S5 Episode 1: Digital For Good - Raising Kids to Thrive in an Online World // Richard Culatta

“Being a healthy digital citizen…is a complex skill and any complex skill requires practice.”

- Richard Culatta

Healthy Screen Habits Takeaway

Resources

For More Info:

https://www.iste.org/

https://www.wsb.com/speakers/richard-culatta/

Resources/Books Mentioned:

Richard Culatta on CNBC Make It

Show Transcript

Hillary Wilkinson (00:09):

I was introduced to my guest today when his mom sent me his book. <laugh> She had listened to an earlier episode and thought we would be a good match. I think it was like a Tuesday – the mail came, I was excited to get a package- with this lovely handwritten note wishing me well. And I thought it was so sweet that this mom was supporting her son and then I opened the book and realized who her son is! Richard Culatta was appointed by President Barack Obama, to lead the US Department of Education's Office of Educational Technology and is the CEO of  ISTE International Society for Technology and Education. I thought I was gonna be lucky if I even got a chance to talk to his assistant, much less, have the opportunity to speak directly with him. However, I have to tell you never underestimate the power of a mom. I sent Richard an email asking if he'd consider being a guest with the opening line, “Your mom sent me your book.” <laugh> and I'm thrilled to tell you - it worked!  Cause he's here today. Thank you for being here - Richard Culatta!

Richard Culatta (01:52):

Hillary, thank you. I'm so glad to be here and you are right. Never underestimate invoking the mom card. I mean that is, she can still send me to my room. So let's just be clear. Like if that's the reason we will, uh, we'll do it, but I, but I, I know of your work. I love what you're doing. And so, uh, so glad to be able to connect with you.

Hillary Wilkinson (02:08):

Thank you. So Richard, I am really intrigued at kind of what brought you to write this book. You were at this real macro level of digital education, policy implementation, et cetera, cetera. And yet this book brings us right back to the family unit. So what, what kind of brought you here?

Richard Culatta (02:31):

Yeah, I think there were two things. Um, one is, uh, I, uh, you know, was working at a national level. I also worked in state leadership. I've worked with schools all around the world and I saw some, um, some gaps in how we were preparing kids to be healthy members of a digital world, right? Our digital world. It's not going away nor should it go away. Technology is very helpful in enriching our lives, but it requires some scaffolding. It requires some support and some guidance to help kids, uh, really use these great tools in, in powerful, helpful ways. And, and, and a lot of that conversation I saw was either missing or in some cases, uh, was very well intentioned, but, but, um, actually not using practices that were helpful  for kids learning to be responsible. So I was seeing this as I was visiting schools, as I was visiting, um, you know, different, different parts of the world, uh, a couple, um, uh, you know, consistent, uh, gaps when it comes to how we were preparing kids.

Richard Culatta (03:33):

And I thought, you know, this, yes, we need to work on things like policy and, and high level practices. But at some point we just need some really practical, uh, guidance for, for parents, which leads me to my second part of this answer. And that is that, um, I, I am, uh, the father of four kids. Uh, my oldest daughter is 17 years old. My, my youngest son, um, just turned nine. So we are right in the middle of dealing, uh, with these issues. And, and so as much as anything else, I wrote the book for me, right. I wrote the book, my whole life working at the intersection of technology and education. And yet, you know, we still found in our family that we struggle with the same thing every other family does of knowing where and how to find the right balance. And as I, as I searched and, and looked at the advice that was available for parents, it just really occurred to me that there was a lot missing in that conversation. And so those are the two, I mean, that's probably the real reason that pushed me to say, let's get this stuff written up in a book. It was to help me, uh, as, as the primary audience member.

Hillary Wilkinson (04:33):

Well, I get that because I, too began. <laugh> began our journey with healthy screen habits as a primarily parent driven concern for. And so, and I think that because people like you and I, we have this, I mean, we are in the weeds of it right now. We do have this very vested interest of we, we don't have time to wait for the policy to take place. We, we need to be teaching it within our own homes as the, the primary teacher. So, um, I'm also interesting, you kind of in the book, you address this dual citizenship of the physical and digital worlds that today's youth have I think it's so often we get caught up in this online life versus offline life. Why do you think, is it necessary for us as parent parents to recognize both worlds and even the merging of them?

