How to get your kid off screens for the summer

Pediatrician Dr. Tiffany Munzer has encouraging words for parents hoping to strike a healthy balance with summer screen time for their kids and teens.

"There are things that they can do, even though the deck really feels sometimes stacked against them," says Munzer.

Munzer, who is also a digital media researcher at the University of Michigan, has no illusions about the challenges parents face over the summer. Fulfilling, screen-free activities are often expensive and require shuttling kids during the workday.

Letting children, even teens, stay home for hours on end presents its own dilemmas. Once a digital device is in their hands, it can be difficult — and feel impossible — to get a child to put it down.

Yet Munzer, along with the childhood independence advocate Lenore Skenazy, shared practical tips with Mashable for summertime device use that can liberate kids from screens and get them outside playing with friends and peers.

Make a screen time plan

Going into summer without a screen time plan, yet still expecting balance, is unlikely to work.

Instead, Munzer recommends that parents develop a predictable yet flexible schedule. Ideally, it reflects when parents most need support, like during a meeting or an unsupervised gap between when they leave and a caregiver arrives.

Younger children who aren't able to read may particularly benefit from a visual schedule they can interpret with symbols or graphics, so they know how the day is ordered.

Regardless of the child's age, the schedule should show the entire day, not just blocks when they'll have access to a tablet or TV.

Start with reasonable screen time expectations

Munzer doesn't expect any parent to forego screen time altogether. A parent's goal, rather, should be to prioritize high-quality screen time experiences and swap in-person activities for device use as much as possible.

In a recent policy paper that Munzer co-authored for the American Academy of Pediatrics, Munzer and her colleagues suggested ranges of less than an hour per day of digital media for toddler and preschoolers and one to two hours daily for school-aged kids and teens.

Munzer recognizes that children may likely exceed those guidelines during the summer or weekend, when they have more time. After all, she told Mashable, digital media is "seamless and easy to access" compared to typically expensive in-person childcare, summer camps, and entertainment and play options for kids.

Set boundaries for digital media content

When parents need help deciding what to allow on a digital device, Munzer recommends they trust their own intuition. Often, parents want to watch or play the media themselves (hello, adult Bluey fans).

In general, Munzer says the parental litmus test should be whether the content contributes to their child's well-being. Parents should look for themes that help kids make meaning of the world and encourage positive behaviors like kindness and perspective-taking.

Ruling out poor or predatory design is also important. This includes AI slop and creepy or violent content.

Less obvious are design choices that maximize marketing to children, amp up emotions for clicks, and incentivize constant scrolling or passive consumption.

Munzer points parents to the American Academy of Pediatrics Center of Excellence's guidance on specific types of digital content with green, yellow, and red light ratings. She also recommends Common Sense Media's reviews of popular shows, games, apps, podcasts, and other forms of entertainment.

Help your child with tolerating boredom

A thoughtful screen time plan is essential, but kids of all ages may need support in coping with boredom when they don't have a digital device or entertainment. (Munzer says parents may also need to learn to tolerate the distress that's triggered when their child is unhappy without a screen.)

Parents should avoid responding to boredom by handing back a device, Munzer says. Instead, parents should rely on their schedule as a guide. If there's an hour of downtime between screen time sessions, parents should stick to that as best as they can.

Munzer warns that toddlers and pre-schoolers may only be capable of 15 minutes of independent play, at which point the parent may have to join them briefly. Younger children should know when these bursts of co-playing can happen, and for how long.

Try a test run on the weekend

Munzer says parents have a better shot at success when they test a schedule on the weekend. Attempting to set new limits on screen time just before a big virtual meeting begins may only end in frustration and tears (for everyone).

Low-stakes test runs help kids build confidence and competence, Munzer says. It also gives parents the chance to see that their child is capable of adjusting to the expectations.

Swap screen time for other activities

A parent with a strong sense of how they want their child to engage with devices over the summer still has to fill in several hours of screen-free gaps throughout the day.

