Last year around this time, the little babe and I made peanut butter and bird seed pinecones to feed the birds and squirrels. She loved watching the squirrels that sat in the tree only three feet away from her. (And so did the cats.) In Springtime we stopped filling the feeders, but since it has been so cold and there seems to be a lot of bird activity already (even though it is still in the single digits), I decided it would be fun to get some birdseed again. The wildlife show started almost immediately and the little babe was the first one to see the bright red Cardinal. She now knows the difference between a male and female Cardinal, which she calls a boy and a "gurl". Now that she can talk, putting together 2 and 3 word phrases, she can make us aware of the many things that she sees before we do!
She loves watching the "tweety birds" outside the bedroom window and she lets me know how many are on the nests or up in the shed roof eaves. The other day she spotted a robin in the middle of the yard - the first one of the season! She is always watching the sky when we're outside and loves seeing airplane contrails. She is normally the first one to notice the moon if we are outside in the evening. She knows that when the sun goes down, the owls come out to look for mice.
My point of sharing this is not to brag as a proud parent (although I am of course), but to wonder whether she would know all of this if she had as much "screen time" as a lot of toddlers do. Can you learn and have something make as much of a lasting impression when you are learning it by staring at a screen? Just last week we moved the television upstairs into the attic. We haven't had cable for two years now and we recently canceled our Netflix subscription because it was a waste of money since we never had time to watch anything. I know that some parents think that children learn things by watching television or educational shows on a computer or ipad. But even if they are playing an "interactive" game, they still aren't "active". They are still sitting, probably inside, staring at a screen. I guess you could argue the same thing about reading, but in order to get something out of a book, you have to actually "activate" your brain. Staring at a screen filled with bright moving objects doesn't take much brain activity.
While actual learning from reading, either a book or on a computer IS definitely important, sometimes it is the actual experience that is just as important. I think the seeing, hearing, feeling, touching, tasting that occurs with actual real life experiences are something that a lot of kids miss out on today.
I know that it is easier to cultivate a healthy relationship with technology for a toddler who is a blank slate rather than to have to "cut the cord" or severely reduce an older child's desire for/dependence on screen time. Over at Maxabella Loves, she has been reducing the amount of screen time that her school aged children have and is blogging about the "why" and the "how". She has a MUCH bigger reader audience than I do, so I am pumped that she is spreading the word about this issue which I think is so important.
I don't think I'm going to miss that television and I don't think my little babe will be missing anything important on it either.