“The best thing in front of your child’s eyes is you”
— Kirsty Nolan, author of "Rebooting Childhood: How to Balance Screen Time, Build Relationships, and Help Kids Thrive"
AUTHOR INTERVIEW | Rebooting Childhood by Kirsty Nolan
ThinkPlayful Director of Education Margo Smith interviews author Kirsty Nolan.
For families who struggle with screens and “digital disruption,” author Kirsty Nolan’s book “Rebooting Childhood: How to Balance Screen Time, Build Relationships, and Help Kids Thrive” can help.
At ThinkPlayful, we grapple with these issues in our own homes too! And since we know real relationship is the focus, our core goal is to develop technology as a positive tool that supports families rather than adding to the struggle.
ThinkPlayful Director of Education Margo Smith interviewed Nolan about real strategies for real families.
Nolan works at Chaddock (Chaddock Attachment and Trauma Services) in Quincy, Illinois, where the team has spent years developing a treatment model grounded in neuroscience and attachment science for the children they serve in their residential care program. The principles apply to every child and every caregiver, so her new book, Rebooting Childhood, uses those principles in the context of family life with screens.
What makes Nolan’s framing of the issues so useful is her realistic focus. Most screen-time conversations deal only with the screen or device (how much, what kind, what to block). Nolan drives the conversation using a deep understanding of child development and relationships. Her book meets families in real life and adds the relationship back into the conversation.
The strategy clearly is not about being a perfect parent. Nolan is refreshingly clear about that with stories of her own toddler and teen. The goal isn't screen-free perfection. Instead, it's to find ways to be present enough, often enough, so that the relationship stays strong.
“The goal is joy. It’s just whatever you can do to have fun together,” she says.
She describes “reciprocal play,” which involves interaction and joy together, as the key for maintaining relationship and to countering the dopamine hit of the screen. Nolan emphasized that using real relationship to counter digital disruption can be very simple: it doesn’t require planning, it only requires showing up.