Expert Tips for Managing Kids' Screen Time This Summer

Who are you and what do you do at YouTube? >> Garth Graham. I'm a physician and I am in charge of uh YouTube health. >> Summer is just around the corner and for many parents that means the annual stress, maybe the tough conversations around managing screen time for the kids. >> Yeah, I mean I I would say this is uh major challenges for families not just the United States, you know, across the world. And you know,

there's a couple of things. Um one, you know, um uh teenagers are, you know, wrestling with their own uh independence and managing their own time. Uh you know, families um uh parents um are wanting to make sure that teenagers are using their time uh constructively. Um and so, you know, a a mix and match of goals um and emotions um and time um always leads to uh potentially a lot of tension. >> Yeah, I was a

kid and I wanted to do what I wanted to do when I wanted to do it. And I think for parents they they feel stuck in between the thing the kid wants to do and the thing that's best for the kid. >> Yeah, and you know, and and somewhere um in that um is, you know, where where we always want to be. You know, we want to encourage um uh uh children to grow, evolve, autonomous, develop

their own um likes and dislikes um and become who they are, uh but also guide them um um in ways that, you know, help lead to positive outcomes. >> You have this philosophy around protect kids in the digital world, not from the digital world. >> so kids nowadays are digital natives. Um they understand technology and it's a natural part of their life in a variety of different ways. And as they grow, technology is going to continue

to evolve and be a part of their future. So, the real question I I often say is, you know, how do we help them become um the kinds of individuals that can uh manage their time in terms of technology, uh but learn and and utilize the time wisely so that they become I often say better than we are as parents, but understand that these tools are are have the possibility and have the capacity to enhance a

lot of uh young people's uh time and energy. And so, you know, how do we allow them to to kind of achieve that balancing act so they can extract the best out of technology. >> YouTube also has different experiences, correct? From the Kids app to supervised accounts. How do those sort of build together? >> One of the things that's really important for us at YouTube is this idea of age-appropriate experience. So, you want kids to have

the right experience on YouTube that fits their age and their overall developmental timeline. For younger kids, we have the YouTube Kids app, which is own standalone app that has curated experience for children. Within that, you can even then set other content settings specifically for your child's age or maturity. And so, it's really amazing you can block certain videos or block certain channels. You can select the kinds of videos if you want for your channels to for

your child to view. And so, it really gives you a lot of uh control over your kids' experience. And as your kids get older and they you want them to experience more of YouTube or have a broader digital experience, then we have a supervised experience for for preteens as well as an experience for teens as well that allows parents to again go in and be able to set things like the short time limit control to to

to to guide their children's experience. >> One of your tips, maybe one of your go-tos, is the foundation starts with open dialogue. But many parents find it hard to start those kinds of conversations. What are some simple, low-stress ways to begin talking to kids about digital habits, like maybe even before they get conflicted about it? >> You know, one of the fascinating things I found, you know, with with my kids is just, you know, snuggling up

with them, sitting on the couch or, you know, when when they're doing something and just coming over and then asking them like, "What did he like? What are you looking at?" So, you get a sense of who they are. And then my son um watches I think 1,000 soccer goals a day. Part of what I understood by engaging him in that conversation is just how he thinks in terms of that goal-oriented um uh mindset and how

he's thinking about um how you get to the end goal. You've mentioned >> uh like co-creating a family media plan or a family media contract even, which sounds very much like adulting to me. Um but it it sounds like really good in theory, but how can a parent lead that conversation so it feels sort of like inclusive, like the child is part of it, it's a team effort, and not just like a lecture or a dictate?

>> Yeah, so this goal This is an evolution of that um conversation that you're having. And so, sitting down with your child and co-creating the rules. Let them have a voice. You know, asking them, you know, "How much time do you think is fair? And what do you think could the consequences should be? Or what do you want to have happen next?" And when you help kids build a framework, they are statistically far more likely to

comply with it because they feel a sense of ownership and that they're part of it. And so, the idea of of having um this kind of uh a family contract, a family agreement, um uh you know, is really about coming together, um thinking through what the goals are. You want to do this in a calm setting, on a calm weekend, and not when things are hectic, and and then have an agreement on those boundaries that you

can come back to. >> But sometimes parents feel like they're at odds in this conversation. They end up being the enforcer, the bad person, and that's either exhausting or just really unpleasant. So, how can tools like YouTube parental controls and Google Family Link help automate the rules so parents can step back and be on the same side of the kid? >> Um you want to use the tools to help um deliver that um in a very

