Screenagers Movie Screening - March 14, 2017

Snow Date March 28, 2017

Monroe Woodbury High School, Monroe Woodbury, NY
Cost: $5.00 for movie
CTLE modules are FREE to any librarian in our 7 counties

Professional Development Opportunity Sponsored by School Library Media Specialists of Southeastern NY
This is open to teachers, technology coaches, and librarians in the following counties: Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland, Sullivan, Ulster, and Westchester 

Workshop for CTLE Hours

Dr. Andrea Tejedor will facilitate a 15-hour workshop exploring Screenagers and Digital Literacy. Participants will attend the screening at the Monroe-Woodbury High School at 7:00 p.m. on March 14, 2017. This will be followed by 3 online modules that will explore how to create the balance described in the documentary while still leveraging the technologies to empower student learning by examining the following questions: 

1. Do digital natives need digital literacy?

2. What is internet safety?

3. How is digital literacy connected to creativity?

4. How do we define digital rights?

The cost of attending the screening and workshop is $5. (Dates of Workshop: March 14 – April 11. Blended Format: Attend screening of documentary on 3/14/17 and complete discussions and assignments online.) If you are interested in participating in the workshop register for the screening at:, and email

Screenagers & Digital Literacy

Screenagers is a documentary about the impact of the digital age on children and how to help them find balance. Since it premiered earlier this year the movie has been sweeping the country screening 2000 times to audiences filled with hundreds of parents and kids. It has been shown in almost every state and 15 countries — including 4 times in Saudi Arabia earlier this month. Screenagers is only being screened in community settings like schools, churches, synagogues, community groups and companies. Tech companies like Google, Microsoft, Adobe and Autodesk have all hosted employee screenings. Schools tell the filmmakers about how this movie is drawing out huge audiences of parents like nothing they’ve ever experienced. 


Screenagers emerged directly from a chapter in Dr. Ruston's own life. She was facing a challenge that caught her off-guard — raising teenagers whose attention was increasingly consumed by screen-based activities. With a 14-year-old son who loved video gaming and a 12-year-old daughter who was lobbying hard for her own smart phone, she encountered frequent battles on both fronts. She would work on being tolerant, then suddenly lose her patience, and then feel guilty for getting mad. 

She saw how school administrations were becoming more lenient about phones in classrooms even though many teachers were exasperated trying to police phones. She also saw that there was a real lack of digital citizenship being talked in classrooms. At her daughter’s middle school, the digital citizenship “curriculum” consisted of a single assembly by a police officer who scared the kids about stranger danger and then went on to blame the students for cyberbullying. Science has shown that scare tactics do not effectively influence children’s behavior. 

As a physician, she became increasingly anxious to know how the tech world affects children’s development. She started finding new research on the impact of video gaming and social media on self- esteem, empathy, social skill development, academics and brain development. As a mom, she wanted to examine how we can better manage screen time in our homes and schools. What does science teach us about teaching self-control? How can we best encourage youth to find their own ways to achieve balance? What limits and rules are reasonable and how do we implement them?