04/05/2026
Most advice on the internet will tell you screen time is bad.
But the reality is, screens are part of our everyday lives. We’re on our phones, working on laptops, watching something at the end of the day. Kids see that, and of course they want to be part of it too.
So the goal isn’t to eliminate screens completely. It’s to be a little more intentional about how they show up.
A good place to start is deciding when screen time happens, before your child asks for it. Maybe it’s after dinner, or a fixed 20–30 minutes in the day. When it’s predictable, it stops becoming something they ask for all the time.
It also helps to not let screens become the first solution for everything. If boredom, mealtimes, and meltdowns all lead to a screen, it quickly becomes the only thing that works.
And when you say no, it’s okay if they’re upset. That doesn’t mean you’re being too strict. It just means you’re holding a boundary.
Over time, what you’re building is simple: screens are something we use on purpose, not something we reach for automatically.