Screens...for my child's sake?

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Earlier this year we went over the evaluation results for my son with the doctor. He listed, among other things, that my son would benefit from playing Mario Kart to help with working memory and executive functioning skills. I laughed out loud at this. The paradigm shift I have experienced as a mother, and a homeschooler, around screens, has been a journey. 

I would like to share that journey with you.

As soon as I began homeschooling, I picked up on certain things that were taboo within the community. Screens were one of them. I heard in all the noise that screens were bad, and I was sold. My husband was quick to tell me we weren’t going to get rid of screens (be thankful if you have a Gilbert who balances out your Anne), so as our family grew by two more children I implemented a variety of rules over the years: no screens unless Dad is home, no screens unless it’s the weekend, no screens until I make dinner, earn screens with these tickets, only so many hours of screen time a week, etc. It was exhausting.

Some years ago, I began to loosen my grasp on screen time out of necessity and frankly, weariness, and I found my son was better able to regulate his body and emotions, as well as some other positive changes in our home. I was intrigued. I spent years pushing more outside time in hopes of helping him regulate, as a “good” mom does, but it almost always resulted in triggering his fight/flight/freeze response, increasing his anxiety, and causing a panic attack. It just wasn’t worth it. Nature study and hikes are a big part of our family culture, we practically spend our short summers in the garden, but to try to aim for more random hours spent outside? There’s a lot of pressure out there, a lot of noble pursuits, but his born person doesn’t work that way.

I have learned that some children with nervous system disabilities need one of four things at all times in order to remain regulated: another calm nervous system (this is co-regulation), novelty (a new or rare activity or place to visit), a special interest or flow activity (my son loves anything having to do with space, for example), or screens. When I learned this about my son, I had to ask myself some important questions:

If screens are not a part of his large room, am I really teaching him how to live?

Am I hindering and offending his born person by refusing screens?

Screens help my son’s nervous system. There is a lot he carries I just can’t know the fullness of, so I began to let my son have screens when he asked for them (which wasn’t as often as I expected, and I believe this is due to the perks of a liberal education). I kept a log of his behavior before and after screen time, noted the frequency of difficulties, and tracked if this negatively impacted his lessons.

What I noted surprised me and went against everything I had spent years believing about screen time. First, there was more peace in my home. Not only was I no longer running around like a crazy person trying to control screens, but my son had notably fewer anxieties. Beyond that, his attention and effort in our lessons increased drastically. A child can’t learn if the nervous system isn’t regulated, and that extra help, invisible to me, was allowing him to thrive. Grateful for these gifts, I looked at steps I could take to embrace screens “for my child’s sake.”

For example, we start our days with screens: World Watch News at breakfast. Mornings are high stress. There are a lot of decisions with a new day. Making these decisions, whether that’s choosing a shirt to wear, or even deciding to get out of bed in the first place, can create a lot of anxiety and dysregulation. The simple use of screens during breakfast has helped him to have a better start to our day. Complete resistance has melted into cooperation. Screens help us to have smooth(er) and eas(ier) days.

We’ve also started a special Minecraft world just for his lessons. I enter into his world, and we add creations to it from the books we’ve read. We’ve added Diamond’s hayloft bed from At The Back of The North Wind complete with a hole in the wall for the wind to get through. We added a pin floating on the top of a body of water after we did an experiment from A Drop of Water. We added a circus tent and pirate ship after reading about them in other books. I’ve noticed he comes alive with narrating when we spend time in his Minecraft world; details he didn’t orally narrate to me pop up in his creations. I am getting to know this born person afresh, and it has been a source of wonder and joy for me as I’ve learned to let some things go.

If I could visit with Miss Mason about this modern world, I would ask her what she would say about screens in our homes. I wonder if she would say we need to introduce them to the children as part of their “large room.” Rooted in relationships, being part of the child’s world of “books and things,” technology can be a vital aspect of teaching our children to learn how to live–even if you don’t have a child with special needs.

I’ve learned there isn’t just “one” way, and there isn’t a “best” way. I’ve learned (the hard way) this ignores Charlotte Mason’s first principle. Miss Mason believed in mothers, and I know that she called us to be thinking mothers. This thinking process has taken me many years to wrestle through. There are ideals, but then we have our realities. It is a humbling process and one that we need to champion other moms through.

There is no shame in wrestling with an idea and changing your mind about something despite all the noise. There is no shame when your child is thriving, and there is peace in your home. There is no shame when you “mix it with brains” and find you are Surprised by Screens.

Mariah Kochis 2023