Screenwise: Helping Kids Thrive (and Survive) in Their Digital World October 15, 2016 by Devorah Heitner 
Screenwise offers an encouraging perspective on how to thoughtfully guide kids in the digital age. Many parents and educators worry that kids are addicted, detached, or distracted because of their digital devices. Digital Citizenship expert Devorah Heitner, however, believes that technology offers huge potential to our children--if parents help them.

Best Books for Kids Commonsensemedia.org
Sure, your kids love Harry Potter and Twilight -- but what else will keep young bookworms reading? Whether you're on the hunt for classic kids' books or best sellers, our "best books" lists are full of stories that are bound to spark kids' imagination and keep the pages turning.
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Association Between Screen Time and Children's Performance on a Developmental Screening Test. Sheri Madigan, PhD., Dillon Brown, PhD., Nicole Racine, PhD. JAMA Pediatrics, Published online January 28, 2019. doi:10,1001/jamapediatrics.2018.5056
Excessive screen time is associated with delays in development; however, it is unclear if greater screen time predicts lower performance scores on developmental screening tests or if children with poor developmental performance receive added screen time as a way to modulate challenging behavior. The results of this study support the directional association between screen time and child development. Recommendations include encouraging family media plans, as well as managing screen time, to offset the potential consequences of excess use. 

Brain Drain: The Mere Presence of One's Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity. Adrian F. Ward, Kristen Duke, Ayelet Gneezy, and Maarten W. Bos
Researchers find that people’s mental capacity, their ability to hold pieces of information and combine it in new patterns aka learning, was greatly reduced just by having cell phones on their desks with the sound off or near them in a bag or pocket. The cell phones were found to create “brain drain” as people work to inhibit their attention to the phone and are thus unable to engage fully with the task at hand. Ironically, the more consumers depend on their smartphones, the more they seem to suffer from their presence—or, more optimistically, the more they may stand to benefit from their absence. However, the data suggest at least one simple solution: separation.
Note: Students who had their phones on their desks said that they weren’t thinking about them (any more than the other students) and didn’t predict that their phones would distract them (any more than the other students). So, people are unaware of the effect.
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College Students' Test Scores Suffer with Cell Phone Use in Class, Longwood Research Finds
Dr. Chris Bjornsen publication in Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology, an American Psychological Association Journal
The study tracked the in-class cell phone use of 218 students in the six courses taught over both semesters during the 2013-14 school year. At the end of each class period, each student filled out a brief questionnaire—their responses were confidential but not anonymous—about how frequently, and for what purpose, they used their cell phone in class. There were 4,735 completed surveys. The study found significantly lower test scores for those who use their cell phone for social media ("read or send email, text message, Facebook, Twitter"), which was "overwhelmingly" the most frequent use, and for playing games, which is far less frequent. The average decrease in scores for each use was .6 for the former and 3.1 for the latter. Note that students with a 2.0 gpa reported use 3.8 times per class. Cell phone use is an independent and significant predictor of test scores. Above and beyond GPA, cell phone use still predicts changes on test scores. 

The Relationship Between Cell Phone Use, Academic Performance, Anxiety, and Satisfaction with Life in College Students
Kent State University, College of Education, Health and Human Services, Kent, OH 44242-000, USA
Researchers studied cell phone use in a large group of college students. They found that the more students used cell phones, the greater their anxiety was and the lower their grade point averages. With increased anxiety over s grades were lower, satisfaction with life was negatively affected. use increased anxiety
Cell phone use negatively affects grade point averages
High anxiety and lower GPAs lead to lower satisfaction with life.