The key to great character development is a legendary childhood
Hosting bake sales with friends, biking around the neighborhood, tuning into the latest Disney Channel shows. As I continue to grow into an adult, I often find myself looking back and cherishing all the fruitful aspects that made my childhood extra special. While technology played a significant role in my upbringing, it simply enhanced my experiences and I had plenty of fun without the need for a screen, unlike how many children today.
Coming home from school, I would hastily eat lunch and meet my friends outside whenever the weather was nice. We would play all sorts of games in our neighborhood, such as capture the flag, four square or badminton. No matter how many scratches or falls I endured, they never bothered me because they represented my commitment to socializing and just being a kid as much as I could. I even broke my arm in fifth grade because of the monkey bars, but I found it to be more of an indicator of my fondness for being outside, rather than a painful inconvenience. Watching my thirteen-year-old brother grow up, I’ve noticed him and his peers continuously glued to devices, which makes me quite sad when thinking back to all the amazing memories I made without the constant need for virtual sources of entertainment.
Further, whenever there was a new toy trending on the market, my friends and I would all beg our parents to get them for us and we’d play with them for hours on end. Shopkins, Beanie Boos and even slime; I had experienced it all. Toys are not only necessary for releasing dopamine, but also promote significant brain development. Fast forward to today, children are more likely to resort to short-form content as their main source of entertainment, reducing their overall attention span. Playing with toys seems to have become a lost art as the digital-age continues to consume the lives of adolescents.
All the elements that worked together to build a magical experience for children in the 2010s have suddenly become fragments of the past. Ultimately, kids are spending less time playing outdoors or socializing with others and are instead immersing themselves in a media-world-of-doom. At this rate, children’ s brains will continue to shrink, leaving them to miss out on the beauty of childhood altogether.