it, so I don't see how revisiting the issue is likely to be productive.

Just my take.

A caveat to this, which I don't believe is applicable to e-readers: there is convincing research showing that the strong blue-spectrum light emitted by screens disrupts sleep cycles. Even if they're reading text, I would keep kids (and I try to keep myself) away from computer screens in the hour or two before bed. Eye strain can also be an issue.

Speaking personally, I don't find that reading online has the same immersive and relaxing effect as reading a book. It's too jumpy and manic, with hyperlinks and so on. Ereaders count as books the way I use them, though (which is...to read books only).

Yes-- there IS a difference, evidently, between e-ink and the same text on a computer screen. They're not exactly equivalent in the human brain, for reasons that aren't terribly clear to me.

I think that MegMeg's and Dude's explanations here are quite insightful.

I totally agree. I would just leave it alone, but in future conversations with the principal, mention casually how much fun my son had while hiking or climbing or whatever. In fact, I would probably mention some outdoorsy type of activities in any conversation with the principal in a very upbeat manner. If he has a clue, he will probably back off. But then, I am passive-aggressive when it comes to people like this principal.

This was actually my first thought, after getting a lille POed of course. I figure that he was not at all happy when he saw where DS was and addressing screen time/my parenting was a good way of skirting the actual issue. DS learning is a result of MY bad parenting rather than an actual concern that he was going to have to deal with.

I do think that I am not going to follow it up at the moment but will be very aware of this tactic in the future.