The school year ends in a few weeks and children will be swarming over the landscape with time on their hands. Many will settle down with the latest iStuff, each like a happy dog with a big bone—and all those pads, pods, smartphones, videogame machines and computers look like good, useful fun.
But look again. We ought to group these machines with alcohol and adult movies. They’re fine for grown-ups but no good for children under 13, except for online learning when they’re at home and simple cellphones when they go out.
Minds need rest and work. They rest when you let them wander freely—go where they please, perch where they like. They work when there is a dangling mental rope for them to grasp hard and climb. But the iWorld fails to supply the child-mind with either of these basic needs. These fancy digital toys create a new kind of mental purgatory instead.
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