Richard Culatta (05:43):

Uh, that's a great question. Uh, and I, and actually, I'm glad you picked up on that. A lot of people, I think sort of missed the nuance of that when I, when they read the book and that is, it was real, it's a, it's sort of a core part of the, uh, you know, argument that I was laying out, which is that these spaces, right, that the virtual world is, uh, uh, you know, a world in and of itself. It's a community, it's a place that hosts many of our most important life activities. Now, it didn't used to be that way. Uh, you know, and it started, it was a, you know, fun place to, to get some information, maybe to look at pictures, maybe to find videos, but the digital world that exists today, especially after, after COVID right? Uh, you know, think about how many of us participated in a zoom wedding or, uh, had, you know, grandparent read to our kids over, over zoom, or, or how many of us do work or other important, um, life activities in, in the virtual world.

Richard Culatta (06:38):

It is very much a real place. It is very much a place where, where important things happen, but just like, uh, our physical world, uh, it's critical that we think of it and treat it as a community, as a space where we engage with others as a space where we can determine how we want to be perceived, what we want to be known for, a place where we need to do good in order to, uh, improve the quality of that space. And so viewing it as, as a world that we can move in and out of. And I, and I often think about this sometimes when I talk to parents, I say, you know, your kids by, by the nature of the fact that they were born, uh, in, in this particular year, right, have these sort of two passports, they have, they have, they're dual citizens of these both worlds.

Richard Culatta (07:23):

And, and we are too, of course, as adults, it's just that for us, the digital world kind of grew up with us. So, so it's not as obvious to us, but they move in and out seamlessly between these two worlds throughout the day. Uh, but the way that we have to go about, um, being the type of people we want to be, making the impact we want to be in a digital world is different than in the physical world. The underlying goals, the underlying foundations are the same, but the way we go about it is different. And that's why it's important to call it out. Because if we don't, we don't teach our kids the strategies and the tools that they need to be really amazing humans in a digital world. And, and the, the strategies that we teach in the physical world, they don't just roll over. They don't just magically. If you teach a kid to be, you know, a good, healthy, respectful, engaged human in the physical world, those strategies for how to do that look different in a virtual world. And so we have to teach them overtly, or else we end up with a bunch of dysfunctions in the virtual world, even when we have people who are being very healthy, engaged humans in the physical world.

Hillary Wilkinson (08:30):

Right. And with it, with that teaching, I know comes practice.  We have to practice, we have to allow kids time to practice being good digital citizens, right? So you also, you spend some time talking about this, the digital culture, and I love how you point out that also you point out that changing culture doesn't happen in a single talk. Right. But it happens in an ongoing conversation and, and often, often, often I'll relate that to hydration. Like you cannot drink a gallon of water on Wednesday and think you're gonna be fine come Saturday. You know, it's lots of little sips. So can you explain what is this whole concept of digital family culture and how does it get set? How do you set these conversations up?

Richard Culatta (09:47):

Yeah. Well look like you said, and that was a great example, by the way, I love that. Uh, like you said, culture is, and, and I like using that world. It's not about rules. You may have some, some guidelines or some rules in your family, but, but what we're really talking about is what's the digital culture in your family and culture means, you know, what are the things that, uh, that we care about? What are the things that we, uh, will stand for and won't stand for? What are the things that we are known for to others, right? That's what you think about when we've, when we've cultures, you know, what's funny and what's not funny, right? Those are all that's culture. And so I think it's important to think about what our digital culture is now. Um, the interesting thing with any culture, whether it's a, you have a culture of a neighborhood, of a community, of a school, of a workplace, right?

Richard Culatta (10:32):

Those are things that happen over time, over years, you can't, uh, you can't change culture for better or worse overnight. Um, and so I think it's important to remember that I have sometimes where I'll have a, a, a parent who, who read my book and they'll come up with some of the strategies, um, and, and they'll say, “Wow, this is really great. You know, I tried it for like a day and it didn't work. <laugh> right. This strategy isn't helpful.” And, and so, you know, it's just important to remember. These are things that, um, the  - being a healthy and effective digital citizen is a complex skill. And when we're teaching a complex skill, we can talk more about that in a second. But when we're teaching a complex skill, it requires lots of, of sort of practice over time. And so when we think about our digital culture, it's gonna say, you know, over and over again, what are, what are skills that we practice?

