Smartphones, smart parents

This editorial was written by the chicago tribune.

Parents of preteens know the dismay that comes with this image: kids flopped on the couch for stretches of time, silent and mesmerized by smartphones — oblivious to an outside world that beckons with all things tangible and sunny: a pool, a baseball diamond, a bike ride.

The things that lure kids into their own walled-off worlds have evolved over the years: Pac-man in the ’80s, Nintendo in the ’90s. Today, it’s a smartphone that at times can seem like the Pacific Ocean between you and your children. Recently, a backlash against the trend has burgeoned in the form of Wait Until 8th, a movement that encourages parents to hold off on giving their children smartphones until the eighth grade.

There’s a need for children who haven’t reached their teen years to have phones for communication and safety reasons, but the group stresses that major cellular service carriers offer basic packages for calls and texts — without data plans. “Smartphones are distracting, dangerous and detrimental for children, yet are widespread in elementary and middle school because of unrealistic social pressure and expectations to have one,” the group’s website declares.

OK, we feel your pain, Wait Until 8th. But we think there’s a better way to look at this. Kids still bond in playgrounds, school hallways and backyards, but smartphones have changed the way we socialize. Kids now connect digitally. It’s a reality parents can’t ignore.

But it’s also a reality parents don’t have to accept unconditionally. Being a parent means being proactive about everything, and that includes being attentive stewards of their kids’ use of smartphones.

What matters is being engaged enough in your kids’ use of the phone to know if, when — and how — it becomes a problem.