The two seminars will take place from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. on 5-6/9 at Rex Hotel Saigon, 141 Nguyen Hue, Saigon ward, Ho Chi Minh City.
Jocelyn Brewer is a registered psychologist in Australia and the founder of Digital Nutrition, a platform established in 2013 to help families approach digital device use from multiple perspectives, rather than solely focusing on screen time. Her field of expertise is cyberpsychology, which studies how humans interact with technology.
Before becoming a sought-after speaker at many international educational events, she taught and worked as a school psychology consultant in the Australian public school system for 16 years, from 2003 to 2021. In 2015, she was a TEDx speaker.
The program targets parents with children aged 0-6 and 7-12. The first seminar, for parents with children aged 0 to 6, will focus on early developmental changes, where children's language and emotional bonding abilities are formed through eye contact, voice, and direct responses from adults. A key question will be what might be replaced when screens appear in interactions between children and adults.
The second seminar, for parents with primary school-aged children, will focus on the impact of AI on cognitive development. The central question is what activities children will still perform when using AI, and what tasks technology might perform instead.
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Jocelyn Brewer, founder of Digital Nutrition. Photo: Provided by subject
Jocelyn Brewer stated that through the program, she hopes to explore how children's relationship with technology evolves as they grow up. The Digital Nutrition approach does not just focus on simple rules about screen time, but also guides families to look deeper into the quality, context, and purpose of technology use.
"I hope to connect scientific research with the experiences and practical questions of Vietnamese families, so parents can leave the session with practical suggestions that can be flexibly applied to each child and their family values," she added.
Regarding the reason for organizing seminars on this topic, Do Thu Phuong, Deputy General Director of Vinschool, noted that with the increasing rate of children accessing digital devices early, especially for learning English, the lack of expert knowledge creates a gap that many parents try to fill with personal experience or fragmented advice from social media.
"We are not looking for a speaker who talks generally about parenting in the digital age. What Vinschool needs is someone who truly understands what is happening in a child's mind when they face screens, algorithms, and AI," Ms. Do Thu Phuong emphasized.
The Deputy General Director of Vinschool affirmed that this direction is a natural continuation of "thuan dong" education (education in harmony with nature and development), which the institution has pursued since preschool. Vinschool aims to help parents understand where their children are in their developmental journey to provide appropriate support.
"With the advancement of technology, parents do not need more lists of prohibitions. Instead, they need someone to help them ask the right questions," she said.
Vinschool invited psychologist Jocelyn Brewer because she focuses on examining the quality of content, the context of technology use, and the role of adults alongside children. Digital Nutrition guides parents to evaluate technology experiences based on these factors, rather than just emphasizing the number of minutes children use devices.
The two seminars will be interactive. Parents will participate directly, engage in group discussions about real-life situations, and ask questions during dedicated Q&A sessions. The organizers will also accept questions from parents in advance to include in the discussion content.
Nhat Le
Parents can register to participate here.
