ast year, The Royal Children’s Hospital
in Melbourne conducted a study asking
Australian parents about the impact of
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screen-based devises on their children.
The results were striking, reporting half of all
toddlers and preschoolers were using screen-based
devices without supervision and nearly all
Australian teenagers and most primary-school-age
children now have their own smart phones.
On average, parents reported that kids spend
over 32 hours a week on screens at home (not
including homework) and teens spent over 44
hours a week on screens.
There is no doubt that screen usage is a big part
of life for Australian families today, but there
is increasing evidence that this use is having
a detrimental impact on vision and eye health,
weight gain, sleep, and the mental health and
well being of children.
In the survey, parents reported almost half of
all Australian children use screens at night,
which has been linked to the causation of sleep
problems. Parents also reported that many
children were experiencing online bullying and
had decreased physical activity due to screen use.
Tech elites such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and
other Silicon Valley parents recognised the issues
surrounding excessive technology use early on,
and it is reported, seldom let their children use
the very technology they created.
By now, most parents are aware of the danger
that technology poses, and yet it is still one of the
hardest challenges of modern parenting.
We sat down with some of Pindara’s
Paediatricians from Leading Steps Paediatric
Clinic and discussed how they manage these
challenges with their own families.
Dr Eta Raicebe has two teenage boys, Dr
Annelise Wan has four boys aged between 2 and
11 years, Dr Dylan Wilson and Dr Catherine
Stewart have four children aged between 3
and 11 years, and Dr Victoria Matheson has 3
preschool age children.
How do you manage the time your children
spend on screens?
Dr Dylan Wilson, father of four children aged
between 3 and 11 years:
We have some family rules – no screen time
during the week, no screens in bedrooms or at the
dinner table and no social media accounts.
The older two children are allowed up to an hour
a day on the weekends depending on how much
physical activity they have done, and whether
they have done their homework. Usually on a
Sunday they will have been at Nippers for two
hours running on the beach and swimming in the
ocean so we don’t have an issue with the older
kids having an hour on a screen after that.
We encourage our kids to be busy, sporty, active
and outside a lot. We live in a street where
they play with the other kids for hours on the
weekends, so a bit of time on a screen here and
there seems reasonable, but we don’t let it get out
of hand and set strict time limits.
Dr Annelise Wan, mother to four boys aged
between 2 and 11 years:
We have a family media plan – no screen time
during the week, no screens in the bedroom or
at the dinner table, no surfing the net randomly
and no social media accounts like Facebook or
Instagram.
We set aside time over the weekend for recreational
screen time for the older two boys, usually for an
hour when the younger ones are asleep.
We include the older ones in the decision making
process by asking them how long they want to
play for and then we agree on a time. I give them a
five-minute warning when time is up and that’s it.
Dr Victoria Matheson, mother to three children
under 5:
My children are still young so they don’t use any
screen-based devices but they do watch one hour
of children’s television a day, and we enjoy a
family movie together on the weekend. The kids
have never been allowed to play with our mobile
phones. If the children are too restless while we
are out doing something like eating a meal we
will leave, rather than pull out a phone or device.
Dr Eta Raicebe, mother to two teenage boys:
Our teenage boys are very much encouraged to
be part of the decision making process about
our rules around screen time and devices. Since
they were tiny we’ve had a rule around no
screen time during the school term except for
homework. This year they agreed that this is a
good rule to keep.
The boys look forward to using either their
computer, PlayStation or watching a movie for
two hours on the weekends. We like to watch a
movie together, but inevitably these days they
want to watch a rugby match instead.
pindaramagazine.com.au Pindara Magazine 53