Have you heard the word “off the grid”?
Off the grid means when you are located somewhere that people cannot find or it’s not on the map. It does not mean that you are lost, but actually you feel more like home.
Some people like to live far away from the city, away from the chaos. They don’t have to worry about the traffic jam and the crowd. They sometimes grow vegetables, raise chicken for eggs, and eat simply from their own garden.
Well, for some people this lifestyle is too extreme . For today parents, technology is still necessary for their children, but of course with a balance control. Introducing children to technology in a very young age is a risk, and they starts to think that smart phones and taplets are toys.
The term “unplugged parents” is the parents who values learning through surrounding objects that are not invloved with technology or batteries.
“If children want to play, they have to invent and make their own toys”
The good examples are making rockets from plastic bottles, mud play, painting rocks, and even making a mask from paper plate.
Unplugged parents value these activities more than plastic toys that you can purchase from the department store. Because while their children playing and learn to make their own toys, children develop brain synapses and problem solving skills. On the other hand, the plastic toys always move themselves and technology thinks and make decision for children.
Decision making skill is very important even for adults. For children, they can develop this skill when they are young and through fun activities. Starting from simple problems like making toy, choosing materials, and time management. When they are older, they will be able to solve more difficult problems for their daily life, such as what kind of food I have to eat to get full nutrient, what kind of shoes I should ware, so they are easily be taken of, and what house chore I could do to help my mom around the house.
This kind of decision making cannot be done by technology. Children need to make decision for themselves with help from parents to provide them with good tools and appropriate activities. How about starting with choosing their toy?
Do you think you can be unplugged parents?
What kind of activities you can do to help your children to create unplugged toy?
Share your thoughts here with us!
Ploy
Founder and Instructor at Scrambled Art