Richard Culatta (11:21):

What are some areas where we're gonna have to revisit the conversation multiple times? Think about, uh, uh, you know, bedtime, H how many of you to come with a bedtime routine? Do you have any, if any of your listeners have a kid where you can say, once in their life, 7:30 is bedtime and never have to revisit that again. I wanna talk to them cuz they're amazing parents. No, if you're like us, this is something you have to over and over again, get used to, and this is how we go to bed. You brush your teeth before you go to bed, you do this and you get these patterns. And then when your kids are older and certainly you, you, you know, able to manage this on their own, you can back off of some of that because the culture exists, but it only exists because you've had the conversations because you've talked about because you've modeled it because you've done all of that work.

Richard Culatta (12:09):

And that's what we need to think about. Uh, when it comes to our, our technology lives, it's a culture. We have to talk about it. We have to ask questions. We have to say, what happens when something goes wrong? We have to talk about what, how we want to be perceived for other members of the digital world, what, what we want to be known for. And if we can do those things over the long arc, we end up with a really healthy, effective digital family. Um, but it's not a one, one hit deal. It's not a quick conversation or a one time, you know, uh, uh, solution. It happens over many years.

Hillary Wilkinson (12:43):

Yeah. And, um, I feel like I'm still working on it. I feel like, I feel like, you know, technology evolves so quickly and I feel like I make so many stumbles along the way, but I think that it's also important for us to, um, really share our mistakes and communication and maybe our own breaches in digital citizenship, if you will! Like being the, you know, I mean, if you were, if you mess up and if you send a text that you meant for it to be funny, but it got misconstrued and it's okay to talk about that with…. 

Richard Culatta (13:24):

In fact I say in the book, it's, it's actually essential that we talk about that, right? Because we need to model for our kids that you do need to take action when something goes wrong. In fact, one of the questions that I put in the book is talk to your kid and give some examples about sometime when you said something in a virtual space that you regretted either, cuz you shared something that wasn't true or you made a comment about something that somebody that you thought was funny, but, but you know, they took it in a way that was offensive or whatever it is, sharing that with your kids helps them recognize, “Oh, this happens. It happens to my parent. It happens to all of us. How do we then move forward from it?” And so, yes, it's really important to talk about when things go wrong, as well as when things go. 

Hillary Wilkinson (14:01):

Right. And recognizing when a phone call is more appropriate than a text or yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah. Um, so we have to take a break, but when we come back, I'd love to take a deeper dive into this whole concept of complex skills and digital citizenship and mistakes that we could inadvertently be making today

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Hillary Wilkinson:

My guest is Richard Culatta, a dad of four who has a vested interest in the way digital citizenship is being taught today. So before the break, we were talking a little bit about digital citizenship and digital culture and Richard, you make compelling statements about how digital citizenship might it. Well it's often kind of being taught wrong today we're focusing on the wrong things. Can you start to address the fundamental flaws in our current approach, I should say, to teaching digital citizenship.

Richard Culatta (15:34):

Yeah, sure. There are things that I see and, and by the way, I should say, uh, it was great to see a lot of things that are happening right as I was going around and doing, uh, uh, you know, research for the book. Uh, and so, and I've tried to include a lot of those examples, uh, there. Um, but what I will tell you is there were two consistent problems that I saw over and over again when I talked to parents when I talked to teachers, community leaders. And so here's what they are. The first is the conversations that we have with our kids are generally, uh, far too negative. They become what I call the list of don'ts approach. Right? Don't do this, don't share your password. Don't be a jerk. Don't spend so much time on that game. Don't, don't, you know, just all the don'ts and yes, you know, it's problematic in part because it's not very compelling message to be constantly telling a kid don't, but, but there's actually a, really a more important reason why not to do that.

