The greatest footage never filmed

I recently witnessed a family at a random lake somewhere in the area, children digging, playing happily and absorbed and mom and grandparents reading on the beach. Suddenly the children started laughing at their shenanigans and mom jumped up, pulling out her phone, and said 'wait, hold on guys....'  Phone up and in place she said 'ok, carry on lol' (yes, she said lol) and the children resumed their tumbling and cavorting, but as you can probably imagine it was very different. In a word, it was fake. When they were 'done' they ran to mom, crowding around her beach chair asking to see it. "Are you going to post it?" "Post it mom, share it! I want Ms....... to see it!" 

I drove home thinking this scene over, and I had a few thoughts on the matter;

The most beautiful and therefore most valuable play happens when children are truly immersed in their actions. Removed from the goings on around them, and completely lost in their 'story', either alone or among a group of friends. Social interactions are being learned, all the synapses are firing, new neural pathways are being forged, autonomy and executive functioning are being trained; in short, exciting and important stuff is happening! 

Why is this SO miraculous? Because it has NOTHING to do with us! It is their journey, their decisions, their business :)

You may be familiar with the concept of ONLY speaking to a child who is deep in play if they initiate eye contact with you. Protect and respect the process and don't insert yourself! Magic is happening before your very eyes. The longer you can resist the urge to interrupt, the more magical it will become - and the greater the benefits to your child! 

You might be beginning to see where I am going with this. As much as we love to take credit, our children are growing, developing and learning despite us! Oh sure, we give them healthy food and make sure they get to their doctor's appointments and visit a dentist every so often. The real meat of their 'becoming', the true growth of their identity, their personality, their passions, aversions and thought processes must happen beyond our control, and why would we seek to control these things anyway? 

We live our lives to be worthy of imitation, model our values, read books, introduce art and music, sports and hobbies that we love, our children take it or leave it! 

Most of the good stuff that is really important to you, they will choose to try, at least for a few years. Then we as parents can celebrate! Yay! We have something in common! My child takes after me! We can join a choir together, share our love of stamp collecting or train together for a half marathon. 

But if they decide to leave it? You play them nothing but Beethoven, they listen to thrash metal. You buy them their own baby size curling stone and brush set, and all they want for their birthday is a baseball mitt.  Well you celebrate that too of course... because how awesome is that! Your child is making decisions, expressing preferences, forming autonomous opinions. And that is a life skill we cannot teach, yet wish for our children above almost anything else. 

But wait... This was going to be about sharing phone videos of my child with my child. Well it still is. 

What happens every time your child realizes that you are videoing their life...sharing it with friends and family? Think about what you do if you catch someone trying to snap a candid pic of you doing something? We check our posture, change our facial expression, fix an item of clothing or a stray strand of hair...In short, a candid moment becomes a performance. And that is exactly what happens when your child realizes that you place value in the content of these deep and private moments of play. An activity that is a purely positive opportunity for development and learning in all the best ways, suddenly turns into a 'what will mom and dad think if I do it THIS way?" performance. It is remarkable and scary how quickly children become conditioned to filter their actions, language and play through this lens. Sideways glances to see whether a parent is taking their phone out to record; or straight up asking you to video something. Bringing their activity to where you are, so you can fully appreciate the cute factor or the funny game they are playing. Their play becomes one long performance, one long quest for your approval, your laughs, your next upload. 

This generation of children is growing up with a very real threat to the natural development of their character and their personalities through the omnipresence of phones/videos/windows into other's lives. The immediacy and widespread potential for uploading and sharing their every move holds the potential to permanently change who our children will become. Many teens and young adults have long ago noticed the impact this cultural phenomenon has had on their lives. And most of it isn't good. 

The more we can leave our children to fully inhabit the worlds they are creating for themselves during these early years, the longer we can hold off inserting our opinions and superfluous praise on their process, the better. 

It will allow a platform where our children can develop naturally and be true to themselves. And all the cute, tender, amazing moments you get to witness quietly from the sidelines will be truly genuine. Instead of grabbing your phone, how about leaving a note book somewhere close at hand, and jot a few key moments down! 

As a final thought, if a child at Oak Hill notices a staff member with a camera out, we stop taking pictures! The phone goes away, and that's that.