Summer screen time

We’ve always been pretty restrictive of screen time for our kids. The first studies showing the ill effects of screen time were just coming out when my son was a baby, and TV has never become a part of our family’s life. We simply forget to turn it on.

Computers, however, are another thing altogether. My husband and I both work on computers, and our son was interested in programming from quite a young age. Our daughter mostly used the computer to send e-mail to Grandma and to watch Magic School Bus videos.

But this summer, something new happened: Minecraft.

For those of you not in the know, Minecraft is a cooperative game in which users get together in a “world” they build. The world is made of blocks, and after that, the rules and the point of the game are wholly determined by the players. I would never have given in except for the social aspect of it: the kids who were playing it were not only creating their own little society within the game — they were actually talking to each other outside of the game world.

This is a big thing, given that our son was having trouble connecting with other kids once he started homeschooling. All of a sudden he had a way in to their conversations.

Then the connection spread: Our daughter wanted to play, and for the first time in their lives, our kids were spending extended time playing — not fighting — together. It was really quite extraordinary.

But then we came right back to the screentime issue. My kids would have been happy spending their lovely summer inside, in a world where they can build houses from diamonds and if it becomes nighttime when they don’t want it to, they can just bring the sun back up.

I, however, would not have been happy. So I sat down with the kids, a bunch of colored markers, and a sheet of nice paper. At the top I wrote “To earn computer time, choose two.”

Then, I had the kids suggest non-computer activities that could earn them computer time. Here’s what they came up with (with just a few suggestions from me):

Playing piano
Play outside
Gardening
Clean room (requires parent sign-off)
Ride bike/scooter
Read
Cook
Hike to stream
Paint/art
Learn something new
Sing 4 songs (in a nice voice, with words, not to anger anyone, no poopie words)
Touch typing practice
1 full board game (no shortcuts)
Non-screen activity out of house
*Complaints cancel activity

Now, perhaps you don’t have a household that resembles the Supreme Court. Ours, however, makes the Supreme Court look like child’s play. So we had to add little notes and reasonable amounts of time to each activity to forestall the inevitable arguments.

The amazing thing is that it’s working. The other day, my son played piano in order to buy computer time. Afterwards he said to me with this amazed expression on his face, “That was fun!” Yeah, kids. You can have fun in the real world, not just in Minecraft. What a concept!

The great part of this is that along with the “Our Fun Summer” poster we always make, which has all of our summer goals on it, we can make sure that we get out and do things in the real world.

This week we had some of the kids they play Minecraft with online over for a party. One of the siblings professes to hate Minecraft, and I was commiserating with her that she didn’t have anyone to play with. “Why don’t you like Minecraft?” I asked her.

“Because it’s not real,” she said. “You spend all this time building something, but then it’s stuck inside the computer and you don’t have anything to show for all your work.”

Good point, kid. That’s why I like our contract. Along with Minecrafting, my kids have spent the summer playing with Legos, making music, taking photos, hiking in the woods, and helping me create a garden. Though not all of these activities has a tangible product, they are each valuable in their own way, and they balance the time my kids are spending inside their computer world, learning to get along.