Screen Smarts for Kids

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i started

the first children’s film festival in

the americas

and i worked with half a million

children over 30 plus years

i watched 1 000 kids films

every year in fact i’m pretty sure i

logged 16 000

viewing hours of children’s media but

about

20 years ago two pediatricians from the

american academy of pediatrics

came to one of my festivals they were

fascinated

by how i spoke to children before the

screening

and one of them said you’re changing

brain chemistry

around screen time well that changed

everything for me so i left my festivals

and i

started an organization to help

schools and parents implement what i had

learned

over 30 plus years

of watching screens with kids and more

importantly

listening to them talk

but here’s what we’re still up against

sixteen hundred hours a year with

screens and now

more needed for remote viewing thousands

of studies

linking screen time with obesity

bullying elevated aggression early porn

exposure

it’s a laundry list of everything we

don’t

want for our kids what i

learned over all my years working with

children’s festivals

is what we all need to do for

and with our children focus

on what to do before the screen

goes on you didn’t send your child to

the playground or to preschool

without some positive guidelines when it

comes to digital devices

to computers tablets smartphones

same rules the same values and courtesy

and kindness and caring

that we use in our families apply

to the way we use digital devices

so what i did was to create a program

that took everything i’d learned and i

brought it to schools

for teachers to train students and i

wrote a book

so parents could use these techniques at

home

in all my programs we prime

children’s minds before they start using

electronic screens

by doing this we are helping children to

be

mindful instead of mindless users

of technology we call it turning on the

mind before

turning on the screen so what do we do

there are two parts to the approach the

kinesthetic

physical part and the intellectual

academic part

you see children need to use their

physical bodies and

energy to learn and here’s why there’s a

lot of research

that shows physical exercise and

activity build brain function so

exercise is brain food you move more

you learn better so i created

a series of fun fast brain body

exercises

and micro movements that teachers and

parents

and kids can do anywhere

we always start with priming the mind

to turbo charge e-learning we tell kids

we’re going to use our energy and our

concentration to keep our minds awake

then we might pick up micro movements

isolation exercises

there’s an exercise called pallet

shell which is like yoga for the fingers

these kinesthetic physical parts of the

program

boost self-regulation and classroom

engagement

in only 30 to 60 seconds parents and

teachers can then go

right back to the lesson they’ve planned

these are

timely simple strategies that turn

remote

or real classrooms into dynamic learning

environments

the second part of the program is

intellectual

we take that elevated energy and focus

and use it to build social emotional and

academic learning

in an inquiry-based child-centered

approach

what we do is teach literacy emotional

intelligence and

higher order thinking through close

analysis of short story based

videos using a technique that we call

pause and question or p and q when we

pause

a video we’ll ask questions like

what do you think that character is

feeling right now

or is there any clue on that screen

that might tell you what the character

is feeling

so during pause and question we are

drilling down

into how children watch and helping them

understand what they’re feeling and

thinking

while they’re using technology when you

put

these two engines together the

kinesthetic brain body

part and the academic social emotional

learning part

you get true accelerated learning

and i know because i feel tested this

curriculum

for nine years with thousands of

children

in some of the most challenged schools

in chicago

i worked in schools where 100 percent of

kids

lived in families with incomes at the

federal poverty line

where 20 of children in a single

classroom are on the autism spectrum

or 40 languages were spoken among the

student body

the results never failed to astonish

in 2014 one principle came to

four sessions of the 12-week program

principles are busy so i asked her what

are you doing here i mean don’t you have

to run the school

she said it’s addictive

seeing how much these children are

learning

in such a short period of time

year after year the results

were so phenomenal that i can now say

we can close the achievement gap

using healthy tech habits to accelerate

learning

you see we’re just building on something

kids already love

they love screens they love media and if

we give them

a chance they love talking and thinking

about the ideas they have while they’re

using digital devices and here’s

why that’s so important first because it

empowers children

and gives them the feeling that what

they’re saying

matters and second because when children

talk about audio visual content and

make critical thinking connections they

are

learning to process that content

and they’re building better media

filters

ms frankie betts who was one of the most

loving and perceptive of the pre-k

teachers with whom we worked

said this program teaches children

to focus and think well

mizbetz inspired me because she echoed

anthropologist margaret mead who said

don’t

teach children what to think teach them

how to think and that is the greatest

gift we can give our children inspiring

them to love thinking and learning

you