After a long day of work, a mom in McHenry expects to get some rest at home after finishing up household chores.
“Mom! Mom! Mom, watch this!!” her toddler exclaims while tugging on her shirt. She has told her toddler “One second honey,” at least eight times now, yet her toddler is persistent. Overstimulated and aggravated she tells her toddler to take her ipad and go watch some YouTube to get out of her hair. While this approach is successful now, it’s damaging in the long term.
Children everywhere have been immersed in social media and screens. Once they are born they are exposed to the media and children’s programs that are designed to keep them glued to the screen, so much so that they have a hard time functioning if it is not in the background.
Any child under double digits today knows the latest trends on TikTok or the newest ‘brain rot’ terms whether they are appropriate or not. The quickest fix to this issue aside from limiting screen time could be YouTube Kids. But even then, out of touch content can slip through.
During a child’s preschool years around 62% of children have access to the YouTube Kids app which is designed for kids 12 and under, while around 58% have the regular YouTube app which is designed for anyone of the ages 13 and up.
“When I get home from school, I mostly watch YouTube on my Ipad.” fourth grader, Greyson Moore says, “I watch whatever comes up on the home page, mostly Kai Cenat.”
Kids typically click on whatever grabs their attention first. Most YouTubers have caught on to this trend and began including bright colors and exaggerated scenes in their thumbnails, more commonly known as ‘clickbait.’
“I like to watch Doctor Mike on YouTube.” fourth grader, Prudence Dotlich says, “I watch things that grab my attention in the thumbnail or caption or title.”
“On YouTube, I watch a lot of fortnite” sixth grader, Hudson Murch says, “I also play a lot too.”
One good example of this take over is smaller children’s addiction to “CoComelon,” on Netflix. This show has dominated children’s media. It is the third most popular channel on the entire platform with 189 million subscribers.
“My little cousins will not peel their eyes away from the screen when ‘CoComelon’ is playing.” Sophomore, Fil Fiore says, “They won’t watch anything else and they cry unless it’s on.”
The media is not a place for children to roam free. Not only is it unhealthy for their brain development, depending on the type of content they are consuming, it can be unsafe.
Depending on whatever kids watch, play, or scroll on, the main point is that it takes up a lot of their attention. As they grow fonder to it it makes it extremely hard to pull away from these habits. We notice similar trends in ourselves but it’s mentally and physically beneficial to avoid these habits at a young age.