Doctors should counsel parents of young children on screen time

June 1, 2017 – As exposure to digital media in Canadian family life increases, so have concerns about how screen time affects children and families. A new statement from the Canadian Paediatric Society (CPS) recommends that physicians and health care providers counsel parents and caregivers of young children on how to minimize screen time and mitigate its potential negative effects. The CPS also recommends that physicians guide parents on how to mindfully use and model healthy screen use to encourage positive habits.

Welcome to the Jungle

Hi there! I’m Lynn Jatania, the new MediaSmarts Parent Blogger.

The internet is one wild and woolly place. It sometimes astonishes me how far we’ve come from our own childhood – days when we wrote programs in BASIC on our TI-99 and saved them on cassette tapes, and our modem made a cool whoo-eee sound while preparing to tie up our single phone line for the next three hours. We were a long way from the connectivity and social media sites that are second nature to our own children.

Family TV Time

Sometimes I wonder if watching TV is going the way of the dodo. Remember when we were kids, and there was concern about how watching TV was going to turn all of us into mindless zombies?

Applied Design, Skills and Technologies

In 2016, British Columbia launched a new  Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies curriculum which it describes as “an experiential, hands-on program of learning through design and creation that includes skills and concepts from traditional and First Peoples practice; from the existing disciplines of Business Education, Home Economics and Culinary Arts, Information and Communication Technology, and Technology Education; and from new and emerging fields.  It fosters the development of the skills and knowledge that will support students in developing practical, creative, and innovative responses to everyday needs and challenges.”

Outcome Chart - British Columbia - Applied Design, Skills and Technologies K-3

This outcome chart contains media-related learning outcomes from the BC  Applied Design, Skills and Technologies K-3 curriculum, with links to supporting resources on the MediaSmarts site.

Outcome Chart - British Columbia - Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 4-5

This outcome chart contains media-related learning outcomes from the BC Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 4-5 curriculum, with links to supporting resources on the MediaSmarts site.

Outcome Chart - British Columbia - Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 6-7

This outcome chart contains media-related learning outcomes from the BC Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 6-7 curriculum, with links to supporting resources on the MediaSmarts site.

Outcome Chart - British Columbia - Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 8

This outcome chart contains media-related learning outcomes from the BC Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 8 curriculum, with links to supporting resources on the MediaSmarts site.

Outcome Chart - British Columbia - Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 9

This outcome chart contains media-related learning outcomes from the BC Applied Design, Skills and Technologies 9 curriculum, with links to supporting resources on the MediaSmarts site.

Career Education

The  British Columbia Career Education curriculum includes a number of media and digital literacy expectations in both the Curricular Competencies and Content, particularly relating to the Personal Development and Connections to Community strands.