Dr. Leigh Weisz 11:27
Say, I think any parent sees when their kids have a sleepover or something that their kids fragment typically the next day because of the lack of sleep. So I think that we know we aren’t able to be our best selves when we don’t have enough sleep. And for kids, this is this is a big one. In my practice, I will often talk with parents about kind of phone rules when the kids get their first phone. And typically parents are not as concerned about where the phone charges as I am.
And I will say, please make sure to start with the phone charging, whether it’s in an office or the kitchen or your parents room, but not the kids bedroom. And sometimes parents will say, oh, it’s no problem. They turn it off, you know, blah blah. And the kids will tell me, I heard it ding! Or I actually did wake up to pee in the night.
And I checked and I realized all these messages I had missed out on. And so then they’re nervous about it. And did I do I have to respond? And actually, I think this is interfering with sleep more than parents realize.
Dr. Lisa Novak 12:27
I couldn’t agree with you more. And it’s a it feels like a no brainer, especially if we implement it right away. As you said, when you give somebody their first phone, It’s harder to do when they’ve already had their phones in their rooms, but it still feels like something that is one of those little nuggets of. There is something pretty simple that you can do here if you just charge the phone elsewhere. And, you know, for the record, teens do need about 8 or 9 hours of sleep at night.
Very few are actually getting that, especially these days, and especially in communities like ours where it’s not just the phones, but it’s also how busy they are. And there’s a lot of extracurriculars, and it’s 9:00 by the time they get home before they’ve even started their homework. And so, you know, what do you mean, 8 to 9 hours of sleep? But any thing that we can do to help get them the sleep that they need just feels so essential.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 13:19
Absolutely. So what would be the third harm of the social media?
Dr. Lisa Novak 13:23
So the third harm he talks about is what he calls attention fragmentation. And this is the idea that we are not able to sustain our attention for nearly as long as we used to be able to. And the reason that that’s connected to phones is because phones are a constant distraction. I read somewhere that on average, I think people get about 250 notifications per day, which is truly a notification every couple of minutes. And so there’s no longer this, okay, I just have to sit and focus on my homework or for me, on writing my neuropsych report for the client, I just saw for a 40 minute stretch and then go take a snack and a break, because every 2 or 3 minutes our we hear a ding, we have a buzz, a vibration, and all of that is constantly vying for our attention and just not allowing us to stay in that Zen focused place that we need to be able to.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 14:23
Yeah. No, I was going to say, I think a lot of parents have are trying to implement rules around homework time that the phone is in another room, but the kids will say, but I need my phone to X, y, Z or I need the device to help with this homework. So it’s a little bit tricky in how much of it where they really do need it and how much they just want the phone. But I agree, I think adults have trouble, so you can only imagine for kids that that’s so much more like appealing than doing their math homework, you know, continuously for 40 minutes straight.
Dr. Lisa Novak 14:53
Absolutely. And I do want to to say this is yes, this is very hard for kids and for parents. And some of it’s about modeling. I mean, I know that I am not a great model of phone use for my kids, and it is something that I am consistently and actively trying to work on. But the other piece, like you said, is there are logistical factors here. You know, I’m hearing a lot about, you know, I wasn’t going to give my kid access to this social media app, but then they were on a sports team, and this is exactly how the coach is communicating with the team. And so they had to have it. There are logistical pieces at play here that we have to balance, and that’s why it’s not as simple as just a yes or no phone or no phone. Of course we have to find the ways to do the things we can. I don’t think there’s a reason that students need to have their phone with them when they’re doing their homework. They might need access to certain websites and having a computer or an iPad there, where maybe somebody can see a little bit more as they walk by, like what’s actually happening on that screen. But it is it is tough. Right.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 15:57
And then would you share with us the last main harm? I know there are more, but of social media.
Dr. Lisa Novak 16:02
Yeah. The last one he talks about is addiction. And he recognizes, and I echo that this is the trickiest one to really talk about. You know, when we talk about addiction, are we really talking about that term from like a clinical and diagnostic standpoint. Are we talking about it just from what it feels like standpoint?
