Educational tech: how to support your child’s hobbies digitally – Growing Family

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In 2026, technology plays a strange and dual role in our lives. On one hand, it offers endless opportunities for learning and exploration; on the other, it can easily pull us into mindless entertainment.

For example, during a nature walk a child could open a phone’s identification app, point it at a wildflower, and spend a few minutes comparing the leaf shapes with the app’s results. In this scenario, the app doesn’t detract from their experience – it makes it more interesting. That same phone, left unchecked at home, could have meant hours spent lost in Roblox before dinner.

This is the odd reality of children and technology in 2026. The device that can turn a garden walk into a science lesson is the same device that can swallow an entire evening. The apps that teach, inspire, and encourage creativity sit right next to the ones designed to keep small fingers tapping forever. And without some kind of structure, the second group always wins.

The good news is that setting up that structure is simpler than it sounds.

When screen time actually feeds a real-world hobby

There’s a real difference between screen time that leaves children glazed over and screen time that sends them running to the garden with a magnifying glass. A plant identification app is a perfect example.

Hand a child a phone with something like Seek by iNaturalist on a nature walk and something shifts. Suddenly every leaf is worth photographing, every wildflower needs looking up, and the walk home involves plans to press flowers and label them properly. That’s learning in action, not passive consumption.

Drawing tutorial apps work the same way. Children who love to sketch can follow step-by-step lessons on a tablet, then transfer those new skills to paper and canvas. Gardening apps can help them plan beds, track planting schedules, and learn about companion planting. The technology becomes a springboard, not a replacement.

The trick is making sure these enriching apps don’t end up buried under a pile of distracting ones. And that’s where a bit of practical planning comes in.

Sorting the ‘positive’ apps from the ‘passive’ ones

It might help to think about children’s apps in two simple categories. There are the positive apps, the ones that actively support their interests, teach them something, or encourage them to create. And then there are the passive apps, the ones designed to keep them tapping and scrolling with no real purpose beyond entertainment.

Both have their place. But the issue comes when the passive apps eat into all the available screen time, leaving no room for the ones that genuinely enrich a child’s hobbies.

What if you could set things up so that the educational and creative apps were always available, while the time-sink games had a clear daily limit? That way, a child could spend as long as they like identifying butterflies on iNaturalist or following a watercolour tutorial, but Roblox or whatever the current obsession happens to be would switch off after thirty minutes.

How app groups make this simple

This is exactly the approach you can take with Salfeld Child Control, a parental control tool that’s been around since 1998 (originally developed for Windows 98, which gives you a sense of how established it is). What makes it particularly useful for families with active, hobby-driven children is the App Groups feature.

Setting up the groups

The idea is straightforward. You create groups of apps based on how the child uses them. So you might have a “Creative & Learning” group containing things like Seek by iNaturalist, Tayasui Sketches, YouTube (filtered to art and gardening channels), and a favourite drawing app. This group can be set to unlimited access, with no time cap, because these are the apps you don’t mind them using.

Then you create a second group, perhaps “Games & Social”, for the apps you want to keep in check. Set a daily or weekly time limit for this group, and the software handles the rest. When the limit is reached, those apps lock automatically, but everything in the “Creative & Learning” group stays accessible.

It takes the arguing out of screen time. The child knows the rules because the device enforces them consistently. No negotiations, no “just five more minutes” at the dinner table.

A few other features worth knowing about

Cross-device tracking with roaming

Salfeld’s app works across both Windows and Android, with a single web portal to manage everything. So if a child uses a tablet for drawing apps and a laptop for homework, you can set shared time limits across both devices using the Roaming feature. No more “but my tablet time ran out so I switched to the computer” loopholes.

Bonus time for positive screen time

The Bonus Time feature allows you to designate certain apps as “bonus apps,” and time spent on them actually earns the child extra screen time elsewhere. So twenty minutes on a maths app might automatically unlock ten extra minutes of gaming. It’s a carrot-not-stick approach that rewards the right kind of screen time without you having to manage it manually.

Web filtering for independent browsing

The web filter is useful too, particularly for older children who are starting to browse independently. You can filter by age or category, or set up a whitelist of approved sites.

Making technology work for your family

We don’t have to see technology and real-world hobbies as being at odds with each other. A child who loves nature can use an app to deepen that love. A child who loves drawing can find new techniques and inspiration on a tablet. The role of technology is to add another layer to what they’re already passionate about.

Setting up clear boundaries around which apps get unlimited access and which ones have limits doesn’t take long, and it makes a genuine difference to how children experience their devices. Rather than fighting over screen time, you’re guiding it, and that feels like a much healthier approach for everyone.

Trying it out

If you’d like to give it a try, Salfeld offers a free 30-day trial with all features included, so you can set up your app groups and see how it works for your family before committing. There’s no credit card needed, and it cancels automatically with no sneaky renewals.

Over to you

Do your children use any apps to support their hobbies? Share what’s worked well for your family in the comments.