By Rajul Garg
Director, Sunstone Business School
Just to be clear, an iTouch is actually an iPhone without the phone. You can download all the apps, browse, email, etc., but can’t make any phone calls. When my daughter was six years old, my brother gifted her an iTouch and she has been carrying it for a year now. She loves it, and after initial trepidation, my wife and I love the fact that she has it. Here is why we love it and some practices we use:
We introduced an allowance, and using it, my daughter at this time has nearly 350 apps. Only 100 fit in at a time, so she has some triaging to do. Almost 95% of these are free apps. The rest cost around `50-100 each. We introduced a budget of `250/month for her (usually five apps). I set up the Apple ID account, set up my credit card and gave her the password. She keeps track of this budget, it’s a gentleman’s agreement. She usually finishes it within the first 5-6 days and waits for the month to finish. If I feel that one of the apps is too silly, I joke about it to her and she gets it. I feel this has resulted in some awesome benefits – firstly, she feels trusted and independent. Children are already little people and it is great that at 7, she can spend money according to her own discretion. Secondly, she has understood the concept of a budget and also the concept of money. She understands what spending Rs 50 means. And thirdly, her choice of apps has improved. She started with silly ones and has graduated on her own to less silly ones. I think these will improve further.
It’s economical too. When we go to a physical toy shop in Delhi, I don’t remember anything being available at less than Rs 300-400. It quickly gets into thousands. In terms of engagement, most physical toys do not engage enough and quickly fall out of favour. There are just not enough difficulty levels. At `3,000 per year, I can’t buy nearly enough physical toys to drive the amount of fun and engagement that my daughter’s iTouch does. It has not encroached on physical play time. I would rather say it has eaten from TV time. She loves physical play with friends and always chooses it. However, it is not possible at all times; and this is a great gap-filler. I would rate it higher than TV. She has started writing a mini-blog, has her own email address that I can write to her on and watches YouTube videos all on her own. I keep checking and blocking content that she shouldn’t be seeing. It hasn’t been bad at all.
I must put in a disclaimer here that I grew up playing video games and I believe they helped me build focus, persistence and strategy. However, an iTouch takes it a step further and lets you express your choice of music, games and content. It’s awesome. (I must also disclaim that I don’t hold Apple stock and have not been paid by Apple for this!).
The same goes for my experience in education as well. Make available a lot of tools and content, let students self-express and build levels to cross. It’s fun, and they learn too.
My five-year-old has started lobbying already. Perhaps this birthday...
Feedback: dinesh@sunstone.in
