Tips for When You Give Your Kids Their First Digital Device

In this guest blog, my friend Steven Johnson says that giving our kids their first digital device is similar to our parents handing over the car keys… Except with the digital device there is often very little teaching and structure. I love his tips here in this blog. Steven is Director of Family Ministries at Mt. Hermon Christian Conference Center in Northern California.

Tips For When You Give Your Kids Their First Digital Device

Sitting on the edge of their future, the Israelites had to be a little excited, a little unsure, and a little curious. What would the life look like on the other side of the Jordan in the promise land? Would crossing over it really make some sort of difference? Would it bring about more simplicity to life? How would it change how we do things, or even send time together?

Giving a child their first smart phone, tablet, or video game system might feel like crossing over into the promise land to them. In some way, they have finally arrived in the land of milk and honey.

For parents giving your child their first digital media device comes with suitcases of unknowns, questions, worries, and fears. For the first time, our kids can access information, friends, avenues of entertainment, or social media for the first time. I have to wonder if this is how our parents felt when they handed us those car keys for the first time.

Unlike, driving a car, there are little to no widely held and subscribed to rules for navigating the road ahead.

It was the same for Israel sitting on the doorstep of the promise land, ahead of them was uncharted territory. So just as God had done before many times, through Moses God outlines the rules of the road for how God’s people might best traverse a path in front of them.

Today, we can glean from Moses’s famous last sermon to help us as parents as we step into the unknown “promise land” that lies ahead.

Moses begins his sermon by saying, “These are the commands, decrees and laws the Lord your God directed me to teach you.” (Deuteronomy 6:1)

Just as we wouldn’t give our kids keys to the car and say, okay go. In the same way, when we  gift our child a smart device or new video game system, it needs to come with a guide—and I am talking about that little booklet in the box. Instead, you are that guide. You are the one who gets to help them know the do’s and don’ts of the digital media landscape. You are the one who helps form your child’s engagement in a world unknown.

That sounds like a big task, which it is. Here are a few tips can help:

First, set up boundaries for the device. This is what God did through Moses in order to set Israel up to best continue to follow God and honor God in the promise land. Ground rules are needed to help provide boundaries for your kids to learn how to best use their device as a follower of Jesus. These boundaries are helpful for kids because it helps them learn in safe moments how to navigate digital media. One way to think about it is that kids are getting “digital driving lessons” until they graduate high school. Upon graduation, they kids get their “digital driver’s license to be able to navigate the road on their own.

A great way to do this is write down values and guidelines of who we use devices in our household. Those boundaries should speak to when, where, how, and how long one might use their digital media device. For example, when you learned to drive, you learned what the rules of the road. What different signs meant and what to do when you hear a siren. In the same way, kids need to learn parameters to help them successfully navigate the digital landscape.

Second, think about your own device usage and consider how you might best model the behavior you want to see from your kids.

Moses reminds the people of God, “These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts.  Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.  Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” (Deuteronomy 6:5-9 NIV)

Moses is talking about formation. Helping a child become a disciple. This doesn’t just happen, there needs to be intentionality. One major way children learn is through observing the daily practices and routines they see their parents do. You are the mirror, and like it or not, children will reflect your behavior back at you. For example, if you consistently speed while driving, it is more likely that your child will also speed while driving.

Think about your own device usage and consider how you might best model the behavior you want to see from your kids. For instance, in the midst of bedtime, while my four-year-old’s doing the I-took-a-nap-at-school-so-I-going-to-throw-a-party-til-nine-dance, I don’t pull out my phone to help me through the unfolding shenanigans. Instead, I try my best to rest my body and even lay calmly in his bed. I do this because I want my kids to understand how we go to sleep in our house.

Thirdly, continue to remember to make your own and your family’s spiritual practices a daily part of your lives. The good news of Jesus is our true north that points us in the right direction and allows us to course correct if we need. Through spiritual practices we remember and are formed by through the redemptive work of God. In this way spiritual practices are the driving school teacher who helps guide as we first get behind the wheel.

This was an important part of Moses’s message to Israel. He reminded God’s people to not forget what God has done, “be careful that you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” (Deuteronomy 6:12)

There will be times as we parent our kids that we will need to remind our kids, and ourselves, of what God has done. Our kids will fail and make mistakes. They will forget whom they are and whose they are. One of my favorite verses to help me during these moments is Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

This verse not only reminds me of the grace of God, but that even when mistakes are made, those do not define, but the God who has and is redeeming us lives within and defines us.

Lastly, practice empathy. Empathy is a key aspect of grace in which we enter into sacred spaces with our kids as we learn what is really going on in their lives.

Moses statement in Deuteronomy 6:20 of what to do when your sons and daughter ask you about the laws of God, presupposes the exitance of a trusting relational of empathy and understand in which the children of the community would seek wisdom from their elders. Empathy builds connection and is key in parenting kids who will experience situation, ask questions, and feel emotions that their parent’s generation never had to at their age.

A key thing to remember is that no parent has been a child or teenager in 2024, so we don’t know what it is like, but we can seek to understand. When listening first and practicing empathy, we build trust with our children. Trust that can turn into conversation as our children feel safe to share with us their fears, joys, losses, or excitements. Through empathy we sit next to our kids as they get behind the wheel and have more freedom on their journey.

In these times, it might be appropriate to share the wisdom and lessons you have learned as you have navigated digital spaces. It hasn’t been long, but you have been navigating digital media since the days of Myspace. You have learned some things in your own discipleship journey as you have navigated digital media. You have wisdom that you can teach your kids. Take a moment before you give you kids a device to write down some key learnings, missteps and wisdom you have gained over time. (And dear God pray that they never have to explain to that one friend why they were cast out of their top eight.)

For instance, looking at my social media before bed was a normal daily practice. That lead me to unrestful sleeping, stress, and even feelings of anxiety as I was going to sleep. Since shifting that behavior and reading Christian authors prior to bed, I am falling to sleep more easily and rested better.  

 Digital media and devices can be fun, educational, and exciting, when used with wisdom. When we set boundaries, model healthy practices, continue to grow together spiritual, and practice empathy, we can help our children form wise behaviors as use their phones, computer, tablet, and/or video gaming systems.