What he refers to is this idea that every all of us feel, quote unquote, addicted to our phones. I think that’s something we can all resonate with. But there is a certain portion of the population that truly becomes addicted, I think. Current research is suggesting it’s around 14% where life. Life circumstances are getting impacted very adversely by the addiction to. That technology. So whether it’s somebody at being at school and their grades are really dropping or being at work and not being able to meet their work expectations, or it’s having a very significant impact on social relationships, and they’re suddenly more withdrawn and not doing things that they used to be doing. That’s when we lean into that space of true addiction. But for the rest of the population where we can do our air quotes addiction, and we all know what that feels like to us. Yeah, there are lots of psychologists working very hard to make these apps as addictive as possible. They want us to stay logged in. They want us to continue scrolling. And so they are tapping into the neurotransmitters in our brain, things like dopamine that are getting us to have these hits that we feel of like, you know, a rush of, oh, that felt really good. I posted this thing and then I just checked and there’s already 12 people that like my post, and it’s barely been up for five minutes, and that doesn’t satisfy us. And I think that’s the biggest problem here, is that this dopamine release feels really pleasurable, but it doesn’t lead to satisfaction or satiation. Instead, it leads us to keep seeking more and more and more of that. Which brings us right back into our phone. Oh boy, oh boy.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 18:10
Yeah, exactly. Oh boy, I agree. So now that we know right, we know there’s lots of, you know, bad effects, especially on the developing brain of social media and the smartphone and in general. But we also know that while, again, the author, Jonathan Haidt recommends, for example, waiting until 16, you know, for the first smartphone or for social media. We don’t necessarily think that, at least again, in our area and many in this country, that that’s realistic for most people. And and for me, again, as a parent, I can certainly say that the reason is that your child becomes the only one without. And so if they’re the only one without these apps or a phone, even just the phone, they really do feel the emotional ramifications of feeling left out. And so I guess my question for you is if you are someone who’s not in an area or again, certain private schools where they’re all on the same page and they’re all going to wait, you know, much later, which is amazing and power to them. But if you’re not in that circumstance, what do you think parents can do? Because you spoke at the CATCH presentation beautifully about it doesn’t have to be a black or white question. It doesn’t have to be. Is my kid the only one left out? Or am I going to make this great choice for their developing brain?
Dr. Lisa Novak 19:33
It’s a great question, and I’d love to dive into it. Before we talk about suggestions that I have for folks that already have, you know that they’ve already given their kids smartphones, they already have access to social media. I do want to leave a little nugget there to say that I truly don’t feel that it’s too late for everyone. And I think the issue is for when we’re talking to audiences right now, and we’re talking to audiences of parents who have kids in their oldest is five, and we’re talking to audiences where, you know, the parents have high schoolers and everyone’s had a phone for years already. You know, the idea of like, let’s take away your phone and social media. Totally unreasonable. But for the younger generation, and maybe this is just me being able to fall asleep at night, I feel hopeful that we actually can make a change and that if we are talking about these things early enough and long enough, and really explaining them and getting people on board, we will see communities of people even around here who are doing things like signing the wait until eighth pledge, where they and their peers are all agreeing to not give their kids smartphones until eighth grade or for height. It’s actually at the end of eighth grade. So before high school? Yeah. Yeah. And I will say, I mean, I personally have a first grader, he just turned seven and then a three year old. And yesterday actually was the day that I got the email back from wait till eighth that said, congratulations, your first grade class at your kid’s elementary school officially has enough people to, you know, have onboarded. And so you are now locked into this wait till eighth. And it felt like a very freeing moment. And then also a very scary moment of like, okay, they’re in first grade, though. How do we keep up that momentum? Right. We don’t all just, you know, fall, fall like flies in fifth grade, sixth, seventh grade.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 21:25
And I appreciate you sharing that because I should have said that more clearly. Yes. I think one of the reasons we’re doing this podcast, 100% is that people are because of this book and sort of, sort of the popularity of it. Parents are talking and parents are talking throughout the whole nation in a way that they hadn’t before. And so I do think there’s the power of the community, like you said, to make change. And I think at least in the parent communities that I’m involved in, the younger kids I do think are going to have a chance at actually making this work, because they will not be the one person in their group to not have a phone or to not have, you know, whatever the social media at the time becomes. And of course, it’s always changing. So I think that’s right. I think the first thing is parents who, you know, have not yet had to deal with this. I think you’d say delay, delay, but you can first speak on that and then we’ll move on to the what if your child is of age, where most people have it and kind of how to handle that.