automated fashion. So, you know, use that so, you know, the the the the screen might then fade to black on an agreed upon time or um you know things will will shift and change and the the child brain then stops blaming you for interrupting them and accepts that really this is an objective reality and that's linked back to that overall family our contract and that family plan so really automating the enforcement by utilizing these tools helps

outsource who the child makes into bad guy is and really just make it a part of you know an agreed on ecosystem. >> Yeah, it feels like that's one of the biggest friction points the times up moment because we've talked about avoiding that constant negotiation but kids are amazing negotiators. They put the biggest corporate sales people the person who's been working in the marketplace their entire life to shame. So can you share some of your like

evidence-based strategies like logical checkpoints soft landings the things that can help make this give parents a fighting chance. >> Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, you really want to help them transition. So transition by the logical checkpoints not just by the minute. So respecting their own the child's digital agency. So instead of saying you know, you have 5 minutes and your time is up. You know, look at what they're doing and say okay, you're going to finish

watching that or you can play one more of that and then we're shutting this off and this allows them to reach a natural cognitive closing point which softens their emotions and then allows them to transition. You don't expect a child to go straight from something that they're doing to just sitting quietly at the dinner table. You want to help them with an offline bridge giving them like a high engagement activity or you know, they're shooting hoops

outside or you know, if a board game or you know, it's something that as my kids help help me cook something that helps provide a soft landing for their emotions and their activity at the time. >> You've also mentioned validating the pivot. Why is it so important for parents to praise their child for turning off a device, and what effect does that have in terms of longer-term behavior? >> You know, for example, when that automated timer

goes off, and your child actually hands over the device without a fight, you want to praise that transition instantly. You can say something like, you know, I know you really wanted to keep playing. Um, I saw how hard it was for you to turn it off, but thank you so much for sticking to our agreed-upon contract. It makes me really proud. Um, and uh, it's amazing to see you, you know, sticking to our agreement. And so,

what you're doing here is this positive reinforcement helps build their emotional regulatory skills. And reinforces that the contract leads to a peaceful household, and they start to see how these pieces come together um, for a a a less tense environment, um, and then gives them uh, the power feeling their own agency um, in that transition. So, a lot of this is um, you know, just um, not about teaching them digital literacy skills, but having them feeling

um, empowered um, over um, the experience as well. >> And you've also called it a balancing act. What does a healthy balance summer look like to you, and what's the most important piece of advice that you can give a parent who might be still feeling a little bit overwhelmed right now? >> You know, just like, you know, when I talk to my patient about um, diet and exercise, everything is balanced. Um, you know, so allowing them

to have um, you know, the offline activities that um, also um, bring them that they can even engage in, that brings them a um, excitement and joy, um, knowing that, you know, they may be learning things online, maybe, you know, engage in educational content in YouTube, um, and learning new skills, or listening to music, then um, they're going to go out to go out and hang out with friends, or go out and play sports. So, it's

about trying to kind of weave that um, overall um, mix of um, a variety of different activities. >> I I've talked to a lot of creators who remember incredibly fondly watching with their parents and watching with their families, especially educational content on TV. And now they're creating that educational content on TV. And I talk about all the parents and all the kids who come up to them and tell them what they get, like the value they

get from watching together. It feels like that's also like a really nice bridge between like just what the kids doing on their own and what the family might be doing for the summer. >> Yeah, you know, a lot of um uh medical organizations like the American Academy of Pediatrics uh having their guidelines. This idea of co-viewing and um watching together. Uh co-viewing helps facilitate things like joint attention. Um uh for and for younger kids, it helps

to bridge the deficit um that they may have in terms of transferring uh screen lessons into the real world. And so, you know, being able to engage with your kids um within that context helps them develop a lot of skills that they can use um in terms of digital skills, uh but it also helps them develop um skills uh offline as well in terms of uh you know, critical viewing and critical thinking. So, a lot of

these things um allow um uh families to to help develop thought patterns together, which is particularly important. >> I love that so much. And I love these tips so much, Dr. Gareth. If we want to find out more of them, where can we go? >> So, we we said they put out uh a blog on this um at blog.youtube, where you can uh see some of these tips. Um and again, it's part of how we are

uh going to continue to work um and as we've been working with parents and families around the world to make sure we continue to uh uh you know, listen to parents, but also um help provide um as much resources as we can for them to have the right experience for their children.