During the pandemic, the online overhaul of work, school, and the rest underscores a tech-aware message passed along by Denise Roland's Intentionally Unplugged and Nicole Delma's Mind Offline, brainchildren largely inspired by their real children.
The plea "I'm trying to talk to you, would you please put down your phone" from the mouth of her 4-year-old daughter one morning at their home in Quogue not only got Ms. Roland to drop her phone, but also got her thinking about why she had picked it up in the first place.
Her first move was a children's book, "Please, Look Up at Me," which has won a Gold Level Mom's Choice Award and is available for pre-order at places like Amazon and Barnes and Noble ahead of its Dec. 8 release. The book will be sold at Stevenson's Toys and Games in East Hampton as well.
After a six-year hiatus to bring her children up at home, a return to her teaching career kick-started Ms. Roland's work on curriculum to support kids and parents in finding boundaries with technology. "We cannot be anti-tech. We cannot be anti-screen. It doesn't make any sense, we live in a digital age," said Ms. Roland, who took on the role of family and consumer science teacher at East Hampton Middle School this year.
She was pleased to see that healthy boundaries around screens and unplugged initiatives were well underway at the school, so there was a natural starting point to incorporate her digital wellness curriculum, which is available at intentionallyunplugged.com/curriculum for free downloads.
The curriculum above all considers kids' "social and emotional well-being when technology is overused or used incorrectly," explained Ms. Roland. One of the ways Intentionally Unplugged approaches the danger of "dopamine hits from likes" is through the lens of personal body language around screens. Video of the Stillface Experiment, which shows a baby go from jovial to distressed when her caretaker's face assumes slack, "screen" position, is one resource used in this discussion.
In addition, the curriculum has math problems that multiply the average American teen's time on social media by an average life span -- "We came up with something like seven years," said Ms. Roland. Quotations about the toll technology takes on mental health from celebrities such as Selena Gomez is also an aid to involve young people.
In another world away from screens, Nicole Delma is offering screen-free involvement by sharing her love for crafts at her store, Mind Offline. Her project kits for D.I.Y. or "D.I.F.M., do it for me," run the gamut from embroidery, pottery, and chakra sage stick-making to chai blending, collage, and patchwork sweatshirt sewing.
Ms. Delma said that "to produce real things, tangible things" offers a cocktail of pride and satisfaction, a tonic to technological woes.
With many clients of her digital consultancy, Fond Group, on hold, Ms. Delma found herself elbow-deep in crafts with her two children while quarantining in Sag Harbor. She seized the opportunity to bring to life Mind Offline, a project name she had been kicking around for a couple of years.
Ms. Delma said the site was up in 24 hours and she had already contacted local artisans like Mary Jaffe, Peter Spacek, and Grain Surfboards to see if all the recent disruption to their artistic cycle might allow her to buy up unused inventory.
In addition to her store on Main Street in Amagansett, Ms. Delma also strives to make Mind Offline's delivery local, often by hand with boxes made by Grain Surfboards. Of course, in the "pro" column for technology and its reach, Ms. Delma has accrued about 650,000 of 100,000,000 signatures on change.org to get Amazon to offer plastic-free shipping at checkout.