Dr. Lisa Novak 22:25
Yeah. Well, and I think I largely did speak on that. Like, I don’t know that there’s so much more to say, aside from the fact that we do, we do need to band together. This is one of those issues. And it is a rare parenting issue that truly is about power and numbers. You think about most of the parenting decisions that we have to make. What time are we going to, you know, have curfews for our kids or are we going to force certain vegetables on them? You know, all these things day to day that we get to choose, and it really doesn’t matter what the parents around us in our community are choosing. This is a different issue for exactly the reason that you described that it is only feasible, or I shouldn’t say for all, because some people really are going against the grain and kudos to them and not giving their kid access to these things, even though most of their peers do have it. But that’s a very hard thing to do, and it’s so much easier to do if the people around you are also doing it.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 23:22
So maybe on that. On that point though, for the younger people, 11I would say action step that I’m thinking about and that again has been talked about in in our area, is really lobbying for schools to also adopt sort of the phone ban in a way that’s actually effective. So not just saying we have a no phone rule, but actually having consequences when a kiddo does have a phone out. And I know we’ve gotten emails in our district about like the Apple Watch buzzing during the school day. So even something as simple as like, don’t bring it in or put it on classroom mode so that it is not a an issue. And the phones, they have all kinds of things they’re doing nationwide. But but Illinois is a little behind. It sounds like so far in terms of being able to adapt the the band’s.
Dr. Lisa Novak 24:12
Yeah. Yes to all of that. And you know, I guess maybe it’s worth mentioning that when in Haidt’s book. In The Anxious Generation, he breaks down these next steps into these four main principles. And then we’re going to talk about some some different ones or maybe some accommodations to, you know, when we can’t go whole hog with some of these. But what he talks about is no smartphones before high school. So that’s this wait until eighth movement. And he’s really clear that he’s talking about smartphones. He’s not talking about phones in general. There’s really nothing wrong with a flip phone or a watch that allows you to text and make phone calls to, you know, your your parents and your inner circle of friends. We want kids to be able to communicate with us, especially since we actually want to be building their independence and having them biking around the neighborhood more and just hopping over to friends houses. And I think it’s okay to want to know where your kids are, but that’s very different than the smartphone that gives them, you know, the entire internet on, you know, in their pocket and by the touch of their fingers, 24 over seven, without a doubt.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 25:17
Right.
Dr. Lisa Novak 25:17
That’s his first one. And then his second one is no social media before the age of 16. And then the third one is exactly what you were just talking about, moving into this realm of phone free schools and what that really means and how we can implement that. And then the fourth one goes back to that first thing we talked about, where not only are we under parenting online, but we’re over parenting our kids in the real world. And that’s causing its its own harms. And so his his fourth tenet is more unsupervised play time and independence.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 25:50
Yep. And again, interestingly, that the book has sort of taken off. And in our little neighborhood, kids are actually biking more and and the parent community are saying, come to our house, you can come to our house and pick up my kid, like, and they’re actually doing this, which is just so cool. And I don’t think the parents, now that it’s been happening now, it’s of course getting cold where we live. But I don’t think they’re actually so nervous anymore because now that’s just something we’re all comfortable with. We’ve all built up that tolerance for it a little bit more. But I think you’re right, you know, to have a basic way of communicating if kids are actually engaging in more unsupervised play around the neighborhood is is important. Right. And so you can balance the two.
