Strategies for managing screen time and digital technology use

Screen time and digital technology use can be part of a healthy lifestyle for teenagers when they balance these things with other activities.

Strategies for managing screen time can help your teenage child and your family achieve a healthy approach to screen time and digital technology use. These strategies might include:

• family rules
• routines
• sessions
• choices.

Your choices about screen time and digital technology use influence the way your child uses screens. By using digital technology in healthy, balanced ways, you can be a role model for healthy screen habits.

Family rules for screen time and digital technology use

Family rules about screen time and digital technology use can help your child understand your family’s limits and expectations. It’s a good idea for you and your child to work together on developing and reviewing the family rules. These shared rules could even become a family agreement that you both sign.

These questions can help you and your child discuss and negotiate screen time:

• How will you treat different kinds of screen time? For example, will you have different rules for passive use like watching TV shows, interactive use like gaming, and productive use like creating a podcast? Or will you have one rule for schoolwork and one for every other use?
• When can your child use digital technology? For example, when they’ve completed chores and done some physical activity, but not during mealtimes or not late at night?
• Where can your child use devices? For example, in family rooms but not bedrooms? What about in the car or while visiting other people’s homes?

Making the rules
It’s important to involve everyone when you’re developing family rules about screen time. The rules also need to reflect the different types of screen time and your child’s changing needs and interests.

It’s a good idea to revisit the rules and guidelines every few months or whenever you introduce a new device into your home.

Commitment to the rules
If gentle reminders aren’t enough, you might need to talk with your child about how you can help them to follow your family rules.

Difficulty following the rules
Sometimes your child might not follow the rules you’ve negotiated and agreed on. For example, your child might use their phone late at night after they’ve agreed on an earlier screen curfew. In this situation, you could try a strategy like loss of privilege. For example, you might agree with your child that the consequence for using their phone late at night is that they’ll have to give up their phone for the next 2 nights.

Routines for screen time and digital technology use

Routines help family members know what to do, when and how often. This means routines can help you build screen time and digital technology use into your family life in a healthy and balanced way.

For example, if you want to put time limits on screen time, you can make this part of a routine. For example, your child can watch TV or use the Xbox but only after they’ve finished homework and practised the guitar.

Routines can also help you minimise conflict about screen time. For example, if Friday night is an agreed tech-free family night, you can avoid any arguments about whether you or your children can use the PlayStation, check Instagram or watch YouTube.

Screen time sessions

Your child might find it hard to stop using screens, especially if they’re online with friends, trying to complete a level or just having a good time. The idea of a ‘session’ with an endpoint and set boundaries can make it easier for your child to monitor and limit screen time and digital technology use by themselves.

Here are tips:

• Agree on what your child will be doing. For example, ‘You’re going to use the tablet to work out how to do that skate trick, but you’re not going to scroll through skate videos’.
• Agree on the length of the screen time session before the session starts. Your child will be more likely to cooperate when it’s time to stop. For example, ‘How long will it take you to finish the level? OK, let’s agree you’ll finish up in half an hour’.
• Give your child a warning when it’s almost time to stop. For example, ‘Jasprit, we agreed half an hour. You’ve got 10 minutes left’.
• Give your child time to save or finish what they’re doing. You might say, ‘Hana, it’s time to save what you’re doing. You need to finish up in 5 minutes’.

Some streaming services play the next episode or show automatically. This can make it very easy for your child to binge-watch content. Check your service to see whether you can switch off this feature.

Choices about digital technology use

Encouraging your child to make choices about screen time and digital technology use has several benefits. For example, it:

• helps your child become a responsible digital citizen
• gives your child the chance to practise managing screen time independently
• helps your child develop long-lasting healthy screen use habits
• makes it more likely your child will follow your family’s screen time rules.

You could encourage your child to make choices about things like the following:

• When to play online – for example, ‘Why don’t you finish one piece of homework before you play NBA 2K for half an hour? Or you can play for an hour if you finish all your homework first, and it’s not too late’.
• What to watch or do – for example, ‘Why don’t you work on your podcast rather than scrolling through Instagram?’
• When to have breaks – for example, ‘You’ve been sitting still for a while. What do you want to do, go for a short walk, shoot some hoops or do some stretches?’ or ‘Do you want to set your timer, or would you like me to remind you to take a break?’

You can also encourage your child to make choices about screen time based on quality. Here are ideas:

• Talk with your child about good apps, games, TV, movies and social media videos.
• Play a game or watch a TV program with your child, and talk about why it’s good quality or poor quality.
• Ask your child whether they think they’re making good choices about their screen use – why or why not?

Encourage your child to avoid games that simulate gambling, have casino themes, betting activities or risk-and-reward activities, or use fake money or tokens. Games with gambling themes and activities might lead to gambling in adulthood.