Parenting in the Age of Attention Snatchers: A Step-by-Step Guide to Balancing Your Child's Use of Technology Paperback – April 28, 2015

I can’t say enough about Lucy Jo Palladino’s new book, Parentingin the Age of Attention Snatchers: A Step-By-Step Guide to Balancing YourChild’s Use of Technology. This book should be in the hands of every parent from infancy to young adulthood. To date, this is the most comprehensive and practical guide for parents on how to help their children from a very young age learn to use their technology as opposed to having it use them. When children practice voluntary attention in their use of technology, they are building the neural pathways for attention and focus. When they allow digital devices to “snatch” their attention, they are building the neural pathways for involuntary attention. Voluntary attention is intentional, requires effort, is hard to sustain, and builds the pre-frontal cortex of the brain. The center of memory, focus and comprehension, among other strengths needed for success. Involuntary attention is effortless, is hard to stop, and builds the sensory cortex of the brain creating more reactivity, among other qualities that inhibit focus.I teach teens about technology awareness and mindfulness, helping them understand that the mindless use of technology stimulates their sympathetic nervous system, whereas mindfulness and meditation stimulate their parasympathetic nervous system. Until I read Palladino’s book, I did not consider the other ways to help teens develop sustained attention and focus. Parenting in the Age of the Attention Snatchers not only provides a comprehensive definition of voluntary attention and its characteristics juxtaposed again involuntary attention, it also provides concrete suggestions and solutions to the growing difficulty children and teens have paying attention.I am working with teens preparing for the SAT and ACT college boards. I do not work with them on the academic aspect. Instead I help them train their brains to focus when they are studying, completing practice test, and taking the official tests. Asking students to maintain focus for over 3 hours is like asking runners to run a marathon without training. Lucy Jo’s outstanding book lays out the blueprint for instruction that I use.I need to reiterate. This book belongs in the hands of every parent from infancy to young adulthood. I must say that I am practicing some of her suggestions with my own process of attention and focus, with technology and without.

Dr. Palladino does a wonderful job of mixing the latest brain research with compelling stories to help parents navigate a challenging digital age. She describes the profound differences between “bottom-up” involuntary attention and “top-down” voluntary attention, and why it’s vital that we help our kids develop the brain skill of “top-down” attention, especially in an age of always-on, distracting technologies. It’s clear from her wisdom and compassion that Dr. Palladino does real work with real children and families, as she understands the nuances of helping kids use tech primarily as a tool and not a toy. I highly recommend this amazing book.

Recommended by my son's school. Good information.

I am so thankful to have encountered this book, and the perspective and the tools it offers for talking about the power of digital devices over our children's attention.

Buy this book!Okay, if you don't have kids, work with them, or care for them, you can probably skip this one. But, if you have children living with you or you work with children, then you need to read this book. Technology, gaming, and social media are here and we can't realistically avoid them. But it's hard to know the benefits and pitfalls and if it's hard for adults, imagine the difficulty for children, and that includes teens, whose brains are quite literally still developing.This book is not my usual fare for the blog but I saw it at NetGalley and had to have it. I hoped that, despite its emphasis on the family, I would find it useful as a teacher. Happily, I did.What I loved:1) The advice and information is firmly grounded in science and research. Numerous studies are cited as are YouTube videos (apropos, no?) but we also get anecdotes from the author's work with children of all ages as well as visits to classrooms.2) Palladino, the author, has a calm, sane, reasonable approach. There's no 'the sky is falling' nonsense. She accepts that computers, gaming, social media, etc. are here and it's the job of adults to help children learn how to manage their time and to make responsible decisions concerning technology.3) I learned, a lot. Any book that teaches me something is a good one and this had a lot. The information about voluntary and involuntary attention alone was a mix of new and familiar. Add in the information about how computers affect the brain and its development and I have a lot to think about.4) The advice and suggestions, while definitely aimed at families as the title says, are easily adaptable to classrooms, camps, and other environments where children of all ages spend time.5) She respects the children. That alone is huge. Too many of the books I read, aimed at parents, show a distinct lack of respect for children. They try to 'fix' the child or address the child's issues only from the parental perspective. Palladino neatly navigates the tricky balance between the child's needs and the family's needs. While most of the advice given is to help the child, some of the advice she presents is aimed at the parents, to help them cope.6) This is related to number one. Palladino clearly understands child development and it underpins her advice. Suggestions given are not one size fits all but each one is broken down by age, how to make it applicable and relevant to the different ages and stages.7) A nice bonus for me is that I can count reading this book towards my required annual training for my teaching certificate. :)A few minor complaints:1) A few statements and examples lacked context. For instance, she talks about a father trying to engage his son in interests other than gaming but disregards, initially, the son's interest in drumming. He, the father, stated that he'd noticed his son tapping along to music but thought it was a nervous habit. That confused the heck out of me because tapping along to music is both normal and common. Palladino provided no context as to why the father though this was abnormal behavior. I read it and thought the problem lay with the father and not the son; context was seriously needed.2) Occasionally the text was dry but that had more to do with the science than Palladino's style. Overall, her style was easy, clear, and witty.Verdict:Buy it, read it, use it. I'm encouraging my school to buy this book and use it. I think it would not only be educational for the other staff but a good foundation for developing an official technology policy. If you're a parent, teacher, guidance counselor, etc. I can not recommend this book enough.