Smartphone Lost Kids

By Coach Frank Sagasta 2025

If childhood looks like a glowing screen, what’s getting lost in the dark?  Kids deserve more than endless scrolling—let’s take time to reconnect, rebuild, refocus on family, and remind them that the real world still matters.  Who’s in?

I have been in the field of education for fifteen years, and it’s quite clear.  That not all parents (mother & father) are raising children.  In fact, many children today, especially in my community, are raised by grandparents.  So, what’s the point… Simply, that you’re not raising children.  You’re raising adults that are hardwired to their phones or devices.  

This addiction is not harmless.  Studies show that excessive screen time fuels anxiety, shortens attention spans, and stifles healthy social interaction.  Children are trading their precious developmental years for quick dopamine hits from likes, hearts, levels, and sound notifications.  Imagine the cost for a quick moment; less creativity, fewer real connections, lack of communication, inability to build healthy relationships, more loneliness, and an entire generation struggling to focus in classrooms or build resilience in real-life challenges.  It isn’t just a personal or professional issue—it’s a national crisis quietly shaping the future of America’s leaders, innovators, entrepreneurs, worker forces, and caregivers. 

I have thought about this for the last five years, especially after reading Dr. Jean M. Twenge‘s book Generation Me and i-Gen.  And now I am getting ready to dive or embark upon her newest book titled, “10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World.”  I am excited to read it, but also nervous to see the data, research, and personal/professional experience of individuals that have been affected by our tech industry.  Let’s face the truth head on, I know it is a big pill to swallow—but tech industries, including social media corporations spend billions of dollars on keeping us addicted to the screen.  

The reality is America’s children are growing-up in a world where glowing screens often feel more present than family, friends, or even their own imaginations.  Phones, tablets, computers, and consoles have become the new pacifiers of modern childhood, luring kids into endless thumbnails, scrolling, clicks, and games designed to be addictive.  So much that the science community has called this addiction and loss of cognitive ability, “brain rot”.  What used to be hours spent outside inventing games, riding bikes, or climbing trees or building forts out of whatever we could find.  Are now hours lost to pixels, witty videos, and AI generated videos.   Parents, grandparents, or guardians everywhere see the signs—glazed eyes, short tempers when devices are taken away, and children who would rather live in virtual worlds than the vibrant one right outside their doors.  Parents, grandparents, guardians, and teachers are seeing the side effects.  Though many don’t truly understand because we don’t educate ourselves enough to truly see the long-term effect.  

But it doesn’t have to stay this way.  Parents, schools, and communities can reclaim childhood by setting hard boundaries and building alternatives that compete with screens—family dinners without phones, local clubs and sports, outdoor adventures, and genuine conversations that teach kids how to engage in the real world.  Every hour handed back to play, discovery, or face-to-face connection is an hour that protects the childhood wonder technology is stealing.  

The question we must ask today is urgent and simple—will we let screens raise our children, or will we fight for the joy, happiness, imagination, and freedom of their youth?  Don’t let screens steal away childhood—one hour, one day, one memory at a time.  Let’s start fighting back by power down for dinner, plan a family adventure, talk about the joy of real connection.  Find a mentor that shares authetic skills for real-life. I also believe more homes need to set-up boundaries which can refocus your child's or teen's activity, learning, and developing deep relationship is essential. So, reinforcing that only helps in the long-run. Without addiction to a smartphone or tablet, they can dream more, take adventure, and embrace a standard or self-expectation as they enter adulthood – and have their own kids. It’s not a stretch to conclude that you are saving – and giving them back, their lives.

Will you join me and others in protecting what matters most before it slips away? 

I would also like to encourage each of you that have kids or plan on having kids to read the books herein. I have also attached two great links for each of you as well.

https://youtu.be/4TMPXK9tw5U?si=8OkxxfARBcM5nxwr

https://www.ted.com/talks/adam_alter_why_our_screens_make_us_less_happy?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare

Respectfully,

Coach Frank Sagasta

        (c) Coachingbeyond LLC,