Finally, after years of wanting to do this, Lisa Tabb and I, along with our Screenagers team, have launched a national campaign to get devices out of the bedroom at sleep time for elementary and middle schoolers.
And read on, because my blog today will make you laugh and smile!
I’m sharing a spoof video we made to kick off the campaign! You’ll also find an invitation to chat with me directly about how you can help activate the campaign in your community. Scroll down for Zoom dates and links.
As has been discussed for years, anxiety, depression, and academic problems have been increasing among youth. A major contributor to this mental health crisis is sleep deprivation, partly driven by screens in the bedroom at night.
Our goal: Empower parents to remove devices from bedrooms and replace them with simple alarm clocks. The more parents ensure this for their kids, the more it becomes the norm. We see it as the “seatbelt” of our time.
To create the Screen-Free Sleep Campaign, Lisa and I partnered with creative director Dave Cicirelli to design a fun, engaging way to educate and motivate parents, and to make the effort easy for anyone to spread in their communities across the nation..
This led to the iSleep Pro, a kit designed to look like an iPhone box, featuring a 9-year-old on the cover and, inside, an eye mask, alarm-clock stickers, and a guide on why the best tech at bedtime is no tech at all.
The Campaign launched with flair in New York City on August 12th, 2025, when “Steve Jobs lookalikes” performed flash mob dances throughout the city, handing out iSleep Pro kits and engaging with families.
These fun kits will be the cornerstone for adults (hopefully you) to bring into schools and communities, sparking conversations about the why and how of screen-free sleep for kids.
One feature of our campaign is a playful two-minute video. If you remember the original Steve Jobs iPhone announcement, keep that in mind as you watch, and enjoy!
Link to iSleep Pro Video to make you smile
With much appreciation and joy,
Delaney Ruston, MD
Working together, we can do this! I know it seems lofty, but parents have led big safety shifts before, from car seats to bike helmets. With your help, we can do the same for bedtime. When Lisa and I launched Away for the Day in 2017 to get phones out of schools, many people weren’t sold on it. Yet, as of now, 34 states and Washington, D.C., have enacted or are in the process of implementing policies that ban or restrict cellphones in schools.
*Why we are focused on elementary and middle schoolers: Over 80% of teens sleep with phones in their rooms, and changing that is difficult. By starting earlier, we can help make screen-free sleep the norm, which can more easily become a routine that can be carried on into the high school years.
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Finally, after years of wanting to do this, Lisa Tabb and I, along with our Screenagers team, have launched a national campaign to get devices out of the bedroom at sleep time for elementary and middle schoolers.
And read on, because my blog today will make you laugh and smile!
I’m sharing a spoof video we made to kick off the campaign! You’ll also find an invitation to chat with me directly about how you can help activate the campaign in your community. Scroll down for Zoom dates and links.
As has been discussed for years, anxiety, depression, and academic problems have been increasing among youth. A major contributor to this mental health crisis is sleep deprivation, partly driven by screens in the bedroom at night.
Our goal: Empower parents to remove devices from bedrooms and replace them with simple alarm clocks. The more parents ensure this for their kids, the more it becomes the norm. We see it as the “seatbelt” of our time.
To create the Screen-Free Sleep Campaign, Lisa and I partnered with creative director Dave Cicirelli to design a fun, engaging way to educate and motivate parents, and to make the effort easy for anyone to spread in their communities across the nation..
This led to the iSleep Pro, a kit designed to look like an iPhone box, featuring a 9-year-old on the cover and, inside, an eye mask, alarm-clock stickers, and a guide on why the best tech at bedtime is no tech at all.
The Campaign launched with flair in New York City on August 12th, 2025, when “Steve Jobs lookalikes” performed flash mob dances throughout the city, handing out iSleep Pro kits and engaging with families.
These fun kits will be the cornerstone for adults (hopefully you) to bring into schools and communities, sparking conversations about the why and how of screen-free sleep for kids.
Have you ever read a magazine in a dentist's chair, and it made you want to jump out of the chair? That is what happened to me when I saw an ad, which is the photo of today’s blog. I was completely shocked that people in the industry would have the nerve to imply that taking a drug is how a small child “sleeps naturally.”
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Understanding just how much insufficient sleep affects our children is a motivator to help them get the best sleep possible. As kids return to school, resetting sleep habits and rules around tech in the bedroom is hard but imperative. I share why sleep is so important and what you can do to help make a tech-free bedtime less painful. Most importantly, I share some of my favorite ways to set and maintain rules around sleep time - They might surprise you!
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Today I discuss powerful research regarding how sleep deficiency can impact brain development. Having a calm conversation about the latest science of sleep and brain development before even broaching the ideas of new sleep rules can be effective.
READ MORE >for more like this, DR. DELANEY RUSTON'S NEW BOOK, PARENTING IN THE SCREEN AGE, IS THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE FOR TODAY’S PARENTS. WITH INSIGHTS ON SCREEN TIME FROM RESEARCHERS, INPUT FROM KIDS & TEENS, THIS BOOK IS PACKED WITH SOLUTIONS FOR HOW TO START AND SUSTAIN PRODUCTIVE FAMILY TALKS ABOUT TECHNOLOGY AND IT’S IMPACT ON OUR MENTAL WELLBEING.
