Favorite Bird-Watching Resources for Kids & Teens

Favorite Bird-Watching Resources for Kids & Teens

Discover the best birding resources to ignite your child’s passion for nature. From beginner-friendly field guides to our favorite binoculars, we’ve curated everything young bird enthusiasts need to start their avian adventure. Get ready to transform screen time into green time!

Favorite Starter Devices—Spring 2024

Favorite Starter Devices—Spring 2024

Goal: To help you to take the slow-tech road! You can use a step by step process for introducing tech. This is easier now than ever with so many great options! We don’t recommend giving personal devices to kids. Start with a shared family device and then you can...

5 Ways to Roll Back the Phone-Based Childhood

5 Ways to Roll Back the Phone-Based Childhood

In Jonathan Haidt's The Anxious Generation, he boldly states: "...the Great Rewiring of Childhood, in which the phone-based childhood replaced the play-based childhood, is the major cause of the international epidemic of adolescent mental illness." And he cites a lot...

The Anxious Generation is here!

The Anxious Generation is here!

This book should be required reading for every Big Tech CEO and employee, parent, teacher, school administrator, and really—everyone.

Celebrating Screen-Free Week

Celebrating Screen-Free Week

Do you feel like your device controls you? Could you use a little jump-start to form better tech-habits? JOIN US for a screen free week from May 1st- May 7th! Screen-Free week is a world-wide invitation (led by Fairplay) to spend a week without using our digital...

Is 3 Hours of Gaming Per Day Really a Good Idea for Our Kids?

Is 3 Hours of Gaming Per Day Really a Good Idea for Our Kids?

Recently Adam Grant, a thought leader with over one million followers, posted his thoughts on this study: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children This study of "nearly 2,000 children found that those who reported playing...

Is Your Teen Begging for BeReal?

Is Your Teen Begging for BeReal?

BeReal gives you a random two-minute window to post a photo of whatever you are doing right then and there. Here’s what you need to know.

Which Kid-Safe Smartphone is Right For Your Family?

Which Kid-Safe Smartphone is Right For Your Family?

We believe the best childhood is the one that is untethered to a device. However, at some point kids will start to learn tech as a tool. We share our slow-tech approach and how to choose the right kid-safe phone for your family when the time is right!

Is My Teen Ready for a Cell Phone?

Is My Teen Ready for a Cell Phone?

Is my teen ready for a cell phone? This is the million-dollar question for parents today! There is no single right answer because every family and every teen is different.

We are parents who are still learning, but we’d like to share a few strategies that have helped us make this important decision.

Swap Likes on Your Phone for Love in Your Home

Swap Likes on Your Phone for Love in Your Home

When we get a like on social media, it can feel a lot like getting a high five in real time. That dopamine hit feels good! While this isn’t necessarily bad, as parents we need to be mindful of how we might replace the likes on our phones, with love in our homes.

We’ve created 3 R’s to lead you to a healthy relationship with your phone AND your family.

Why We Love Turing Tumble

Why We Love Turing Tumble

Turing Tumble is a computer game that doesn’t use electricity. We explain why we love this screen-free educational game so much.

Our Family’s Screen-Free Gift Guide

Our Family’s Screen-Free Gift Guide

After years of storing our TV in the closet, living in a small home, and losing most of our belongings in an extensive house fire, we have a solid idea of which toys and activities are worth keeping around! We hope this list inspires you to create a home where your...

Easy Isn’t Always Best: Take Back the Family Road Trip

Easy Isn’t Always Best: Take Back the Family Road Trip

In our digital era, we often want to avoid boredom, discomfort, and dealing with the hard stuff. I know many families who allow free-reign with electronic devices on road trips for this reason. It’s much easier to hand everyone a device and just let everyone zone out, but if we do this, we miss out on unique opportunities to connect with one another.

Career Guidance: An Opportunity to Connect With Your Teen

Career Guidance: An Opportunity to Connect With Your Teen

Are you struggling to connect with your teen? Are you wanting to help him or her discover strengths and start thinking about a career path? Guest author, Heather Glenn, shares some great ideas to help with career guidance and an exercise to help you work with your teen to discover their strengths.

The Reality of a Virtual Reality

The Reality of a Virtual Reality

Guest author, Spencer Sessions, courageously stepped away from his gaming addiction to create a life of meaning and purpose.

Master or Slave? Evaluate Your Technology Use

Master or Slave? Evaluate Your Technology Use

Master or slave? We have an assessment to help you evaluate your personal technology use. Changing your own mindset, environment, and habits will help you to lead your family to better screen time.

Help Us Fix App Ratings

Help Us Fix App Ratings

We are supporting a NEW movement called #fixappratings and we would love your help!

Should I Tighten or Loosen My Grip?

Should I Tighten or Loosen My Grip?

Do you ever feel scary, crazy, clueless, or controlling when it comes to technology and your kids? When we act out of fear, we tend to tighten our grip and overreact.

