[teekert]

Screw getting bored and “fixing” it with a screen. I’ve been seeing a new trend: Parents with kids on the backs of their bikes (something everyone does here, but now) with the kids glued to a screen… So, instead of learning (without getting bored at all!) about the reality that they are one day going to have to navigate by themselves, they watch some cartoon, blaring annoying audio to people around them in the process.

What’s wrong with humanity?

[hakuseki]

In what sense is looking at a screen a failure to prepare for the world that adults navigate? Adults also look at screens.

[teekert]

It’s a huge missed opportunity for the developing brain to learn about the world, its sights, its sounds, its interactions, its physics, its rules. Everything.

[watwut]

700th bike trip to preschool or school is not teaching kids all that much.

[jbstack]

Yes it is. It's teaching the skill of being able to cope with mundane routine without mindless phone scrolling as a distraction. This is the whole point of OP's linked article.

[watwut]

This is what the comment quite literally claimed: "instead of learning (without getting bored at all!) about the reality that they are one day going to have to navigate by themselves". Later added in comment " missed opportunity for the developing brain to learn about the world, its sights, its sounds, its interactions, its physics, its rules. Everything."

It is opposite of what you say. It claims it wont be boring, but that it will teach them to navigate themselves which they wont learn otherwise.

[teekert]

So, we make them myopic and teach them that boredom is battles with a screen?

[watwut]

No, my point is that you dont have to turn every little mundane thing into a teaching-something-important moment.

Overall, it is absurd, someone getting outraged over a kid not having a trip to preschool or whatever turned into as educational enriching character building exercise as possible.

[teekert]

Perhaps it is absurd, and indeed loosing a small amount of time for neural development is negligible, but I find it at least equally absurd that the kid needs to be sedated with a screen when riding on the back of a bike.

I can’t imagine anything good coming from that bored=grab-screen-attitude that people have. Moreover those screens are also used to silence kids. Like pacifiers, but with worse side effects and with habits formed for the rest of their lives.

Also, why use the screen on the bike? I bet that is not the only screen time. Kids have been behaving on the backs of bikes for 100 years with 0 issues. The value of the screen is negative.