Children of the Digital World

I eavesdropped on the conversation Mrs. Gupta our next door neighbor was having with my wife. Mrs. Gupta in her boisterous tone said “My three-year-old daughter knows how to use WhatsApp, she even knows how to make a WhatsApp call to her grandmother, she has a Facebook page on which I post her pictures and videos and it gets likes and comments in hundreds”.

 As Mrs. Gupta was telling this to my wife there was a glint in her eyes and a lilt in her voice. Mrs. Gupta was filled with extreme sense of pride as she was narrating this incident to my wife who was bemused as it was not something to brag about. Even I am averse to giving all such gadgets to my children as it is akin to killing their childhood and taking them to a la la land which does not exist.

This fascination with mobile phones, laptops, Smart TVs, Smart Watches is increasing by the day even more so in this pandemic. This pandemic made life miserable for many people including children who were forced to stay indoors as the pandemic was wreaking havoc outside and it did not make much sense to let the pandemic affect our children.  All these digital devices and gadgets became a boon for children as online learning gained traction.

Online learning has many advantages as it has made life of parents and children much simpler and our children are much more tech savvy now than what they were earlier but at the same time this pandemic and online learning had some undesirable side effects which have opened up the Pandora’s box.

We need to teach our children the rightful use of gadgets, even though latest gizmos and online presence is important but how to maintain the right balance between real and virtual life is of tantamount importance. Excess use of electronic gadgets has its own perils which we as parents must be careful about and not handover our children the latest gizmos without understanding the effects it can have on young and impressionable minds of our children.

Children these days are much more knowledgeable and much well equipped than what we were at our age and time and it fills our heart with immense pride if our children know how to handle the latest gizmo or mobile but at the same time it has some distinct disadvantages as mentioned below:

1. Instant gratification: In this age of instant gratification patience level of children has gone down drastically. My five year old is enamored of TMKOC but he wants to see the episode of his liking and if the episode is not to his liking he immediately switches over to next episode on You tube and he can watch his favorite episode without caring for others who are sitting with him. Patience is a virtue and children need to learn that.  Instant noodles, instant solutions, instant travel has all taken the fun out of the daily chores.

• Online Education and Solutions: During our time we used to spend hours thinking about the possible solutions to a problem, go to teachers, talk to experts, even if we couldn’t solve the problem we discovered thousand new ways in the process but these days all solutions are available at the click of a button, we can just google the questions and solutions are in front of us and this again has taken the joy of struggling and then finding the right solution.

• Phone was better when it was tied to a wire: With the advent of mobile phones we are all tied to our phones, there are numerous WhatsApp groups for schools for coaching classes for sports classes and what not. Even though these WhatsApp groups help us in quick dissemination of information but at the same time we don’t know what our children are doing fiddling with these phones.

• Cyber Bullying: With the advent of online classes and extra time spent on the internet comes the side effect of cyber bullying, there are people on the net who can influence the thinking of children and can damage them mentally.  We won’t even come to know what our children are accessing over the internet and who they are interacting with as internet offers the anonymity.  In offline world we at least know who our enemy is but in online world we don’t even know who we are dealing with and this might have serious ramifications. Children can be subjected to cyber bullying wherein a bully takes advantage of children.

• Compromising on family time family ethos: In good old days grandmothers and grandfathers used to be the great story tellers and were the ones who instilled family values in children which has now gone missing. Even reading books which was once considered a fun activity is now obsolete and children do not even like to read their course books as everything is available online.

• Spending time outdoors: Children have almost forgotten to spend time outdoors as they are enamored of staying indoors and play with their video games, mobile phones and watch Smart TV. Even when they want to go out, it is all about going to Funky Zones in mall wherein they get to play the latest video games. Playing with real friends outdoors is part of folklore now.

Most of the health experts are saying that the COVID pandemic is reaching the endemic stage and children have developed antibodies and are lot less likely to be affected by COVID. Schools are also opening for children. It is high time that we involve our children in other fun activities, every child is special, every child has a special talent, may be it is music, may be it is drawing, reading or something else which they well and truly adore.

Let these children live their lives fully and revel in the outdoor atmosphere rather than confining themselves to a cocoon. Let the children bloom like flowers, let them go out and explore the real world, discover new species and find their own calling in life.

 Let them not get entangled in this web of the World Wide Web. There is a beautiful world outside which is their canvas and each child has to paint her own beautiful painting in this world full of mesmerizing colors.