The Benefits of Digital Play & How Parents Can Encourage Productive Screen Time
Whatever your opinions on screen time may be, there’s no doubt that smartphones, tablets and other devices will play a role in every child’s development across the digital age. As a parent, it’s your job to regulate your child’s screen time and make sure that all the hours they spend tapping away at a screen in their earlier years is as productive as possible.
Thankfully, there are plenty of ways to ensure that your children’s digital play is more curious and less mindless and ultimately has a positive impact on their overall development. In this article, we’ll go over some key benefits of letting your kids use devices and how you can make sure that they make the most out of their screen time.
Boost Creativity With Fun Tailored Activities
It’s impossible (and probably unhealthy) to completely deprive your child of any screen time. As a parent, however, it’s your job to make sure that this screen time is as constructive as possible. Among the best ways of doing this is by leading by example and using technology to create your own fun activities for your kids. With the help of tools that let you edit images online and make other changes to digital files, you can create fun screen-based activities for toddlers that also gets your kids interested in the creative potential of technologies from a younger age.
One example of an activity that’s suitable for children of any age is colouring. You can purchase digital colouring books or even draw your own images using apps like Procreate. Then, simply export your black and white images into a kid-friendly paint platform where your little ones can spend their time colouring in their own personalised drawings. Alongside providing hours of entertainment, working with a stylus or Apple Pencil to colour can also be great for building up fine motor skills in toddlers.
Another fun activity is ‘I Spy,’ where children need to pick out certain objects in a picture. Using photo editing software, creative parents can create highly detailed images that your kids can then zoom in and out of to find specially hidden objects. Once again, this activity aids in developing fine motor skills, and may even help build pattern recognition skills in younger children.
Encourage Digital Reading
Most digital devices are incredibly versatile. Besides being used for games and videos, they can also be used to contain a vast number of educational books, which are essential for early childhood development. Besides helping your kids succeed in school early on, teaching them to read also carries benefits like enhancing language skills, building cognitive abilities and encouraging empathy.
While buying physical books for your kids is an option, this can get expensive, especially if your little one is a voracious reader. Real-life books also take up plenty of shelf space and can be difficult to lug around when travelling. Ebooks are the solution to this. Moreover, many virtual books are interactive, which combines the best aspects of educational video games with traditional reading.
Reading is a skill that lasts a lifetime, and it’s never too early to learn. Load your kids’ devices with a variety of educational books to turbocharge their cognitive development.
Set Limits on Digital ‘Play’
While technology provides plenty of developmental benefits for small children, it also has plenty of harmful effects. Staring at a screen 24/7 can harm the eyesight of your kids and leave them little time to develop other skills. Moreover, it can also lead to their becoming addicted.
To ensure that you’re raising a balanced, well-adjusted child, it’s important to strike a balance between exposing them to technology and helping them learn other skills. This involves managing screen time where children are using their devices recreationally rather than educationally. Set a limit for how many hours your kids can use tablets and other devices. This limit may differ depending on whether it’s a weekday or a weekend, but it’s essential to be firm with your rules. There are many apps out there that can help you enforce these time limits.
Digital play can be extremely beneficial for kids, but only in moderation. Set a boundary on your children’s screen time to help them make the most of their devices without cultivating an addiction.
Foster Problem-Solving With Learning Games
While many parents see video games as a waste of time, they actually carry many key benefits when done in moderation. Among the most important of these is that they help kids become better problem solvers.
Almost all video games provide cognitive benefits. A life simulation game, for example, can teach your child how to act in various social situations, while a puzzle game can improve spatial reasoning. By downloading some child-friendly games on your little one’s devices, you can help them foster certain useful skills.
Of course, it goes without saying that not all video games are appropriate for small children, so make sure to read the reviews before allowing your kids to play certain games. We also recommend playing the game yourself so you can pick up on unwanted content. You should also limit the amount of time your kids spend on games. Any activity can become an unhealthy addiction, no matter how educational it is.
Revolutionise your Child’s Relationship with Technology
Screen time is a controversial topic among parents. While some are wary about exposing their kids to digital devices, others see tremendous value in allowing some level of digital play. In our view, exposing your kids to technology from an early age can be extremely beneficial for their early development. However, it’s also important to regulate screen time and monitor the sort of content they’re exposed to in order to avoid some of the pitfalls of digital play.
In this article, we’ve gone over some of the key benefits of digital play and some ways you can encourage productive screen time. Incorporate these strategies today to make sure your kids grow up healthy and well-adjusted in an increasingly digital world.
