As a writer for the Tech Timeout Challenge by life insurance provider Foresters, I made a huge commitment as summer began. I set off to up the ante and do a full week without technology with the whole family. Over the summer, how hard could it be? It was hard. And I am embarrassed to say that we did not succeed. We lasted 3 days. But in the process we did accomplish the original intent of the program. We sat as a family for a minimum of an hour a day for the whole summer, talking, playing board games and playing in the sand. The art of balancing technology use as a parent proved far more challenging than I expected.
“Beep. Ding! Ring!!” Twitter is chirping, the kids just finished a dance-off with the Wii and my facebook feed is buzzing on the Blackberry. As summer approaches, Canadians have a growing social concern about the impact that digital devices and technology are having on family togetherness. Remember those long cottage days as kids when we spent hours playing Battleship, catching fireflies and beating the parents at Monopoly? (I think they let me).