Dr. Lisa Novak 26:32
Yes, absolutely. And there’s a whole other podcast episode to be done here around this overprotecting of kids in the real world. And what you’re alluding to now is this idea of we’re parenting through the lens of safety ism, where, you know, ensuring their safety comes first and foremost above all else. And that is true except real safety and real harm. Let’s let’s be aware of that. But let’s not move so far down that path that we are actually not allowing them to build the independence and the problem solving skills and the resilience that they need in order to be functional adolescents and adults. And we have as a community, as a society, as a as a country, as a nation moved farther and farther away from that freedom. Parenting. You know what the terminology that Haidt uses is? We moved from a play based childhood to a phone based childhood. And the truth is that that shift started to happen away from a play based childhood, years before these, these smartphones even came out. Research will tell us that right around the 80s and 90s for a variety of different reasons, we started to fear from a lens of to sorry, to parent, from a lens of fear, and not from a lens of independence and growth and fostering those kinds of values in our kids. And it really, it really has, has impacted them in, in so many ways. And then the phone just adds to all of that.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 28:04
Right, right. Absolutely. So before we dive into again some of the I’m going to call it baby steps that parents can take. Kind of like moving towards what Hite is really recommending. But again, if it feels like maybe too extreme for for where they are at, I do want to kind of make sure we have options for parents to what they can do. Before we go into that, can you maybe just say a couple sentences about why it’s hard for parents to to not just like you said, be the one to say no phones, no social media. If all of the friends and the friend group have it. Because I think that’s a real issue too.
Dr. Lisa Novak 28:41
Yeah. I mean, I think the this is probably the statement I hear most often from clients and from, you know, friends and families around. It’s, well, my kid will be socially isolated then, you know, if everyone is making their plans on these apps and on these phones, and your child is the only one that doesn’t have that, then they will likely experience some very real repercussions of that. And the truth is, those harms aren’t good for our kids mental health either. It’s a really unfortunate place that we’ve kind of put ourselves, where parents have been having to make this decision of like, which is worse for the mental health of my kid, giving them access to smartphones and social media before I really think their brain is ready, or having them be socially isolated because of the fact that I haven’t give them, given them those access to those things and neither of those is a good option. It’s really kind of a terrible place for parents to have had to be, and I feel for all parents who have had to make that choice. And so my hope is that we get to a place where we don’t have to make that choice anymore because like I said, you know, especially as we work with our younger kids, the more that we can get people on board with not doing that and not giving these, these devices out so early, we will there won’t be that repercussion on the other end. There won’t be such social isolation of all of your kids. Friends also don’t have access to those things. And I should.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 30:16
Also say, I think with any parenting.
Dr. Lisa Novak 30:19
I meant to say, Hi Maggie.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 30:22
I should also say that you know, it’s not possible in my like, there’s always going to be parents who kind of like do things differently than you would as a parent. And so if a few kids had phones early, like earlier than ideal, but the majority of the kids didn’t, then your kiddo saying like that, you know, I want a phone because so-and-so has a phone would really not be a big deal for most parents. They’d go, okay, but this person doesn’t have a phone and this person doesn’t have a phone, and this person doesn’t have a phone. But I think it’s the problem when like again, the majority do and you’re the one who doesn’t. So to your point, I think like the mass appeal of people being on the same page is powerful. And also like, obviously we have to be careful as parents not to be judgmental and to recognize that, you know, parents are allowed to make their own choices. But yes, they do have impact on on each other. So it’s just it’s very interesting. Like you said, it is.