Richard Culatta (16:24):

And that is that being a healthy digital citizen, a good member, having a, you know, a good digital culture, um, is a complex skill and any complex skill requires practice. Uh, and you can't practice not doing something. Right. So I think about my son, uh, plays the piano. He's a great little pianist. And, uh, I, I, I think about when he goes into his piano lessons, uh, his teacher tells him the things to practice, but what she doesn't do is she doesn't say, Here's all the wrong notes, not to play, don't play those notes. You're good.” Right? Like she could do that every day for years. And he would never become a better pianist. Imagine that with anything, you know, a sport, uh, learning math, right? You can't learn to do something by being told what not to do.

Richard Culatta (17:07):

And so that's the first problem is we have to flip that around and say, here are the skills we want you to practice. We want you to practice being a, you know, a, a, a good person in this space: fact checking, um, finding a balance between your digital activities and your other activity. You see? So, those are helping create the culture, but they're all done in a positive way that allows kids to practice. So, that's the first thing. The first thing is we gotta make sure that we're, we're, we're being very careful about staying outta the list of don'ts approach. The second thing that we have to be careful about is, and it's related is, um, not being too narrowly focused on online safety. Now, online safety is important. Don't get me wrong. I think we, we we'd agree with that, but, but it is not the end goal, right?

Richard Culatta (17:52):

Online safety is sort of, it's sort of like the minimum bar of entry to the digital world. And, and, and if you'll forgive another example from one of my kids, I, uh, my older daughter, uh, just turned 17. We've been learning how to drive. Uh, if parents have gone through that, you, you know, that the that's quite an experience, but, but when we get in the car to drive, the first thing we do is we put the seatbelt on, right? There's no question. Safety is first, seatbelt goes on. It's just part of what we do. We don't debate it. We don't, but we also don't sit there and spend two hours talking about the seatbelt and then say, okay, we're done learning how to drive, right? No, we spend most of our time learning all the nuances of navigating this new world that she has in front of her.

Richard Culatta (18:36):

Right. Where do we go? How do we get there? How do we not get lost? If we do get lost, what do we do? Who do we go with? Right. What are the rules of the road? What are the customs and expectations of other drivers when you're driving around them? Those are all the things that we talk about so that she can use this new tool, that she has to get places to enrich her life. And I worry that a lot of the conversations that we have, uh, in, when it comes to, you know, kids in technology stop with being safe. Um, and, and I feel like, uh, you know, if that were the goal, we just bury our devices in the backyard and done, right? Like the goal isn't to be safe, the goal is to be amazing, engaged, future leaders in the digital world. That's the goal, uh, and safety is table stakes, but we can't be so overly focused on that, that we don't talk about these other important skills.

Hillary Wilkinson (19:26):

Right. I love that. I love that. Um, you can't, you, you can't be so safe that you're creating a handicap.

Richard Culatta (19:35):

Sure. Right. Or, or that there's no value in the things that the safety is in place for. Like, I think I used to be a teacher by the way, I should share that. And, you know, I think sometimes we'd go on school field trips. Uh, and I, and I think, you know, we'd send a note home and, and say the purpose of the field trip. And I think what if we said the purpose of the field trip, if we do this, right, we will not get into an accident on the way to the zoo and back. Right. That's the goal. I'd be like, really that's the best we can do because we're going to the zoo. Like there's awesome stuff there! We should have a bit of a higher goal than just not - Yes, let's be safe on the way. Absolutely. But man, the goal of this is much higher than just being safe.

Hillary Wilkinson (20:11):

Right. And the, and the reward is much higher than just focusing on the safety. Yeah. Right. So you also point out we're in this really unique window of time, in humanity with today's generation, we're in a very transitional spot. Yeah. And we, as parents are tasked with teaching our kids how to become responsible, respectful, resourceful, digital citizens, while also, as we said, trying to navigate for safety. So it's this unique time of transition and it's a time to start a new conversation surrounding digital citizenship. Mm-hmm <affirmative> and you bring up five talking points that we should be having in these ongoing conversations. And can you kind of go over what those five talking points are?

