Not that I'm planning on having a baby anytime soon, but an article by Jeana Lee Tahnk about her kids growing up on technology caught my attention. It's an issue that's extremely relevant today, and something most of us will be having to deal with at some point in the future.
Learning how to be a parent is already hard enough. There are so many questions and decisions to be made, so many different pieces of advice to consider, and way too many options. It all seems pretty overwhelming. It's a scary thought that this little person's health and well-being depends on you, so naturally (I would hope), you would want to do everything that is best for them. Well, now, we have another big decision to make: how much access to technology we will give them. It's already become normal for very young kids to have their own cell phones and laptops; I didn't even get a phone until eighth grade and it was only because we had all five of the kids in my family going to different schools at that point, so my stepmom needed to know where and when to pick us all up from wherever the heck we were. I still don't know how she did it. The point is, how do we know if bringing our children up on technology will significantly effect their development?
I'm not saying technology will poison their minds, but it is worth considering how much they will appreciate the more natural and basic things in life. To a certain extent, change is inevitable; our generation had much different childhoods than our parents and grandparents because we were exposed to new technological advancements. And I fully expect that to be the case for our children as well. I just hope that by the time our generation is having our own children, technology has not infiltrated our society so much that our kids become glued to a screen before they can even walk.You see teenagers walking around today and every one of them is on their phone, looking like a pack of zombies. I don't want that to be my kid, though. I don't want a zombie baby. Is that too much to ask?
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