Dr. Lisa Novak 31:18
And I think every kid has said like, oh, but I’m the only one. And so I know you wanted to steer us into this. What can we do phase. And I’ll start with an anecdote that there’s a community member in, in my community that was telling me when I was doing this presentation a couple of weeks ago about how she started a spreadsheet, basically, that she’s passing around to other parents in her district that asks about, does your child have a smartphone yet? And if so, what apps do they have access to and are you holding off on certain apps, etc. so that people can see because there is power in numbers, not just for us as parents, but also to bring back to the kids and say, look, I know it feels like you’re the only one, but look at this entire list of other parents that have said that they haven’t given their kids access to TikTok yet. And I think sharing that out so that we don’t feel so isolated in that process is is a great way to form community and conversation around these things. Yeah.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 32:21
Yeah. And again, I would say up until this book, that just wasn’t happening the way it is now. But again, it seems like in every community, at least, people are talking amongst other parents and trying to figure that out amongst themselves. Like so, even if there’s only a few people who don’t have X, Y or Z yet, it’s known. And again, there’s some there’s some common ground, and those people might be like having more plans together. You know what I mean? Like it’s definitely possible that. But it’s okay. You know, I think that’s a healthy thing. So okay, going back to if your child, they may not have a smartphone by the way for this question, but what could you do again, if you feel like waiting till high school essentially to get the first smartphone or waiting till 16 to get the first app of social media, if that feels a little bit too hard given the area and what’s happened so far, what are some ideas in terms of baby steps? What can parents still do to feel like they’re still being mindful of this new research and new knowledge that we are very aware of? And also, again, not being the only child without x, y, z. Yeah.
Dr. Lisa Novak 33:31
Great. Let’s let’s dive into a couple of these nuggets. Okay. Thing number one. And this is really somewhere that I’ve been at fault for a long time. And like I said something I’m actively working on still is modeling good phone use for our kids. We can save all kinds of things, but if we are doing things differently, they’re going to see our actions and not just hear our words. And so being mindful of when we are pulling our phones out during the day, when our kids are trying to get our attention for something. I think having our own rules around that, that feel good to us can be a really helpful start, and then implementing those rules within the house too. When your kids do have smartphones. One prime example. Phone free dinners. You know nobody brings their phone with them, not even in a pocket to the dinner table. And that is just going to be kind of this sacred time as our family, that we are talking to each other and looking each other in the face instead of straight down at our phones. We talked a lot about the sleep deprivation piece and how harmful it can be to our sleep, and how disruptive it can be to our sleep, even just to have our phones plugged in beside our beds or in our rooms. And so there can be a common place in the house where everybody charges their phone overnight and not in anybody’s bedroom. And that’s so that’s another simple tool that we can apply there. A third idea would be to talk about places that your kids and their friends don’t have access to phones. So phone free play dates, for example. Hey, everyone wants to come over and hang out at my place. Awesome. And when we get into the front door, we check our phones at the door and we actually go hang out and talk to each other like people used to do, and have fun doing all kinds of different things. The good old days. Yes. It’s making sure that our kids social time is not actually just them all sitting on the couch together in the basement, staring at their phones. So those are a couple of of really quick, simple, actionable steps within the home environment. I’ve got other ideas for one.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 35:53
More thought on that before we move on. Car pools seem to be an issue too, I’ve found. And so I think again, when you start younger, like with the kids first phone and you just make it a rule like, hey moms, can we be all on the same page or dads? I should include dads to whoever’s driving these carpools. That, you know, in the in the car. It could be like a half an hour, multiple days a week that the phones are in a zipper pocket of the backpack or the the sports bag or whatever, so that kids are, again, engaging and talking and listening to music, but not just playing whatever they’re playing like, and not even talking to to each other.