Richard Culatta (20:58):

Happy to, and, and I'll do it obviously very quickly cuz of the time that we have, but I do go into them, uh, more deeply I in the book. By the way, I should should mention. So the book is called Digital For Good: Raising Kids to Thrive In An Online World. And so if any of this is, is of interest, you can get much more, uh, much more information there. Um, but, but just so you can get a flavor of it. I talk about five skills that are really critical for being a healthy member of the digital world today. And that is the first one is being balanced. So balance is about finding the right balance between not just your use of tech. Sometimes we make it a little too binary:  use of tech and you know, activities that are not tech.  It's more complicated that it's yes, your, your balance of, of tech versus non-tech activities.

Richard Culatta (21:41):

But it's also the balance of time and activities that you spend in the digital world. Some activities are far more valuable than others. And so the, this sort of binary screen time thing doesn't help us because there are some really valuable activities that happen on a screen and some really stupid ones that we shouldn't be wasting our time on. And so, so this idea of coming with, uh, with good balance helps recognize where and how we should be spending our digital time. Uh, so that's the first one. The second one is, uh, the skill of being informed. There is so much information that's out there and available. That's not the problem that we have anymore. The problem is knowing what information is valuable for what purpose. Uh, and again, it's more complicated than just true and false. Like we sometimes make it.  There's content and information that can be very helpful for the purpose that it was intended.

Richard Culatta (22:30):

It's often when we, when we mix, you know, advertising and think that that's factual or opinion and think that that's scientific research, right. There's role, for opinion, it's important. It's when we aren't recognizing where and how we're applying that information, that it gets, uh, uh, complicated. So being informed and knowing how to use the digital world for, uh, for our learning, uh, and creative purposes, the third area is being inclusive. So how do we, uh, uh, create inclusive spaces for others in virtual spaces, but also recognize that we need, um, we need, uh, differing viewpoints in order to learn. It's not that we should just put up with other people who disagree with us because we should be nice, although we should be nice, it's because we actually have to have, uh, ideas that can contradict with our own in order to expand our own understanding of a topic.

Richard Culatta (23:24):

And so being inclusive and, and, uh, you know, balancing multiple viewpoints is a critical skill. The fourth one is being engaged. These tools that we hold in our hands, these, you know, phones and tablets and computers are amazingly powerful tools at connecting us to our families and our communities. And I think sometimes we, we miss that. And so learning to be engaged, learning to make our communities better, learning to help, uh, um, uh, you know, capture and curate family, uh, memories, uh, in, in ways that are important learning about, uh, deeper, uh, understanding of our, of our, uh, you know, community and our community culture and history. That's all about what it means to be engaged and also problem solving. Right? Kids can be amazing problem solvers when they have the digital tools in their hands. Um, so that all falls under that bucket.

Richard Culatta (24:13):

And then the last one is being alert. And so we talked about this, you know, it, yes, of course it is important to be, uh, safe and aware of, uh, what you are doing in, in digital spaces. And, and, uh, you know, I'll mention this one again. It's not about just yourself. So much of the, uh, conversation that I hear about, uh, online safety is very selfish. How do you watch out for you and make sure you're not getting in trouble? No, it's about how do you help create a safe space for somebody who may not be able to, uh, uh, take care of themselves as easily as you can for a variety of reasons. And so, so being alert is yes, being alert for dangers, but it's also being alert for others and helping create a safe space for them as well. So when we think about those five skills, being balanced, informed, inclusive, engaged, and alert - we set our kids up for just amazing success in their future digital lives.

Hillary Wilkinson (25:11):

If anyone was doubting the importance of, um, teaching our kids, this model of digital citizenship, and by the way, it's like you said, I feel like that was, I mean, the barest of skimming of each of the chapters that you gave, um, examples to, but the thing I wanna also impart is that the, that your book is very easy to read. It reads much like you speak it's it sounds like somebody, like you're, you're in the room talking to me. 

