I don’t know about you, but screen time has taken many forms, in my parenting life!

I’ve only been a parent 10 years so far, and my husband and I have four kids: aged 10, 8, 5 and 2. I have always felt strongly about having good boundaries around screen time, teaching good habits, modeling good habits ourselves and prioritizing other ways to spend our time: playing outside, exercising, seeing friends, taking care of our home and yard, exploring our community, etc. You may have already seen some of my other posts, on the tricky subject of kids and technology!

How Screen Time Looks in Homeschool

If you’re here reading this blog, you likely homeschool. We just finished up our third year of homeschooling, and I feel like our screen time strategies and struggles have taken many forms. Here are some of the things my husband and I have tried, in our search for “best practice” screen time in our family:

• Screen-free summer (we did this two years ago)
• A token system for earning screen time
• A family TV guide that we created, that simply stated what was on, when (think old-school TV guides we used to have, when we were little and couldn’t choose between hundreds of options!)
• Screen time allowed once all chores and schoolwork is completed (this is our simplest and most common go-to, during the school year)
• Using screen time as a tool, strategically, so that we can juggling multiple academic homeschooling needs and schedules
• Slightly more screen time allowed in winter months, during subzero temperatures (while still having some sort of outside time, each day)

Not All Screen Time Is The Same

Now obviously, not all “screen time” is the same. Each family does things differently. For example: in our homeschool, we do typing. This is, technically, screen time, because it is in front of a screen, using technology. We using typing.com, and it has been awesome. (You can read more about our elective choices in the curriculum reviews, here.)

I do not count typing time against my kids’ allotted screen time. If we watch an episode of World Watch News for current events or social studies, do a favorite drawing tutorial or watch educational clips on SafeShare, this does not count as their screen time, either.

Screen time, in our family, is a fun & relaxing time to watch a favorite show or movie together. Typically, it is a certain time of day, and while the kids watch a show, I either take downtime myself, or start dinner, a load of laundry, or another chore. It is a nice mental break.

Screen Time Challenge: Multiple Ages

Another challenge that presented itself in the past year or so, is that our kids span enough of an age range, that they don’t always want to watch the same types of shows anymore. My youngest (recently 2) isn’t involved in this, but my older three span in age from 5-10. Of course, the 10 year old son is not interested in the shows that my 5-year old son wants to watch. So, this results in sometimes splitting the screen time into two parts, and often my oldest watches his show at night, once the younger two are in bed. It’s always something!

Screen Time is A Privilege, Not A Right

I don’t want to be tyrannical about screen time, but, I also want my kids to appreciate it as a privilege, not a right. I don’t want them to become habitually grabbing the remote, (someday) running to their smart phone, TV or computer to self-medicate, or, when they’re older teens, “doom-scroll,” whenever they have a moment of boredom. This is where I have to put my money where my mouth is, and try to model what I expect from my kids, myself! I will never be perfect, but I hope I can present a healthy, balanced usage of screens, whether that be with my own smartphone, laptop, or TV-watching at night.

I want them to know that while they’re still children, screen time is a privilege, not a right. I want them to be free to be a kid, and have their default be to go play outside, or create something imaginative with MagnaTiles or Legos while they listen to their favorite audiobook. I don’t want watching TV to be their default activity. There are so many other things to do!

Our Screen Time Hack This Summer

So, the screen time hack I came up with this summer was a pre-set TV Guide, customized to our family’s favorites. You could do this many ways. You could whip up a little template on Google Slides, or a free Canva account, and plug in a few of your favorite shows. A few months ago, when this idea came to me, I simply opened a calendar template in Microsoft Word, then plugged in the names of shows we like, one week at a time. For example, the calendar may have McGee & Me for the show during weeks 1&2, and Wild Kratts for the show during weeks 3&4. You could also change up your show on a weekly basis, instead of bimonthly. Whatever works!

I also added in a “choice day” on Fridays, so that each kiddo could get to choose one day. Even my husband and I had a choice day! 🙂

What I found is that by creating a set show for the week, and posting it in the kitchen, there were significantly less fights about what to watch. We talked about the new plan at the dinner table, including the kids in the conversation and hearing their thoughts. I asked what a few of each of their favorite shows were, and we talked about how it’s important to compromise within a family. Then, I created a calendar template with a different show, each week. The template allows the decision to be made, the decision to be clear, and decision to have a set time limit. I chose one week, for each show.

Here is another option: use the snipping tool to grab thumbnails of an assortment of shows or movies, for the month. I have this hanging in the kitchen right now, and if anyone is ever stumped at what they’d like to watch, they can pick from this list.

(I went to our Disney+ account and, using this alphabetical list of choices, just started grabbing movies in alphabetical order.

This allows for a bit more choice than the calendar option, while still maintaining some order. One of my pet peeves was when my kids figured out that there were, quite literally, endless options for them to choose from. I didn’t really want them scrolling and scrolling through my phone each day, to pick which movie. I think less is more. Less options = less stress, and more peace. I wrote “May Movies” but I may keep this up for a few months, because we haven’t used it that many times yet. It’s a fun way to explore new movies we haven’t seen yet, and also cuts down so much on sibling squabbles regarding what to watch.

You can certainly do this however you want–you don’t even need to use the computer! You could grab a sheet of printer paper, or a large lined post-it note, and just write down the date and shows!

What screen time hacks do you use in your home? I’d love to hear!

Cait