Dr. Lisa Novak 36:31
Yes. And I like how you said specifically in the zipper of like a backpack, and you didn’t just say on silent in their pocket, because what we know is that even when a phone is on silent, it just it physically being on your person, on your body, you know, in your pocket is actually distracting in and of itself. They did all kinds of super interesting studies where people went into like take a test and sometimes the the variable was whether they had their phone sitting there on silent, even on do Not disturb on the desk, whether they had it in their pocket or whether they had it outside of the room entirely. And even when nobody was actually getting notifications or buzzes, the people that had their phone elsewhere in a totally different room, were consistently performing better than the ones that had it in their pocket or on the desk, even if they were checking it at all. So it is the presence of these devices now that is really impacting our attention. And and so it’s such a great idea to actually be storing it somewhere else entirely.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 37:40
Yeah, absolutely. And one more, one more thing on that one. The the phone free play dates was a great one. I was going to say. Also, even for younger kids, sometimes kids will bring iPads to play dates or to to sleepovers rather. And I think the excuse or the rationale is, well, then I can say good night to my parent. You know, they can call or they can text from that device. And I think, again, it sort of takes away the the purpose of a sleepover, but also then just having it there in the sleepover bag means that the kids are going to end up using it and playing some game together on the iPad, rather than actually doing free play at ages where you want them to do free play. So I just wanted to put that that out there too. Okay, keep going, keep going. Dr. Novak, you’re doing great.
Dr. Lisa Novak 38:26
Another thing I was going to say is we I think we talk about these things as very all or nothing either. You know, I gave him a smartphone or I didn’t. And with a smartphone comes everything access to any app and anything they want to look up on the internet, etc. and it doesn’t have to be that way. It’s not just, okay, I’ve given you a smartphone and now, you know, go forth and hither we can be really mindful about what we’re actually giving them access to. And I listened to a wonderful podcast hosted by Lisa Damour that where she was talking about this particular issue. And her advice that really stuck with me was that she had given to her own daughter was, we are staying off of social media for now, and we are holding off on social media until it becomes the hindrance to you having a social life. And if and when there comes a time that you are no longer being included on things because everybody else is using other channels of communication, then you will tell me what is the primary channel of communication people are using? Are they using Instagram? Are they using Snapchat and whatever that one thing is so that you can still be in close contact with your girlfriends. That’s the thing that will give you access to. But that doesn’t mean you’re also going to have access to TikTok and, you know, all of these other things. And so reminding ourselves that we are still the parents and we do still get to make these decisions, and that we don’t have to open the entire Pandora’s box up to them.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 40:04
Yeah, I was going to say the other piece with that. And that’s great advice, is limits. You know, that there are ways on the phone to have limit set of time. So if they have one of these apps that we’re not thrilled about, you know, you can set a 20 minute timer a day, you know, that kind of a thing or only on the weekends or whatever is appropriate for the situation. So that again, like you said, it doesn’t have to be all or nothing. And again, if you let’s say you’ve delayed as long as you can for the first smartphone, you can have a whole list of rules around that smartphones use to make sure that you’re still making sure it doesn’t, like, take over the child’s life.
Dr. Lisa Novak 40:45
Yes, absolutely. And I wanted to touch on something you said about the sleepover and, you know, the kid wanting to be able to text their parent. Good night. I mean, that example sounds pretty, you know, innocuous. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. But it does raise this bigger issue of parents being used to having constant communication with their kids and expecting that, and then the kids becoming dependent on that. And so it brings me back to our conversation about schools and phone free schools. And I will tell you, from every conversation I have ever had with a teacher, a school administrator, you name it, they hate these phones. They dream of true phone free schools from bell to bell, you know, morning to afternoon. Nobody has access to their phones. Let’s go back to learning and attending and socializing and doing all the things we’re supposed to be doing. Part of the pushback that they are getting is from parents who say things like, but what if my kid is freaking out because they felt like they did really poorly on the math test, and they’re having a panic attack, and they just want and need to reach me. I don’t know about you, Leigh, but like, I grew up at a time where that wasn’t a thing. My I couldn’t reach my parents and they couldn’t reach me in the middle of class if I got a bad score on a math test, or if I just finished taking the math test and and freaked out that maybe I got a bad score. And I think what we need to take a moment to acknowledge is that we are inadvertently sending messages to our kids that they do need us, and that we do need to rescue them when we are there all the time.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 42:27
That they can’t handle it on their own.