Munzer recommends looking for local or community-based activities, including library reading events, hobbyist clubs for kids, and summer-specific programming. To find the right fit, she suggests leaning into a child's interests. If they enjoy Minecraft, for example, parents might look for a LEGO or robotics club for them to join. Similarly, a child who likes crafting videos might be excited to join a crafting club.

While these options are most feasible for parents of older children, who can potentially attend on their own, parents of younger children can try to replicate the idea at home. A child who loves building online but can't be unsupervised in public might love the challenge of assembling their own creation with pieces of cardboard.

Addressing device and screen time meltdowns

In her pediatric clinic, Munzer frequently advises parents of children who meltdown when their device or screen time is limited. This reality, or the dreaded fear of it, often makes it harder for parents to enforce limits.

First, Munzer wants parents to understand that an emotional response to restrictions is not their fault or their child's. "There's these behavioral tactics that are built into the design that make it hard for any of us to transition away."

"There's these behavioral tactics that are built into the design that make it hard for any of us to transition away," she says.

That's why Munzer encourages parents to normalize those feelings for children by describing how devices and platforms are designed to keep and hold our attention.

Emotion regulation strategies

To help kids deal with this, Munzer recommends emotion regulation strategies that name the feeling and offer ways to calm the body, such as using Play-Doh, reading a book together, listening to music, or going for a walk.

Parents should avoid soothing a stressed child with the device itself, because it makes it harder for them to learn regulation skills on their own.

Identify underlying factors

Some children may struggle more than others due to developmental conditions like Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. Munzer says these kids may gravitate toward the behavioral reinforcement that digital media can often supply.

That doesn't mean they should stay on a device as a coping strategy. Instead, parents should try to identify factors that contribute to screen-related meltdowns and address those.

How to get your kid outside playing with other kids

The dream for many parents is to let their children loose outside and let them play, explore, and socialize until the proverbial sun sets.

Not only is this a free summertime option, it also represents a childhood that many parents had but can't replicate for their kids, for a variety of reasons.

Lenore Skenazy, president of the childhood independence nonprofit Let Grow, says parents can actually give their kid these experiences with the right approach.

"[W]hen kids do things in the real world, it pulls them into more real-world interests and skill-building, away from screens," says Skenazy, who is also the author of Free-Range Kids: How Parents and Teachers Can Let Go and Let Grow.

Let go of the anxiety

Many parents are held back by their own anxiety, Skenazy says. Unlike their own parents, they fret about something terrible happening to their child when they're unsupervised.

Yet Skenazy argues that keeping kids indoors isn't safe for their mental health and well-being. Nor is it conducive to their long-term independence.

In her experience, parents only become less anxious about the what-ifs when their child gets the chance to prove they're capable. The more the child is successful in the world, on their own, the more the parent can see their child's competence more clearly.

Coordinate with other parents

The other big barrier for parents is the absence of children who are also allowed to do things unsupervised.

Without this, Skenazy says, parents are "sunk," and it becomes much harder to consistently offer activities other than screen time: "I don't think it's very realistic to say you're going to send your kid out and they're going to have a great time without any other kids."

That's why she recommends coordinating with other parents who also want their child to have independence. "There's rocket fuel in knowing that you are not just a taker — you are a giver."

She's spoken with parents who created informal play groups or clubs for the summer. They might set physical boundaries for the kids to explore within, but the expectation is that they'll be on their own for much of the day.

Some use cell phones or trackers while others don't. Skenazy recommends the latter strategy to build more trust. Regardless, parents instruct their children on how to get an adult's help, if needed.

Give your kid tasks that build independence

In general, Skenazy recommends kids take on confidence-building tasks, like going to the store, helping a neighbor, building something they can use, or making breakfast for the family. She adds that such activities help children learn what they like to do besides be online.

Tasks can also be particularly helpful if a child doesn't have a playmate or friend to spend time with during the summer, but their parent still wants to swap screen time for more fulfilling activities.

Let Grow offers a free checklist of ideas to try for the summer. The most important part, says Skenazy, is giving kids the opportunity to contribute, and to do so without constant supervision.

"There's rocket fuel in knowing that you are not just a taker — you are a giver," she says.