Reply to If you have 11-/12-year old boys who DON'T play Fortnite/video game all the time -- what do they do?

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Reply to "If you have 11-/12-year old boys who DON'T play Fortnite/video game all the time -- what do they do?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]So after resisting Fortnite for a year, we caved this year and let our son play. Before that he played Minecraft and War Robots, but all his friends were on Fortnite (literally all of them).

Now I feel like whenever he plays with his friends and I don't allow them to have screen time, they are just passing the time until they can get on their screens. If they go outside, they ask for how long, and then they come back the very first minute they can so they can get set up on screens. If I tell him to do chores or homework first, same thing - he does them but then goes on screens the minute he's done. It just feels like that's the default they want to return to, and that they don't really enjoy any other activities. I guess the one thing they do enjoy is playing basketball outside, but they can only do that for so long.

If it were just my son behaving like this, it would be easier to deal with, but it's his three best neighborhood friends as well. The pressure to turn the screens on is always there.

What I am wondering is, how are other parents - especially the ones who want their kids to have less screen time - dealing with the constant pressure to get back on the screens? (They have to be experiencing it too, since whenever my son logs on to Fortnite, it seems like a majority of his school friends are online!) And for those that have successfully lessened screen time, WHAT activities do your son(s) like to do? Should I enroll him in a sport or some type of activity every afternoon? Should I restrict screen time to the weekends? (I have tried this in the past, and then just got worn down, I guess.)

I'm not sure I've clearly articulated the problem, so I guess the tl;dr is, my son and his friends want to be on screens all the time; I feel like it's not enough to just limit screentime - I need to help my son find activities that are equally compelling, and could really use suggestions. Thanks![/quote]

We shared your concerns as well (DS is 13) and fought very hard against the games. We simply refused to buy any and his screen time is restricted. It worked——However, there are some consequences. Because what you say is true (that the rest of the boys are game addicts), it means my son doesn't have a ton of friends, or rather, the friends he has made are not the gaming kids. He plays a travel sport and an instrument and between that and homework, there's not a lot of time anyway. I don't have any great advice really, other than to stand your ground and not give in. The game-addicted boys are scary to me... They don't have good social skills and I wonder where it will lead them in life...[/quote]

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