how much time is the right amount of time?

{3 minutes to read} Co-parenting after divorce is most successful if you can agree with your former spouse on similar rules regarding your children’s activities and schedules. If you can also align your expectations on issues such as school and homework, meals and bedtimes, and extracurricular activities, your children will adjust more easily as they navigate from one home to another.

One of the questions that seem to come up most frequently in this Covid era is the usage of electronic devices aside from the time children spend online for school. How much time should they spend:

Playing games on their tablets,
FaceTiming with friends,
Creating videos on TikTok,
Watching movies, and
Accessing the list of communication and entertainment modes that are made available to our children — which many of us may still not even know about?

How much time is the right amount of time?

Of all the issues discussed by separating parents regarding their children’s schedules, the use of electronic devices is high on their list and often causes friction between them. When our children are confined because of a pandemic; when they have fewer opportunities to socialize in person and to attend their extracurricular activities, how do we regulate their time online?

The truth is that no one gave us a user manual. We are all in this together and trying to figure out what to do and what is best for the children. Here are some suggestions which may help you come up with a set of guidelines:

Check with other parents as to how they are managing their children’s online time.
Make a list of the sites that your children may be signing into.
Keep a list of the passwords so you can access their sites and monitor their activities.
Give your children some rules as to the amount of time they can spend on their devices.
Adjust the rules to fit the ages of your children.
Encourage other activities such as reading, playing cards, board games, cooking, and getting outdoors as much as possible.

Whereas in the past, many parents would put strict limits on their children’s use of the internet since the beginning of the pandemic we have all come to realize that some flexibility is warranted. Finding the balance between time spent online and offline is challenging for adults and children alike.

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Jennifer Safian

jennifer safian. divorce and family mediator
divorce and family mediation
upper east side of manhattan (nyc)
new york, ny
(917) 881 5206
jpsafian@gmail.com