In a corner of the house, a child sits mesmerized before a small screen—eyes glued, mouth half open, body motionless. You call his name, he tries to turn, but he doesn’t really hear you. He is lost in the world of Cocomelon—that colorful, fast-paced program that wires a child’s attention to constant stimulation.
The child no longer needs someone to teach him… only someone to switch him on.
We hand him the phone so he’ll calm down, be quiet, stop bothering us. We relax—but who is raising him at that moment? Not the father, not the mother… but the screen.
A 2022 study published in Pediatrics found that children under the age of five who use smart devices for more than two hours a day show delayed language skills and up to a 42% reduction in social interaction.
We are not just silencing the child… we are silencing his imagination, his ability to engage, his capacity to form a complete sentence. It’s as if we’re slowly shutting down his mental device… while charging his tablet instead.
The iPad doesn’t raise a child—it depletes him. It fills his time… but doesn’t add to his mind. It calms him externally… but confuses him internally.
The greatest danger in handing a small child a phone is that we are teaching him that entertainment is more important than understanding, and that silence is more important than participation.
O parents of the screen: the relief of the moment may cost you years of effort. Every time you “get rid of” your child with a device, you may actually be stripping away his intelligence, spontaneity, language, and psychological balance.
Yes, the phone can be an educational tool—but only when used after awareness, not before it. Only when it is controlled, not unleashed. Only when accompanied by a present parent… not a distracted one.
In the past, a child who sat with adults would hear language, watch debate, pick up the vocabulary of life. Today, he spends hours with a screen that repeats the same song twenty times, switches scenes every two seconds, and makes him laugh without context.
No wonder the child gets bored with a book in a minute, screams if the scene doesn’t change instantly, and cannot complete a sentence without mimicking a cartoon character’s voice.
Do we realize we are shaping our children’s brains for visual addiction? Do we see that focus is shrinking, attention is fragmenting, language is withering… while we applaud simply because he is “quiet”?
A 2023 report by Common Sense Media found that children under five in homes where devices are used as a calming tool display 61% lower communication skills and more irritable behavior later in life.
Parenting is not “silencing a child’s voice”… but unleashing his mind to express. It is not “filling time”… but crafting thought.
When we give the phone to ease ourselves, we are losing them in installments. Every fake moment of silence before an iPad is withdrawn from the true balance of childhood.
So to those raising children with “artificial calm,” remember: the child who doesn’t bother you today… may not know how to interact with you tomorrow. The easiest decisions today… may be the hardest problems of tomorrow. And the very phone that silenced your child now… may one day be the same device that disconnects him from you—even while you’re sitting in the same room.
