mommy moments – techie tip

“When I was a kid, I didn’t have a laptop, iPod, Blackberry, PS3 or iPad. I played outside with friends, bruised my knees, made up adventurous fantasies, and played hide and seek. I ate what my mom made and Jollibee was a treat. I would think twice before I said “no” to my parents. Life wasn’t hard, it was great and I survived. Kids these days are spoiled. Re-post this if you appreciate the way you were raised. I think we were happier kids. 🙂 Kids these days lost something… Appreciation”

Does this seem familiar to you? It is a wall post/status update that circulated in Facebook not so long ago, and perhaps one of the few posts that I can really relate to most especially the first part which pertains to gadgets. I am part of the generation they called the “baby boomers”, I was born during the last years of the 70’s (there goes my age!hehe) I still remember how I wished for a Game N’ Watch ( this now evolved into a Nintendo DSi, I think) as a “pasalubong” from uncles working in Saudi, but of course I never got it! I also remember how my Mom limits my time watching television to the point of shutting down the fuse of our entire house and telling me, “It’s brown out!”

Those were the days! Looking back sometimes I cannot comprehend the way we were brought up back then, deprived not of the basic need but of the extra needs like toys, gadgets and other recreational materials. We just resorted to make believe toys and games like “bahay-bahayan” or paper dolls to replace Barbie just to name a few.

But I don’t have any remorse over the lack of material things to play with, because if not, I wouldn’t have resorted to books as my companion and I wouldn’t have loved reading. Thus, my childhood is still happy, with fun-filled memories, of sun-kissed days with my cousins and playmates smelling of sweat.

Children nowadays are very fortunate with getting almost all the latest toys and gadgets. Parents who have experienced the “deprivation” in their childhood before have the tendency to provide and shower their children now with the things they have not experienced and/or acquired before. As a new parent, I cannot blame those parents because what we all want is to give our kids the best things possible. I know it’s too early to tell, I really don’t know yet since my daughter is just 8 1/2months old, I may also turn into a spoiler sometime soon, but we (my husband and I) have managed to provide her with what’s right and enough, not too much and I planned it to be that way.

I have nothing against parents who provide modern and advanced toys and gadgets to their kids but maybe we need to limit their use and still expose our kids to other forms of recreation. We should still bring them to the outdoors – park, zoos, museums, or even maybe play multiplayer computer games with them (like an online Settlers of Catan alternative called Colonist), etc. rather than just letting them confined to their computer games or the internet. I still believe in the power of technology and we used still expose our kids to the internet and other techie things but with maximum supervision.

Nonetheless,we should still introduce them to reading and books, playing board and fun games and the likes so as to minimize television watching . As parents, we should also set examples, that is by minimizing our television and internet time and spending more time interacting with our kids.

Everything in excess is not good, so I should say it should be in moderation. Childhood comes only once and let our children enjoy it or better yet enjoy it with them!