Richard Culatta (25:42):

So, so Hillary, right now, I can tell you a funny story. So when I wrote this book, so it was published by, by Harvard. And when I wrote the book, um, they said, you know, who, who are you writing this book for? I said, I I'm writing it for people like me. And, and I, they said, what do you mean? They said writing for somebody who wouldn't ever actually sit down and read a book like this <laugh> right! So, so the goal is to be very, very practical, very easy to read. You can read it very quickly because we're all, if you're a parent, you don't have time to be reading some long. You need some quick tips. <laugh>

Hillary Wilkinson (26:07):

Exactly.

Richard Culatta (26:08):

So that was exactly the goal. As I tried to, as I tried to write it,

Hillary Wilkinson (26:11):

Goal, goal reached! <laugh>. So I'd love for you to share if you could, I've heard this story that you, um, talk about the importance of this kind of falls into so many of those categories that you just covered. But also I think that that whole business of being alert to others, you share this beautiful story about being a digital upstander, not just a bystander when, um, confronted with cyber bullying and you, you have this very powerful story of a girl who was needing money for her prom dress. And could you, do you know the sh story I'm talking about?

Richard Culatta (26:46):

I do. I know exactly the story <laugh> that you're doing. I'll see if I can do, uh, do it, uh, uh, justice in, in a short amount of time. But, but the first part before I tell the story, the first thing that I want to, um, share is that the research shows that the vast majority of kids witness some sort of, you know, online, uh, whether we call it bullying or misbehavior or whatever it is, you know, picking on somebody, we, you pick the word and that when they do it again, the vast majority of kids do nothing. When, when they see it, now, I, I wanna be clear. This is not because these are, you know, bad kids or kids that don't wanna do it. It's because the vast majority of them have never had a conversation with the parent before about what do you do when you see that? When you talk to them, it's, it's not, the inaction is not lack of wanting to do something.

Richard Culatta (27:34):

It's not knowing what to do. And in the moment when it happens, when you don't know, it's sort of too late to figure it out. And so that's this idea of, of, of switching from bystanders to upstanders, right? It's saying, uh, talking about in advance, when you see something that's happening, that's inappropriate, or somebody that's not being treated well, what are you gonna do? And what does that look like? And do we practice that together? Can we talk about that? So that's this, that's, this goal is helping kids know how to engage. And, and, and so I'll illustrate that with this, with this story. So this is a story, um, that I share in more detail in the book, but it's about a girl, uh, who, um, was, trying to sell a, a prom dress. Uh, and it was, you know, used, uh, a dress.

Richard Culatta (28:14):

She was trying to sell it so that she would get some money to, to get another, uh, another dress. Um, the interesting thing that happened is when she, uh, went to, uh, to, to sell it, she showed a picture of it. And as you know, meanness happens in the, in the digital world, she started to get some very negative, comments, on it. She got people, uh, posting things about her looks and how, uh, you know, uh, how her weight and her just, just meanness, you know, it's just, just the, just the meanness. And it started to go down that path that we have seen sort of over and over again, that path of people making mean comments, she trying to defend herself, them sort of jumping back in and, and being mean. And, and that, that spiral, again, that we've watched so many times lead to, uh, depression, in some cases, you know, suicide really, really tough situations, but in this case, and, and I, and I used this example because in this case, something very different happened.

Richard Culatta (29:08):

So Kristen was her name. She was posting this, she was getting these negative comments really, really mean stuff. Somebody in her community, uh, jumped in and said, um, just very simple post said, “I think you look beautiful.”  And then that person went and got other people, sorry, I get emotional when I tell this story.   I don't, I, um, went and got other people to, to do the same thing and got them to jump in and, and create positive comments. And just that simple act of kindness, uh, flooded her feed with people talking about how beautiful she was and how great she was. And she ended up selling the dress for far more than it was worth, and then used it to help buy  prom dresses for, for other people. But the lesson to take away here is it actually does not take that much to turn around negativity online.

Richard Culatta (29:58):

Just a simple comment. Like I think you look beautiful, just a simple comment of saying, we don't talk about my friend like that here. That is enough to turn a, a, you know, one of these kind of bullying downward cycle moments into something that is a positive, inclusive space. And that's what happens when we prepare our kids to move from being bystanders, to being upstanders.