Dr. Lisa Novak 42:29
When we are not there, they do learn to handle it on their own. And my God, the confidence that that builds inside of them and the independence that it helps them create, and the motivation to keep building those self-sufficiency skills that come from that are tremendous. I’ve had a few really great conversations with students at GBBN recently, because they did just implement a no phone rule, and everything has to go into like a pocket at the beginning of every class. And at first, of course, the students hated it. And then a couple weeks in, they were like, I am learning better. I am aware of that. I’m actually happier. You know, they’re acknowledging some of these things and the ones that were most freaked out about, what if I can’t reach? My parents really were panicked about that at the beginning, but having had a few experiences of having to work through some of that adversity without immediate access to their parents, they are like, wow. And you can see the difference in them, which is really what we all need to work towards.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 43:37
Without a doubt. Michelle Winterstein, who’s a coping partner and myself did a webinar for parents of kids attending overnight camp. And one of the things that we talked a lot about is how kids have no access to any screens at camp, right? They do not have access to their parents. Right. And how they come back like new kids, completely grown in different ways in terms of their skills, in terms of their confidence and ability, like you said, to handle and to weather the difficulties, you know, whatever they might be, the social anything. And so I think you’re right. Even just in the course of the day, kids are communicating with their parents, like you said, if they, you know, any little thing that comes up and they’re getting that immediate gratification of or immediate feeling of reassurance that the parents can provide. And so, yes, I think, like, again, as parents, we need to push for schools to really do this. And schools would absolutely do this, like you said, except that so many parents don’t want it. So we need to spread the word. The other piece of that I wanted to share is some parents. The reason they are so nervous about banning phones from the school day is these catastrophic, horrible things like school shootings that happen. And, you know, the research shows that even though parents really want that instant knowledge of my kid is okay in that situation, that it actually is more endangering for kids if they all have their cell phones because they are not able to look and follow the teacher in charges instruction of what to do in that horrible situation, right? Which we hope never happens, but it’s really not actually making them safer to have access to the phone in that moment.
Dr. Lisa Novak 45:22
It’s it’s such a good point. And it is I think probably and especially around here and after July 4th and in Highland Park a couple of years ago, it is probably the primary reason that parents do push up against these, these bans for phones at school. But it’s such a great point that. emotionally it makes us feel better. But from a logical, brain based standpoint, it isn’t. It isn’t actually helpful for us to be able to reach them at that time.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 45:51
Yeah, yeah. Before we move on to kind of my final question, any other baby steps that you would recommend for parents? I loved, again, the phone free dinners, setting limits on screen time modeling. Do as I do, not what I say. Having good rules around smartphones, particularly around nighttime so it doesn’t interfere with sleep. Anything else like that that we are missing that you can share?
Dr. Lisa Novak 46:21
Yeah. I mean, I think there’s two other quick buckets that I just want to touch on. So one is getting other parents involved. I really think that is a very important baby step. Talking to your 2 or 3 closest friends about these things, reading the book together and having a book discussion of, look, you know, we’ve already all given our kids phones, but what can we do? And really banding together, you know, getting for for parents who are younger, getting other parents to sign the wait until eighth pledge. And again, really just making this a community solution because it is, you know, it is and requires that collective action. And then the others.
Dr. Lisa Novak 47:03
Yeah. And then the the last thing I would, I would say is just some, some pieces of advice around the over parenting in the real world. You know, I think that’s another part of this that we have to acknowledge is we have to be doing a little bit more letting go and allowing our kids to have more unsupervised time in the real world, allowing them to go bike places and meet up with their friends and have unstructured time. You know, we are so busy and overscheduled, but it’s not play when our kids are at at soccer practice or at a dance. You know, competition that’s not free play by its nature. And so giving them chances to just be kids and teens and run around and maybe get themselves into a little bit of trouble and get some bumps and bruises and scrapes and learn from those things and develop and grow instead of constantly trying to protect and bubble and shelter tiny things like that of just letting, literally letting them have time to hang out where they’re not doing any kind of structured activity. Letting them, you know, bike farther distances than maybe you were initially feeling like you were comfortable with. Those are all little steps that I think can be really helpful to even just playing in a park.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 48:23
Right. And and arranging with other moms, like, like whoever wants to meet up at this park at this time. So, you know, there’s other kids to play with. But the idea that they can actually play without the parent hovering. Ring play with other kids completely.
