How do we raise our kids to respect and use technology well? How do we integrate God into our relationship with our tools? 

J.M. Boyd is a parishioner and parent in the Archdiocese of Vancouver, raising six children from ages 1 to 16 with his wife. He comes from 20 years of experience in marketing and technology and spent the last 16 navigating how to raise kids who think critically about technology, life, and faith. We talked to him about how he and his wife approach technology use with their different ages of kids. 

B: How many kids do you have and what ages? 

JB: We have six kids ages: 16, 14, 11, 8, 4, and 1.

B: Why is technology management such an important part of how you raise your children honouring God? 

We know it’s our vocation to raise our kids in the faith and help them understand it and part of that is knowing how to share their faith with others. To share their faith with the world, they have to be in the world and experience it. They need opportunities to discuss and know how to respond to things. Life will come at them with lots of questions and I want them to know they can come to us with questions and feel comfortable exploring things. 

We’re intentional about putting stuff in front of them that helps them learn how to ask questions and apply faith to them. 

I’ve helped her find some blogs to follow on Instagram that are modelling how to engage God well in life. This also gives her perspective on faith… Following other things and giving her different cultures and points of view. Anything to instigate discussion and create more conversation because that’s where she can encounter Jesus. 

In the same way, we do things together as a family. Listen to talks together about the Friars and Father Mike or the Sisters of Life. We love reading so we’ll listen to the same audiobooks at the same time. Gives us opportunities to have conversations. As an example, we just finished Dune. This created a ton of opportunities for conversation. From an early age, we started the habit of picking apart a movie on the drive home from the theatre or after watching something together as a family. That became a model for the questions they would ask themselves when reading, watching or listening to anything. What is the author or director trying to make me feel or think? What do I agree or disagree with, and what feels questionable or contrary to what I believe?

B: How did you come up with these rules? 

JB: We started by thinking about our goal in parenting. What did we want our children to be like as adults? What is the knowledge, skills, and experience they would need to be that person? It’s not just going to have to happen if we tell them to be a certain person. So we create ways for them to have experiences that fill a desire for them to encounter Jesus. How do I nudge them towards knowing Jesus? To know and love Jesus above anything else and really desire it. But to do it, they have to know and experience it personally.

My oldest and I would listen to the same Christian podcasts together—some edgier than others. But then we have a chance to talk about it. I can help her navigate different perspectives rather than leave her to do it alone. We want to teach them to have a discerning mind. What is this movie trying to tell me? We have to ask those things around our faith too.

I’m here to teach them how to think so they can think for themselves. I have to be careful not to get stuck in thinking for them—a trap a lot of us get into. 

We can’t cater it around them instead of finding it for themselves. In the world, they have to discern for themselves. 

B: Is there some underlying philosophy? 

JB: I’ve seen a lot of people shelter children from the world, and the moment you aren’t the barrier and they are thrown into the world, they are all of a sudden just ravaged by the world. I didn’t want that to happen. 

I also didn’t want to be overbearing. Our rule is that we don’t ask anything of them that I don’t impose on myself. 

If I ask them to limit time on their phone, I have to limit that myself. There is obviously flexibility with our oldest kids who have earned our trust and taken on more responsibility. 

Every couple of weeks, we do a casual walkthrough of who you are following on Instagram and talk about it. It’s not like they all have to be Christian but we all have to be okay with what we’re following and why, or at least we’ve had the intentional conversation around what they are consuming. 

Prayer is a big thing. Praying over our family and friends. Praying for certain gifts for our kids, and not just by ourselves, but doing it with them. As we model it, they do it for others and see the impact it has on them. This is the same thing with a relationship with Jesus. 

We don’t make assumptions that they don’t know how to be friends with Jesus. Sometimes, it can make them uncomfortable a little bit but that’s how they learn too. We ask our kids to pray for us. We ask them to discern and think for themselves.

