By Pareli Amirkhanian
Almost everywhere you look: heads are down, backs are crooked, and eyes are gazed
upon phones, iPads, tablets, or any another device.
Technology use for entertainment purposes are taking over the world, and sadly taking over children as well.
It is a dangerous and scary generation for children in their growing and developing ages.
As I observe parents trying to give their kids a hobby while trying to get things done, it almost always consists of some sort of technological device.
Entertainment is now solely being relied on technology.
The way children are raised are how they continue to live; give a child an iPad and television all day, they will grow into adolescence consumed in media. Give a child books to read or outdoor activities to do, they will continue into adolescence balanced with necessary hobbies.
Now, I’m not saying technology is a bad thing; I think that it is a great tool and something that has changed lives for the better as it has improved over the years.
However, balance and time management is a necessity when dealing with the new world of technology and that is the skill many teens, adults, and children seem to lack.
According to techaddiction, in a typical day, children consume over three hours of media, while reading is less than 20 minutes per day.
There is no question that children growing up this way are going to have sufficient decrease in real-life activities and will moreover be consumed in media and technology.
It’s troubling to see the dramatic change over the years as regular childhood habits seem to have deteriorated.
According to parenting.com, children ages 8-10 spend about five and a half hours each day using media, and are actually exposed to an alarming eight hours a day because they are media multitasking, such as watching a television show while playing video games.
An eight year old spending eight hours a day in front of a screen? If that’s not one of the scariest reality regarding children’s technology use, I’m not sure what is.
Has spending time with friends, riding bikes, or going to parks as an eight year old disappeared?
Not only that, but babies are now being added to the equation as well. 25% of children under the age of five use the internet; 80% of them doing so at least once a week. By age three, a quarter of these children go online daily.
The extent of technology and media progressing as the years go by is drastically changing lives of young children and pushing them towards a media-consumed life, which can lead to future problems of laziness and lack of interest in necessary life activities such as school work or improvement of one’s self emotionally or physically.
Excess technology usage needs to be managed and given attention to or else negative impacts are going to follow lives of children and future generations to come.
