Parents urged to limit children’s screen time

TORONTO Vanessa Lewis couldn’t imagine watching her kids grow up bombarded by digital screens — so she effectively banned the technology from their sight.

Making a pact with her husband, the couple decided even talking on a smartphone in the vicinity of their infant twins was unacceptable.

“If we needed to use our phones, we would leave the room,” the Toronto mother says.

While it wasn’t always easy, Lewis says banishing TV, tablets and phones was rewarding for her family. Now almost four years old, her boys spend more time playing outside and reading books instead of staring blankly at screens.

New guidelines released Thursday by the Canadian Paediatric Society suggest Lewis is on the right track. The organization issued its first stand-alone recommendations for how much time children aged five and under should spend in front of a screen.

Among the Canadian guidelines is a reaffirmation of their past statement that kids younger than two years old should completely avoid screen time. The overall sentiment leans toward not only limiting screen time, but in some cases eliminating it all together.

Dr. Michelle Ponti of the Canadian Paediatric Society found that introducing screens at such an early age is unnecessary.

Ponti suggests parents start making a “family media plan” even before their child is born, outlining when, where and how screens may be used.

Canadian and U.S. guidelines both recommend toddlers aged two to five should watch no more than an hour of screen time per day — and turn off screens at least an hour before bedtime. Programs should be chosen with specific educational goals to encourage language and literacy development.