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Parent guilt source no.104: Screen time
Parents are having to put their kids in front of the screen because of a lack of wraparound care, says a new survey. It’s yet another source of parental guilt…
How many of us are working after picking up kids from school and feeling guilty that they are spending way too long on screens?
Guilt about children’s screen time is definitely an issue for me and there is rarely a week that passes that I don’t have a ‘conversation’ with my son about wellbeing and screen time [this is generally greeted with a grunt. Indeed I’m often not sure if he takes out the ear pods to listen…]. I also pop in every so often to get him to do something else, such as read a book or play guitar. The most successful tactic, however, has been food-based. He loves to cook and can spend hours in the kitchen, away from the computer…
Sometimes I do note how hypocritical I am being banging on about health and screentime when I am so tied to my own screen. I do try and justify this in terms of earnings, but he plays the GCSE trump card [although I’m not sure he’s doing many studies on the computer…]
Anyway, a study out today shows that this struggle with screen time after school is a fairly widespread phenomenon, due in part to a shortage of wraparound childcare, particularly for younger children who don’t have the GCSE excuse.
The polling by Koru Kids found that almost a third (29%) of mums and dads have a problem accessing the wraparound care they need because either it is full, or the school doesn’t offer the option at all. And of those who do have access, 88% have issues with the provision available, with half (50%) struggling to afford it and two-fifths (40%) saying the days and hours offered aren’t flexible enough.
Koru Kids says this leaves more than a third (35%) of parents forced to have their children at home with them while they attempt to work. Such is the pressure felt by working parents that a third of mums and dads have increased the amount of screentime their children are allowed, just so they can work more hours.
It calculates that children not in afterschool clubs spend half of their time (1.5 hours on average) between 3pm – 6pm on a screen or device. This can lead to sleep problems and irritability. On the parent side, a fifth of parents (22%) worry their child believes they prioritise work over spending time with them.
As I work mainly from home and have done for years, I try to make the point that work is a means to an end, while attempting to show that I enjoy my work too. It’s a hard juggling act to pull off, particularly when technology challenges abound, but I trust that in the fullness of time, perhaps if they have kids, that my children will realise that there are no easy solutions, that the choices, if you have any, should not be so hard for parents and that the world needs to change to make work more flexible and childcare infrastructure both affordable and accessible.
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