Approach

The Balance Project brings parents, administrators and community leaders together to collectively address the challenges at hand given a modern, screen-based childhood. By focusing on encouraging both mindful technology usage and meaningful real-life experiences, The Balance Project aims to help parents and communities give children the building blocks of healthy development and the skillsets they need to thrive in our ever-evolving modern society.

Illustration listing "The 4 new norms" with: no smartphones before high school, no social media before 16, phone-free schools, and more independence and free play. Features a cartoon of a person with a phone.

We are grounding ourselves in the four norms that are laid out in The Anxious Generation and are building a holistic behavior-changing approach and community program around them collectively.

These “four norms” are broadly supported by the mental health community and each play an equally important role in achieving our goals of a healthy tech/life balance.

You can learn more about the four norms here.

Presentation slide with title 'Our Approach' and bullet points about implementing 'The Anxious Generation' concepts holistically, focusing on sustainable behavior change, consensus-building, and curating support for stakeholders.

We believe that active collaboration, healthy debate and consensus-building are the keys to success for true change.

Our approach is built with this in mind and offers opportunities for input from all relevant stakeholders: parents, children, teachers, administrators, mental health professionals, occupational therapists, etc.

We were thrilled to see that the newly released Department of Education “Planning Together” playbook aligns with our approach, confirming we are on the right path.

We have created a straight-forward four-step process to support this approach, along with tools, templates, training and support along the way. We’re happy to share more about this process if you’d like — just send us a note!

Four steps labeled 1 to 4 with words: 1 - invite, 2 - excite, 3 - unite, 4 - activate.

Our Process

A group of people attentively listening to a presentation in a modern meeting room. The speaker is standing near a screen displaying text, and the audience is seated on chairs, focused on the presentation.
Group of women posing inside a room with a minimalist modern design, in front of a wall sign featuring a house logo and text. They are smiling, wearing casual clothing, and standing on a wooden floor.
Group of five women smiling in front of a 'welcome' sign indoors.
Woman writing on a large sheet of paper attached to a wall during a parent discussion workshop. The paper lists topics like parental controls, privacy, and phone usage. She is smiling and holding a marker with presentation materials on the table near
A virtual meeting with five people on a video call interface, each in a separate window. One window is muted, indicated by a muted microphone icon. The background varies for each participant, with some being in a home setting and others with virtual
Group of people sitting in a room, laughing and listening, with name tags on their clothes.

Learn more about starting or joining a community here!