Hillary Wilkinson (30:20):

And I think it's such a powerful story because it really speaks to the power of one. All it takes is one. Yep. So we have to take a short break kind of hard to do after this. Like, you know, I, I love that story, When we come back, I'm going to ask Richard Culatta for his healthy screen habit. 

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Hillary Wilkinson:

My guest today was the chief innovation officer for the state of Rhode Island. His Ted Talk on reimagining learning in 2013 is closing in on close to 200,000 views and he speaks Spanish! <laugh> Any other languages?

Richard Culatta (31:24):

No. Any other languages? I would embarrass anybody if I tried to speak them, but, uh, we do speak Spanish and we try to speak Spanish at home. Our kids also speak Spanish, so-

Hillary Wilkinson (31:32):

Nice. Okay. Richard, on every episode I ask each guest for a Healthy Screen Habit, which is a tip or takeaway that listeners can put into practice in their own home. Do you have a healthy screen habit to share with us today?

Richard Culatta (31:46):

I do Hillary. This is a little tricky because I, I just wrote a whole book of healthy screen habits. So picking like one healthy screen habit is really tricky for me. I'm gonna try, but I might cheat and like sneak in a couple others as we go here. Um, so here's, here's one niche or two, uh, that is an easy one to do. It's super simple, it's free. Um, and that is just to look at your devices as a family and choose to turn off notifications. Uh, one of the things that, that I like and, you know, I, I encourage us as families. We should be using technology, but we should be using it on our terms. We need to talk about and teach agency and our work with our, with our kids. And so a simple way to do that is just, again, going to any of your devices, whatever flavor of phone you have and turn off all the notifications!

Richard Culatta (32:30):

I mean, maybe keep your phone ringer on in your text messages, right. But all of the other apps, you can still go and use them, but we don't need them to be constantly saying, look at me, look at me, come back, come back. Right. We should go on our terms. So that's a very simple thing that we can do. A second part of that is, uh, and it's related is also turn off auto play on all of your, uh, uh, video services. So whether you use Disney plus or Netflix or YouTube or whatever they are, they all, they all have the ability, they're all defaulted “on” by the way. So by default, they will automatically just start playing the next episode or playing the next video. Um, but just go and turn that all off. And so if you wanna watch a video, watch it because you're choosing to not because there's an algorithm that's doing that, uh, that for you. And so those are just two, you know, very simple, very easy things that you can do, but they just help, uh, shift the control back the balance of control back to us, then to a, a, a software developer, that's just trying to build ways to pull in more attention.

Hillary Wilkinson (33:30):

Right. I love how this puts the user back in the driver's seat. That's right. It's yeah. If our listeners would like to learn more about your work or the international society for technology, where can they find you?

Richard Culatta (33:47):

Sure. Well, you can find us online @iste.org. That's ISTE.org. We have a bunch of information about, both about helping, you know, create digital citizens, you know, health, healthy, digital culture, but also lots about just using technology to support learning, uh, in general. So there's lots of information there. Um, and then of course, the other thing is, is you can, uh, check out, check out the book Digital For Good - Raising Kids to Thrive In an Online World it's available on, on Amazon, but also local bookstores across the country. I love to support local bookstores when I can.

Hillary Wilkinson (34:33):

I think it's the book that can kick off every family's school year on the right note. So it'll get 'em on the right track. And as always, I will link all of this information in the show notes, which you can find on healthy screen habits.org, click on the podcast button and use the dropdown menu to find this episode. Richard, I cannot thank you enough, really, nor your mom <laugh> for <laugh>.

Richard Culatta (34:57):

Well, she gets most of the credit for everything as, as moms do, but, but it's such a pleasure for, for me to get to talk to you today. And again, thanks for the great work that you're doing to make sure this is a topic that we're talking about more, that it's part of the conversation that we, you know, it's not, uh, left up to chance, right? It's just, this is so important that we get this right, that we can't leave it up to chance, and we need to be able to practice this and do this the right way. So I, I just appreciate your, your calling this, uh, issue to, to attention and shining a spotlight where we need it.

Hillary Wilkinson (35:24):

Same, same friend. <laugh> okay. Thanks so much.

Richard Culatta (35:28):

Be well, thanks.