Too Much Tech: A Family Experiment

Does anyone else love technology and the parts of our lives that it makes easier? I know I do. I have read about people that ditch their microwave or delete all the apps off their phones, and this is great. I just don’t think my family is quite there yet. Yesterday we had a “clean out the fridge” night for dinner where everyone made their own plate of leftovers and the microwave was the star of the show!  And life without google maps, might literally mean I could never go anywhere new!  As a family, we have drastically cut down on the TV being on. Our family of five might turn the TV on twice a week, and it’s not something we even have to talk to the kids about much anymore. Personally, I’ve learned to embrace quiet or listen to music if I need noise, but yet, screen time has become a discussion at our house at least weekly.  It’s not TV time, it’s phone time.  My husband and I feel that the kids are on their phones too much, and we also feel that they don’t have the skills to successfully and safely manage social media completely. Plus, truth be told, my husband and I probably spend more time on our phones than we’d like to admit.  So the idea of “Tech Free Tuesday” was born. Step one to implementing some tech free time was discussing it.  When we brought up the idea of “Tech Free Tuesday” our middle daughter was excited about it.  She liked the idea of coming together as a family for games or dance-offs (both of which we’ve now done) and our older daughter was a little more resistant. For reference they are 11 and 13. The thought of giving up her phone for an entire evening was different and not something her friends were doing.  She’d be out of touch!  We discussed what the rules might be…will this just be phones, TVs too?, what about the radio?  Will there be any time for tech like 30 mins?  Then once we all decided on the rules, we decided when to start.  I’ll come back to let you know how it’s been going! 

Here are the rules we decided on:
Rules: No TV (including DVDs), No phone from 5:00 on, pandora streaming is allowed over speakers for all to hear (no headphones), recipes can be used off the internet for cooking dinner or meal prep, computers can be used for homework only.

We have been doing Tech Free Tuesday for about 6+ weeks now! To see how it’s going click here and read our update!
https://typeaeverything.com/too-much-tech-a-family-experiment-update/