Keeping the Kids Occupied

“Are we there yet?” The age-old plaintive cry of traveling children. I can easily imagine this happening throughout the entire 40-year trek in the wilderness by the Israelites. Fortunately, modern parents have a few more diversionary tools available to them. Hopefully, this provides relief, however temporary, to the beleaguered parents’ frayed nerves.

MOBILE DEVICES

Although we can be loath to let our tablet or smartphone out of our grasp, sometimes the better part of valor is to give it up and pass it to the backseat. Maybe it’s because the young one wants to be like mommy or daddy, maybe it’s just that the pictures and sounds are way cool or maybe it’s a bit of “you have it, I want it.” Whatever the reason, it provides a much-needed distraction.

There are some things the tech savvy parent on the go needs to keep in mind in all this. Thinking ahead can save a lot of time, money and bottles of headache relief medicines.

Data Usage—I suffer from what my family calls OCFP, Obsessively Compulsive about Fine Print. I will frequently hit rewind while watching TV to go back and look at all the teeny tiny words at the bottom of commercials. Not for something I own, nor even something I’m contemplating buying, but just because.

All of that to say that I’ve learned unlimited data plans may not be quite so “unlimited” as they’re made out to be and that cars with “built-in Wi-Fi” still need a connection to the internet (often times at additional cost). An unexpected bill is never a pleasant surprise, so paying attention to the fine print can be important.

Physical Damage—We all drop things, ding things and break things. Human beings are imperfect and these things happen. So, what are we to do? Many service providers offer insurance that allow us to replace a smartphone that takes a dip in the toilet bowl. Also, to protect against dents, dings and scratches there are a variety of model-specific Android and iPhone cases and faceplate protectors. For any smartwatch, smartphone or tablet on the market there are products made to protect them.

Privacy Protection—By and large, we want to have an open relationship with our children. We don’t want to seem to be hiding things from them. But, it is a fact of life that a responsible parent must put some barriers between us and our children. A randomly pushed series of buttons and Junior can forward just the wrong email to just the wrong person, initiate a phone call with the V.P. of sales in the middle of a huge meeting or play the YouTube video of the distinctly 18-years and up comedian. Make sure everything that should be locked down is locked down.

AMDs (ALTERNATE MEANS OF DISTRACTION)

Children can have a remarkably varied interest in what they find enjoyable to pass the time. Some of them are, amazingly, things we may have enjoyed in our younger days. Maybe not so amazing when the brain trust on Madison Avenue gets factored in.  Consider these franchises that have current game tie-ins for the most recent portable gaming systems:

Star Wars—The original movie debuted in 1977

Mario Brothers—Mario and Luigi first lit up video arcades in 1983

Pokemon—The first Pikachu was dealt onto a table in 1996

Books are also a viable alternative. I remember the back of our cars always had a couple of books the kids could look through. And while they do still print books out (honest!), there are stand-alone eBook readers available as well.

By whatever means, keeping children occupied is a much better option then letting them become a distraction. One study by an Australian based university found that children in the car are twelve times more distracting than talking on a mobile phone. And that is no joke.