Do you allow unlimited screen time on play dates

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We don't do playdates with screens at our house. If our kid goes to a playdate at someone else's house, they follow their rules.

+1 If I go through the effort of organizing and hosting a playdate, kids are going to play, not stare at a screen. If someone else is hosting, my kids can follow their house rules.

Same here. If a kid walks into our house with a handheld game I tell them "we don't use those here - you can leave that right here and I'll remind you to pick it up when you're leaving." It's never been a problem.

Over time these kids will decide they don’t want to come to your house you won’t even notice, just that they will always be busy when your kid invites them over.

That's okay - my kids want to PLAY. They don't want to sit watching their friend play a game that the friend could have just as easily played at home by themselves. My kids will stop asking them to come over because "he's boring and never wants to do anything fun."

[Anonymous]

This is a mine field because the other parent might take it as a criticism of their parenting and get really pissy. I dont know how to deal with this other than you host and/or seek out other intentional low screen parents. FYI kids start being interested in porn etc in their tweens

[Anonymous]

Crazy crazy

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We don't do playdates with screens at our house. If our kid goes to a playdate at someone else's house, they follow their rules.

+1 If I go through the effort of organizing and hosting a playdate, kids are going to play, not stare at a screen. If someone else is hosting, my kids can follow their house rules.

Same here. If a kid walks into our house with a handheld game I tell them "we don't use those here - you can leave that right here and I'll remind you to pick it up when you're leaving." It's never been a problem.

Over time these kids will decide they don’t want to come to your house you won’t even notice, just that they will always be busy when your kid invites them over.

That's okay - my kids want to PLAY. They don't want to sit watching their friend play a game that the friend could have just as easily played at home by themselves. My kids will stop asking them to come over because "he's boring and never wants to do anything fun."

Exactly. Some kids know how to play and run around and invent games and others just sit there and want to play video games. My kid is only 8, playing together and having fun should take precedence over video games. If one wants to play and the other wants his device then they are not a good match anyway.

[Anonymous]

We are a relatively low screen household. We didn’t get a video game system until my kids were old enough to be playing outside without me out there watching, and my general rule was no video games if the weather was decent and it was still light outside.

But my kids enjoyed playing things like Mario Kart with other people, so if it’s pouring rain then we’d let them play.

[Anonymous]

I’m not talking about it 8 year olds. I mean 11 and 12 yo and older.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't allow it at our place and I have told parents upfront to not send ipads. Yes, some kids sneak in phones but I imagine playing on a phone isn't that fun.

My kid's group of 5-6 friends follows similar rules but I know he's not invited to some other homes with very free for all screen policies, and I wonder if it is because those parents know my rules.

Honestly, probably. I know I don’t want the headache of remembering which kid has which rules at their house and then having to enforce them at my house.

I’m not saying your rules are wrong, each kid and family is different so you should absolutely do what is right for you. But when I’m taking into account the amount of energy I’m willing to put into hosting a play date (we have kids over multiple times per week, often neighbor kids spur of the moment so we host a lot), most of the time I don’t really want to have to deal with enforcing someone else’s house rules (esp if the kids from more restrictive houses clamor for it over here when I say no). Send your kid to my house if you’re ok with my rules or don’t, but please don’t make extra work for me if you do send them.

That said, I’m usually pretty clear with parents when we organize. E.g. if it’s a rainy day, I’ll invite a few kids over for a video game playdate. Or sometimes we host pizza and movie nights. Sometimes I will specify it’s a no screens play date if it’s a nice day out and I expect them to mostly play outside. Or I’ll say I’m planning to let the kids play video games for the last hour (of a multi hour) play date.

Basically we are happy to have kids around all the time. Screen usage varies. Either you’re okay rolling with my rules or you’re not and our kids get together elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

The short answer is no. But I do make exceptions for certain situations like sleepovers or if we're visiting and staying with friends.

I can't control the screentime at other people's houses but I do make note of the friends where there is unlimited screentime and I limit those playdates. When I do allow them to go I accept that they will probably be watching more TV than they typically do.

I don't like to give screentime as an option during playdates because I feel like once you start it's hard to stop so I push it off as long as I can. If I notice that a kid is not interested in playing at all and only wants to do screens then I limit how frequently they come over.

As others mentioned if I take the time to organize and host a playdate I want my kids to actually play.

[Anonymous]

No!!!! I won't lie, I get irritated when I send my kid for a playdate and I find out they were sitting on a screen for three hours, especially if it is unfettered access to Youtube/the toilet of the internet. I am always willing to host a playdate and will not let them do that. They are getting together to play, not zombie out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m not talking about it 8 year olds. I mean 11 and 12 yo and older.

Yes.

[Anonymous]

I’d be curious the ages/genders of the kids of each poster. When my oldest was in K-2 I definitely would have been more in line with the “play dates are for playing, I don’t want my kid using their little screen time at your house, etc.” mentality. But by upper elementary video games are very much a part of (especially boy) social groups. My friends with girls don’t seem to have this same issue. But the boys definitely bond over Minecraft, Roblox, etc. So a parent of a 1st grade girl isn’t going to have the same experiences as a parent of a 5th grade boy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’d be curious the ages/genders of the kids of each poster. When my oldest was in K-2 I definitely would have been more in line with the “play dates are for playing, I don’t want my kid using their little screen time at your house, etc.” mentality. But by upper elementary video games are very much a part of (especially boy) social groups. My friends with girls don’t seem to have this same issue. But the boys definitely bond over Minecraft, Roblox, etc. So a parent of a 1st grade girl isn’t going to have the same experiences as a parent of a 5th grade boy.

And I’ll add that younger kid play dates tend to be 2-3 hours, but as they get older sometimes kids will come over for a big part of the day. So in comparison an hour or two of screens over a six+ hour playdate isn’t the same as if that happened during the younger kid play date.

[Anonymous]

We dont have video games but my son (age 9) loves to show off minecraft when his friends come over. Ghey huddle around the ipad and look at things they have built. I would let it be unlimited if they wished but in practice it's never more than 30 or so minutes.

I wouldnt want kids to come over and watch tv. That seems weird. Its never happened on a play date at our house.

In other people's houses, their rules. If they want to play video games for 2 hours and their parents dont care, I also dont care.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We dont have video games but my son (age 9) loves to show off minecraft when his friends come over. Ghey huddle around the ipad and look at things they have built. I would let it be unlimited if they wished but in practice it's never more than 30 or so minutes.

I wouldnt want kids to come over and watch tv. That seems weird. Its never happened on a play date at our house.

In other people's houses, their rules. If they want to play video games for 2 hours and their parents dont care, I also dont care.

I am confused. Minecraft is a video game

[Anonymous]

It varies so you should ask each family what their policy is. If you want to enforce a certain practice, playdate needs to be at your house. It's super rude to accept an invitation and then try to dictate to the host what should happen in their home.