With the onset of summer stretching before us, and my children beginning to bicker with each other, I’ve made some changes in our home. First, a little background:
My children typically get along well and enjoy each other’s company, despite a few brotherly skirmishes. Lately though, there has been a real increase in squabbling. It’s driving me and dh crazy! So I began to do some observing. I noticed that the skirmishes typically revolved around GameBoy or GameCube. In fact, almost all of them did, save for a few soccer game arguments about who fouled who, etc.
So, with the prospect of summer and lots of free time coming, I did the ….. unthinkable! I unplugged and put up all the electronic games in our home. Now, there aren’t alot. But we do have GameCube, Nintendo 64, and Gameboys. They are, as of last night, all boxed up and put away. I explained to the children that we would be taking the summer to really remember how to get along with each other and to use our imaginations. There will be lots of outside play, water fights, pool time, parks, bikes, and just general summer fun. BUT, there would be no electronic games. It was met with mixed reviews. 
The prospect of summer fun is always appealing to my boys. The prospect of no GameBoys was a little less appealing but everyone has adjusted.
I’ve also started a different chore system in the hopes of nailing something down. We tend to work with one system for a bit and then it falls on the wayside. But I’ll save that for next week’s WFMW.
Electronics-free….Works for Me!
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Oh, wow … you are a very brave mom! LOL! I would love to do something like this, but then my kids always tell me that I have to put up my computer if I take away their stuff … hahaha! I hope your kids have a great summer and learn a lot.
We do a modified version of this too for exactly the same reasons. We have no screen time for the kids on weekdays they only watch or play on weekends. That is our schedule year-round. I tried a time limit every day but it got old real fast trying to remember who had watched what with 5 kids. The exception to this is schoolwork that has to be done with the computer.
I love this!! Right now we don’t use those things (oldest is 4) and I have been thinking of asking Love if we may turn off the TV for the summer. I DO belive it would only be fair if I also turn off the computer…which would be hard, but I could get over it.
Maybe we could do a limited TV (only public channels, only weekends? or just to keep up with news) and same with computer.
P.S. Last Christmas we turned off the TV for our little ones. Love and I watch it at night after they are in bed though. Turning off the TV has been a huge gift and major change in our children! I don’t know if we will ever be able to let them watch again.