TPP 486: Ash Brandin Offers a New Perspective for Navigating Screen Time
episode
Full-Tilt Parenting: Strategies, Insights, and Connection for Parents Raising Neurodivergent Children
41 min
1 speaker
7 chapters
transcribed just now
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the new perspective on screen time that the episode introduces?
I'm Debbie Reber, and this is Full Till Parenting. And today we're taking a look at a topic that comes up so often in this community and can be so complicated to unpack: screen time. And the way we're exploring it is all about moving beyond fear, shame, and power struggles and into something far more nuanced and humane. My guest is Ash Brandon, also known as the Gamer Educator, an educator who spent the past 15 years teaching middle school. And helping families create screen practices that are sustainable, respectful, and actually work in real life. Ash is the author of the best-selling book Power On: Managing Screen Time to Benefit the Whole Family. It came out this past summer. Ash and I will talk about screen time through the lenses of social equity and moral neutrality and why empowering kids with skills, not control, is key to navigating technology well.
We're also going to explore practical strategies for managing screen use, how engaging with kids around their interests can change everything, and what a truly collaborative approach to technology can look like inside families. This is a grounded, compassionate conversation for anyone who's feeling stuck or conflicted about screens and modern parenting. Lots of food for thought in this one. I hope you enjoy it. Hey Ash, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I'm happy to be here. I am happy to dive into your work. We're talking about a topic that is always interesting to my community. We're going to be talking about screen time. And you have a new book called Power On Managing Screen Time to Benefit the Whole Family.
So it was like you had me at hello. I love that idea as a way of introducing yourself. I already read your bio, but I'd love to know a little bit more about your why and what inspired you to reframe screen time and do this work to support families' relationships with screens.
It was very organic in that I kind of ended up on social media not against my will or anything. It just felt like sort of an inevitability. I had enjoyed being in sort of like in person physical opportunities and spaces when I was really focused more on like gaming and education. And then as COVID continued I realized that that wasn't something that I was going to be able to do. at that point of my life and so that's where I was sort of like, Well, I guess I'll kind of maybe I'll dip my toe in. At first I really didn't think that my audience was going to be parents and caregivers. That was not at all where I thought this was gonna go. At that time in twenty twenty one, who was a homeschooler was kind of very different.
Many of many people were homeschoolers at that point in time. But my initial foothold into a space and community in Instagram was was a homeschooling community because those are people who were occupying both like educational spaces and home spaces and trying to flip flop between them very seamlessly. And that was when I started to realize, oh, what I thought might have been pain points that felt kind of unique to education because these are adults who are not the caregivers who are encountering some of these difficulties, I then realized, oh These are pain points for everyone. And so my audience is not educators, my audience is caregivers in any sense of the word who are working with kids and trying to navigate this.
constantly changing world and so it could just kind of happen organically around me. Yeah, and here we are.
How do you feel about doing this work? People ask me about the work that I do. I'm like, this was never on my bingo card of like career plans. Are you happy to find yourself in this space?
I mean, I'm an educator, that's still my day job and I believe that this is really good evidence that that is a really big part of who I am because I think a big part of why people are drawn to education is they want to help people but more they want to empower people. And I think education is or at least should be empowering. And if we can empower someone by equipping them with skills or information that they didn't have before.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the new perspective on screen time that the episode introduces?
0:02–5:47
2
How did Ash Brandin’s journey from teaching to screen‑time advocacy begin?
5:47–11:40
3
What are Ash’s three core tenets for managing screen time?
11:40–17:06
4
Why is screen time considered a social‑equity issue?
17:06–23:01
5
How does moving away from fear‑based narratives change screen‑time conversations?
23:01–27:42
6
What are the ABCs of screen time (Access, Behavior, Content) and how do they help families?
27:42–32:14
7
What practical tools (like the sticky‑note trick) can families use to create smoother screen‑time transitions?
32:14–41:18
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from Full-Tilt Parenting: Strategies, Insights, and Connection for Parents Raising Neurodivergent Children
TPP 266a: A Conversation with Poet and Advocate LeDerick Horne
TPP 522: A Whole Child Approach to ADHD with Phil Boucher, M.D.
TPP 091a: A Conversation With Steve Silberman About His Book “Neurotribes”
TPP 521: A Conversation with Dr. Peter Gray About Restoring Childhood
TPP 253a: Advocate and Author Jonathan Mooney on Why Normal Sucks
TPP 520: Dr. Özgür Bolat on Why Rewards Backfire and the Real Science of Motivating Kids