This comes up a lot. Short answer: Screen Time isn’t the best measurement, and enforcing it isn’t the best solution. What matters is the process - what can you teach your kid? how can they learn to make good screen time decisions?
The goal is self-regulation, to help kids make good screen time decisions on their own.
Because “a teacher is one who makes himself progressively unnecessary.”
It’s a life skill.
Screen Time isn’t the best measurement because it mixes together:
- healthy screen time (learning, using maps, listening to music for example) and
- unhealthy screen time (gaming at night, interruptions during learning or playing). Data doesn’t matter as much as process.
How can you teach them / empower them to make good screen time decisions?
What tools and rituals can you put in place to guide them?
Agree to review this together with your child regularly. Set up a routine.
Open up: does this feel right? what else could we have done with our time?
Regular screen time limits on iPhone or Android work, or use an app for stricter enforcement.
The process still matters here: agree and commit, but also review together when needed.
Just like any other activity, schedules help the child learn how to organize their days to get things done.
With the Opal app, you can create your child’s schedules to block apps.
Start with training wheels. Regularly check in, look at screen time data, and make suggestions. You can enforce limits yourself to start.
Listen to your child, adapt, and see progress. When confident, remove the training wheels.
All of these also apply to adults, by the way. Teaching is the best way to learn, as they say. You can download the Opal all on http://opal.so to measure and improve your focus each day, set app restrictions, and more.