If they ask about reading a book, we ask what they know about it. Ask them to look for reviews, and ask them what they think they could get from it. Sometimes it’s just entertainment and that’s okay, especially depending on what else is going on in their life. 

The ideal is to spend an equal amount of time with technology as quiet, whether that’s just prayer or hanging out. Gives room for no noise. In the quiet, that’s where God speaks to us. And also, our world is so noisy. Everything they face when they leave the house is a lot of noise that helps us avoid things that are uncomfortable. Remind them it’s okay to be quiet and silent. It’s also OK to be uncomfortable.

B: How do you frame technology? 

JB: We want our kids to have a healthy balance and relationship with technology because it’s not going anywhere. It’s going to be in their lives forever and we don’t live in a world where we get to separate from our world anymore. So we ease them into it.

Technology is not inherently a bad thing. The only thing that gets a reference of innate more evil is the internet because it’s way more of a wild west. 

In the end, your child is going to end up on something that you don’t love. So how are they going to respond when they interact with something wrong? Hide from you or ask you about it? 

B: Who has their own technology? How did you decide that? 

JB: We have a family computer that is out in the open and password protected. Anyone can use it but they have to request it. Little ones can’t put the password in it. 

All of them except the two youngest have a mobile device—and I know that sounds nuts. It’s all just old iPhones and all for practical reasons. They can text us in emergencies or listen to audiobooks (the only app they can listen to). A lot of that is part of their schooling. Some are homeschooled and some go to school but they aren’t allowed to bring their devices into school. 

We use the Screen Time app through Apple. They have to request to use their apps. It sends us (the parents) a message and we give access for certain times. 

For our oldest, she has a phone number, honestly to make our lives easier as parents. She is the only kid with a social media app—Instagram and some photo editing tools. She very rarely posts to Instagram but rather uses it as the primary communication with friends. When it comes to chatting on Instagram, I didn’t want to shelter her or keep her from building relationships with friends, but didn’t want to be blind to what was going on. We have access to her account and she has to ask for access when going on it. I don’t look at her personal chats but I have access to them and she knows that and her friends know that I can see what they are talking about. In the same way, she has access to mine. She’s allowed to go through my phone. If I’m going to ask for transparency from my kids, I have to hold to the same value. 

We also have weekly summaries that show us what they are spending time on. For example, I can see maybe that she spent 6 hours in two days on Libby listening to an audiobook. It gives me a reason to ask about what she’s reading and also just engage in things she’s interested in.

B: How does this impact your own use of technology? 

JB: My oldest daughter has access to my phone and I try to be open with my phone as much as I can, like not always having my headphones on and keeping my screen up. If I’m watching something on Youtube and the kids are around, they are allowed to ask to see it and I’ll show them. It makes me very aware of how much I am on my devices.

B: How do you manage technology use at friends’ houses? What about at school? 

JB: There is a risk of just leaning on apps to solve your problems. 

While we do use apps to help monitor screen time, you have to have a baseline of conversation and education. Teaching them how to discern for themselves and understand values as a family. 

Our biggest tool is being on the same page as a family. Why do we as a family exist? Who did God make our family to be? Understanding what we value and what we believe. Helps them have conversations with friends. Have respect for themselves, pride in their values, and how to live in lockstep with God. 

We use the language of the “Boyds do this and this”… They take pride in it rather than give in to peer pressure. Talking to them about what we value first and foremost vs. letting them discover it all on their own. I have seen it free them up to be excited about fashion and style, but also do it knowing that’s not everything they are. 

There is no technology to stop them from lying to you about it. Which is why you have to instil a desire for them to do it themselves, building healthy discernment. Instilling in them that they have the capacity to discern. 

It doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened where they sneak stuff by us, but in the times that it has, they have always come to us and felt the need to share. We ask questions like, why did you feel bad? How did that make you feel? What was it that you were hoping for? Creating space for conversation and opportunities for them to learn.