Dr. Lisa Novak 48:38
And I laugh about that because it’s like we are literally structuring unstructured playtime for our kids, right? You know, 10 a.m. on Sundays is when everyone’s just going to go hang out on the street outside. You know, this is a lot of the the documentaries and the books and whatnot on some of these topics give this idea of like, you know, we used to all just run around outside and play after school. We’d run to our house, we’d drop off our backpack, and then we’d go out on the street until dinnertime. And even if a parent wanted to do that right now, they could send their kid out on the street. But then they’re looking around and like there’s nobody else to play with because everyone else is at band practice and doing, you know, their basketball and their this and their that and their home doing homework. And so, you know, it’s hard. It is hard. But really reinventing some of those pieces in and finding specific times that that can be done. And we know there will be other kids out on the street or at the park to do that with. And one person, Lenore Skenazy, who is the founder of the Let Grow project. She there’s a wealth of resources on her website and through her programming, but one little homework assignment that all listeners can do with their kids at any age is to ask them, what is one thing that you have for one reason or another, never done on your own that you feel ready to do, and then work with them to find something that you feel comfortable enough with and that they feel comfortable enough with. And let them do that. And you’d be surprised by the things that kids come up with when you ask that question. But it’s little pieces of freedom along the way that, again, help build those essential skills for for true success as an adult in this world.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 50:20
I love that, I love that. So I’m going to dive into our final question for parents listening who may be interested in learning more about all of this, I’m wondering if you can share any resources that you recommend, whether they be books or movies or podcasts, anything at all?
Dr. Lisa Novak 50:40
Absolutely. So obviously, if you haven’t read Jonathan Haidt’s book, The Anxious Generation, a lot of what we’re talking about today came directly from there. Outside of that, there are a couple of documentaries that I really love. One is called Chasing Childhood, and it’s really not about the phones. It’s about this over parenting in the real world element. And it’s a fantastic documentary that I recommend to all. There’s another documentary called Screenagers that many people have seen, but what I just learned, and I haven’t seen it yet, but I’ve heard it’s great, is that Screenagers has now come out with an elementary aged version that I would recommend people checking out as well, that I just mentioned. Lenore Skenazy Let Grow project, her website is letgrow.org and she’s got some wonderful resources as well. Common Sense Media is a website that I’m guessing many are familiar with, but that gives parents really helpful and reasonable guidelines around not only TV shows and movies, but also different apps and access to different kinds of technology. What age it’s appropriate for, what kids might be exposed to when they access that kind of that website or that app, etc.. And then I do want to give a shout out to CATCH that you mentioned at the beginning as part of my intro. So CATCH stands for Community Action Together for Children’s Health. It is a 501c3 organization that has its grassroots over here in the North Shore of Chicago. And it’s a wonderful, wonderful organization that really focuses on how to help support parents who are supporting their kids on this mental health journey. And so I did a presentation about this topic for CATCH. And we have tons of different programming coming up and historically that I invite you to check out the website. There is catchiscommunity.org.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 52:36
Excellent. Well, thank you so much, Dr. Novak, for everything.
Dr. Lisa Novak 52:40
Thank you for having me. You know, I could talk about these things for days.
Dr. Leigh Weisz 52:46
I think you’re going to be a guest who comes at least once every couple of months, right? Because we can talk forever. And it’s a fun excuse to get to do that. Everyone, please check out more episodes of our podcast. Go to copingpartners.com and click on Podcast & Articles. And thank you, as always for tuning in. And thank you, Dr. Novak. Bye.
Outro 53:09
Thank you for listening to The Coping Podcast. We’ll see you again next time. And be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes and check out our podcast page at copingpartners.com.