Are We Teaching Children How To Be Present?

Today, I went out for lunch and noticed a family sitting together at a table.

The parents were eating, occasionally looking at their phones, while the children barely touched their food. They were too busy playing on their phones.

It was such an ordinary scene that most people probably wouldn’t even notice it. But for some reason, I did.

It was the weekend. No school run, no rushing to work, no need to be somewhere else. Just a family sitting around the same table. You would think this would be one of those simple opportunities to talk, laugh, ask questions and actually spend time together.

But although they were sitting together, they weren’t really together.

And it made me think about how different childhood is becoming.

I had a very happy childhood. We spent so much time outside playing. Sometimes I played with other children, and sometimes I played completely on my own. And I didn’t mind that at all. In fact, sometimes I needed it.

I had my own little world.

I could entertain myself, use my imagination and simply enjoy my own company. Nobody needed to fill every quiet moment for me. If there was nothing to do, eventually I found something to do.

Maybe that is something we underestimate today.

Boredom used to make children find something.

You went outside. You played. You talked to someone. You made something out of almost nothing. You argued with another child and then figured out how to make up. Sometimes you simply sat there and watched the world around you.

Not every minute needed to be entertaining.

Today, though, the very first moment of boredom can be filled with a screen.

And I wonder what happens when there is never any space left for boredom.

Because boredom isn’t only about having nothing to do. Those quiet, uneventful moments give children a chance to imagine, create, wait, observe, talk and learn how to simply be present.

And that leads me to a much bigger question.

If we don’t learn how to be bored, how to wait, how to talk, how to listen and how to be present when we are children, how are we supposed to suddenly know how to do those things as adults?

We often think boredom is something children need to be rescued from. The moment they become restless in a restaurant, in the car, or at home, a screen can make the problem disappear.

But perhaps sometimes we are solving something that was never really a problem in the first place.

I also remember family meals very differently.

At our table, everyone had a chance to speak, and everyone received attention. Phones were simply not part of it. We talked. We listened. Sometimes the conversation was important, sometimes it probably wasn’t important at all.

But we were there.

And I think that matters more than we realise.

When a child tells us something and we genuinely listen, we are not only hearing a story about their day. We are showing them that their thoughts are worth listening to. At the same time, they are learning something too — how to listen when somebody else speaks, how to take part in a conversation, and how to give another person their attention.

These things are not taught through a screen. They are learned in ordinary moments.

Around a dinner table.
On a walk.
During a boring afternoon.
While playing outside.
Even during those moments when a child says, “I don’t know what to do.”

Technology isn’t the enemy. It is part of our world, and children will grow up with it whether we like it or not.

But maybe the question isn’t whether children should use technology.

Maybe the question is what we are allowing technology to replace.

A game on a phone can keep a child occupied during an entire family meal. It can certainly make things easier for the adults sitting around the table.

But what disappeared during that hour?

A conversation?
A silly story?
A question they might have asked?
A moment when they would have learned to listen?
Or simply the feeling of having someone’s full attention?

Perhaps none of those moments seem particularly important while they are happening.

But childhood is made from ordinary moments.

And one day, those ordinary moments become memories.

Watching that family today made me realise that perhaps we shouldn’t only be asking how much screen time children have.

We should also be asking how much of their childhood is happening while everyone is actually looking at each other.