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What "Just Being a Kid" Means Today
The Sedentary Life of Children
By Rae Pica
What does just being a kid mean today?
The short answer is: Electronics. Hand-held electronic games. Computers and computer games. Videos and video games. And, of course, television. That's what today's childhood entails.
Sure, we had television when we were kids. But there weren't as many channels to choose from. The reception might've been lousy. Our parents allowed us to view only one or two select programs. And, besides, we wanted to go out and play!
Today, children spend the better part of their waking lives watching television. In fact, it's been estimated that between the ages of 2 and 17, American children spend an average of three years of their waking lives watching TV (this doesn't even include time spent watching videos, playing video games or using the computer)! That's the equivalent of over 15,000 hours in front of the set (about 1,000 hours a year) – as compared with 12,000 hours spent in a classroom. The end result? A total of 27,000 hours – more than six years of their young lives – without a whole heck of a lot of movement.
Perhaps most disturbing is how early it all starts – how entrenched in the habit children become before they're even preschoolers. Take a moment to absorb these facts from a study of 2,858 children who were part of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth: Seventeen percent of infants under age 1 and almost half of the toddlers under 2 watch at least one hour of TV a day. One in four children under the age of 3 – and 41 percent of 2-year-olds – are in front of the TV at least three hours each weekday. Ten percent of 1-year-olds and 16 percent of 2-year-olds are watching television five or more hours a day!