Ten Practical Tips for Parents from Dr. Dimitri Christakis

Ten Practical Tips for Parents from Dr. Dimitri Christakis

Dr. Dimitri Christakis, Director of the Center for Child Health, Behavior and Development at Seattle Children’s hospital recently gave an incredible presentation to parents on screen time and the developing brain. I’m sharing my favorite takeaways from his presentation.

Screen Time Check-In

Screen Time Check-In

As we talked with our teen, we came up with five questions that each of us, (including the parents!), can ask ourselves before we spend any quality time with our phones. You can print this out and put it by your charging station or take a screen shot and save it as your phone’s wallpaper to help you check-in throughout the day.

How to Help Your Teen Transition to a Smartphone

How to Help Your Teen Transition to a Smartphone

As parents we have to decide when (or if) we want our teens to use a smartphone.

We recently worked with our teen as she transitioned from a feature phone (flip phone) to a locked-down smartphone. This idea comes from our four-phase process.

In this post, we share some help on making this transition!

10 Easy, Screen-Free Ideas to Help You Connect with Your Kids Today

10 Easy, Screen-Free Ideas to Help You Connect with Your Kids Today

If we have strong bonds with other humans, we are much less likely to seek fulfillment in other ways. Johann Hari said, “The opposite of addiction is not sobriety; the opposite of addiction is connection.”

In this article Lyndsey Wells shares ten easy, screen-free ideas to help you connect with your kids today!

What I’m Doing Differently Because of Digital Minimalism

What I’m Doing Differently Because of Digital Minimalism

In Digital Minimalism, Newport shares the experiences of everyday people who participated in a digital decluttering journey. Their real life stories, coupled with historical examples and research, will inspire you to reconsider your own relationship with technology.

Irresistible: How We Can Outsmart Technology Addiction

Irresistible: How We Can Outsmart Technology Addiction

Irresistible, might look like it’s going to make you panic or want to throw your phone out the window, but it won’t. It will, however, inspire you to consider your relationship with technology and find solutions to help keep technology in its proper place. The author,...

What Are Your Daily Bookends?

What Are Your Daily Bookends?

Darren Hardy, author of The Compound Effect, says the bookends of our days are the key to a successful life. How can we minimize our technology use during the bookends of our daily life?

Top Communities to Help You Confidently Raise Kids in a Digital World

Top Communities to Help You Confidently Raise Kids in a Digital World

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by the thought of raising kids in the digital world, you are not alone. Many parents feel this way, but there are some amazing communities out there to help you! Check out our list of top communities to help you confidently raise kids in a digital world.

Tips for Teaching Teens With Technology with The Mom Life Coach

Tips for Teaching Teens With Technology with The Mom Life Coach

Do you teach or work with teenagers in a volunteer or church setting? Are you wondering how to get them to look up from their device and connect with not only their learning, but with the people around them? Our friend, Chelsea, also known as the Mom Life Coach, has some great tips to help!

Our Screen-Free Gift Guide (including our family’s initiation gifts!)

Our Screen-Free Gift Guide (including our family’s initiation gifts!)

Two years ago, we moved across the country and moved into a much smaller home. We have a pretty good idea of what toys and items are worth hanging onto after that process! We’re sharing some of our favorites in our Screen-Free Gift Guide to help you with your gift-giving this year.

Five Strategies to Help Your Family Fight Technology Addiction

Five Strategies to Help Your Family Fight Technology Addiction

As children of the 80’s and 90’s we were taught about alcohol and drug addiction. Today there is a new type of addiction on the rise—technology addiction, and it is our job as parents in the digital era to teach our children about it.​

Printable: Our Four-Phase Process

Printable: Our Four-Phase Process

We have a great printable for you featuring our Four-Phase Process. Print it out, test it out, and consider how you might gradually give your children small amounts of responsibility one step at a time.

Three Concrete Ideas to Carry Your Family Through Rough Waters

Three Concrete Ideas to Carry Your Family Through Rough Waters

As I watch windsurfers, kiteboarders, and sailors navigate on the river where I live, I’m reminded of the preparation and skill required to match the windy conditions and the turbulent water. What if we were just as diligent in preparing our children for the conditions and turbulence of living in the digital age?

iOS 12 Screen Time Controls

iOS 12 Screen Time Controls

With the update to iOS 12, those with Apple devices will have an easier time monitoring and limiting their screen usage. These new parental controls will be good for our kids—and for us! I think the day will come when all devices will automatically come with the...

Glow Kids: Research that will Motivate You to Create a Plan

Glow Kids: Research that will Motivate You to Create a Plan

Today I’m sharing highlights from a book I avoided for awhile because just looking at the cover made me feel anxious and worried. Glow Kids didn’t look like it applied to me. My kids don’t look like the screen-entranced kid on the cover, nor do I think they are addicted to screens. However, so many experts recommended this book; I had to find out why. And now, I’m the one recommending it.

How-To: Setting Up a Feature Phone with Ting

How-To: Setting Up a Feature Phone with Ting

Parents often ask us how to get started with a feature phone for their child or teen. Tyler is our in-house techie, and he recorded a quick video to show you how we use Ting as our cell phone service provider.