The Truth About Televisionby Valorie Delp | More from this Blogger 25 Feb 2007 05:08 AM Upon hearing the theme song to "Little Einstein's" my 20 month old twins begin patting and dancing until the exciting climax: 'blast off'! Surely this is a great show right? It introduces my little ones to classical music and teaches all about music theory. And what about Elmo's world? That's educational too! In fact, if I listen to commercials, marketing and advertisements, there are a whole slew of media products designed to boost my twins' brain power seven fold. (Hey, a foreign language DVD anyone?) I admit that my toddlers watch the occasional T.V. Apparently, we are a rare household. Each of my older children (ages 3, 5, and 7) is allowed 1 thirty minute show per day. ('Little Einsteins' is my 3 year old's favorite.) I have no real means of separating the twins out of the mix, so they too usually end up watching a show or two. At most, if everyone was allowed to sit through and watch everyone else's show, they'd get a whopping ninety minutes of television. While that happens--it's rare. My twins have yet to discover the wonders of Buzz Lightyear (the show of choice for the 5 year old). However, in a recent survey 43% of households allowed their babies under the age of 2 to watch at least 60 minutes or more of television per day. It is not alarming to me that moms use the television as a babysitter on occasion. If you think that sounds horrible. . .I suspect you either have lots of help or only one child who happens to take long naps. We moms after all, have to shower, cook dinner, get a smidgen of cleaning done and sometimes it can't all happen with junior under foot. A little distraction is a handy advantage every once in awhile. What's alarming to me is that we (as in our society) seem to have moved from using television as the short lived 'distraction' to using it to build brainier babies. We are led to believe, by advertising that this DVD or that program will enhance our baby's life in one way or another. Media products for babies pitch their stuff as "brain food" able to help with cognitive development, there is little research to back up these claims. The truth is that we really don't know what effect television has on children under the age of 2 years old. The American Association of Pediatrics recommends that children under age 2 get no television time whatsoever. That includes video games too by the way. In part, it distracts from the natural process of learning. Rather than encouraging them to move and explore a natural world, it encourages them to sit and look at images. Did you know television actually projects images and information more slowly than our brains our capable of processing? The more television we watch, the slower our brains get! (This research was based on a study done older children.) No matter how you look at it, you can't get away from the fact that the best way to build your baby's brain and 'encourage' cognitive development is to personally interact with your baby. Look soon for more blogs soon on this topic highlighting claims made by distributors. Related Articles: Children's Television Shows to Promote Exercise? Watching TV with Your Children Television is NOT a Good Babysitter! Learn more about Valorie Delp  Hello everybody! My name is Valorie and I am one busy lady! When I'm not writing or editing for families, I am busy trying to get my brood of 5 in line. Relevantbaby tags User Comments  Lyn Newton (3966) 25 Feb 2007 05:57 AMGreat article, Valorie! Directv even has a channel just for babies. The advertisement discusses how educational it is! My 3 year old almost refuses to watch TV (for any amount longer than 10min). Sometimes I wish she would for just a full 30 minutes show, but I guess I'm lucky! She'll have brain power!!!  Lisa P (24013) 25 Feb 2007 07:09 AMGood article and great points. I'd like to add a two very small points and a confession though - 1. For those parents who use television as a tool, it can be very effective. For instance, I'm teaching my son (age 2) French as he learns English. (I grew up speaking French.) I find that a good tool for this purpose is the Muzzy program in French. It is broken up into short 30 minute segments. We watch one 30 minute segment together every day and practice the vocabulary it introduces together. 2. For some reason the Baby Mozart DVD always seems to calm my child when he has a tantrum that lasts too long because he is overtired and can't settle down enough to sleep. Mozart has always had a positive effect on him that way. 3. I'm guilty of using a few select Disney movies to distract my son when I need to get work done. Luckily, my job is changing soon and I won't have to put in nearly as many hours as I used to.  Valorie Delp (49340) 25 Feb 2007 07:51 AMThanks Lisa. . .you should check back tomorrow to see what I write about foreign language products for babies! I am all for using T.V. as a needed distraction. Believe me, the year after the twins were born my kids' brains went numb from too much t.v. Sometimes there's just no other way. I don't like when I see parents (for some reason first time parents are particularly succeptible) buying things they don't need to benefit the 'cognitive development' of their child. Television, in whatever form, just isn't that great for our kids. It's like soda for the brain. But you're right. You can use t.v. as a tool. . .but I'll get to that in the next few blogs. ;-)  QueenAngie Central Illinois, USA (59956) 25 Feb 2007 01:09 PMTV can be very educational for children....within certain limits and for short periods of time. I think it is good for children to learn to appreciate classical music, musicals, literature, art, dance, and more. Using specific shows can help this. Lisa, I didn't know you spoke French. Another new twist in your history. Some of us only speak English. From my Swedish heritage, I only know one simple folk song and a few spoken words. What a shame this wasn't shared more when I was growing up. Thanks for sharing some of the good things that come from viewing TV!  mama2riley (24481) 25 Feb 2007 01:31 PMGreat article Valorie! This is an area in our routine I am making some choices about now because up until the last couple months my son had no interest in tv. Now he asks for it everyday and for one specific show in particular. I only allow him to watch one short video a day, which has led to a few temper tantrums lately when he wants to watch more than that. I started letting him watch some Sesame Street in the mornings now too, which I have seen him learn language from firsthand. My son is a VERY visual person - he actually loves books even more than tv which I am so glad for, but has a great interest in tv as a result. I want to be sure that tv time he does get is limited and educational and that it doesn't become something I am dependant on every day to keep him occupied (although everyone has days where that is certainly needed!) Thanks for the great comments to consider.  karabu (980) 25 Feb 2007 10:50 PMI'm so full of guilt latley because I'm 7 1/2 mo. pregnant, exausted all the time, and letting my 3 year old watch way more TV than I otherwise would be comfortable with. Hopefull this temporary indulgence won't cause too much harm, becaue I just don't think I'm up to much else right now. Looking forard to more info. Valorie Delp (49340) 26 Feb 2007 05:12 AMI soooo did that with my subsequent pg. Each child got to watch more and more t.v. and with the twins. . .forget about it. During pregnancy and their first year of life they lived off of t.v. I think. We've always gotten back out of the habit of watching too much t.v. Like I said, sometimes they're just isn't anything else that can be done.  Kay M. (300) 26 Feb 2007 10:52 PMAs a grandmother *yikes* I find that I do limit the amount of televison viewing my grandson Jaden watches while he is in my care. He does enjoy Einsteins and Dora the Explorer. I like teaching him the Spanish words during Dora, and I feel the Baby Einsteins have all the classical music and art appreciation built into the program. Most any other show doesn't keep his attention so I am thrilled. Many parents/grandparents do seem to use the television as a babysitter. As a former teacher I raised my own children without a single gameboy, ninetendo etc in my house and lots of books. My own children have gone on to college and careers. Many of their peers have gotten into trouble or are stalled in their lives. It kinda makes you stop and think about removing more than just television time. We are raising a society of kids that: don't know how to add. won't listen to authority, are addicted to video games and violence, who defy authority, who cannot seem to understand basic language skills and so much more. Frightening --- right? We could change it all when they are little-- with just a few minor adjustments. At least that is my humble opinion. Valorie Delp (49340) 27 Feb 2007 05:15 AMWe too are archaic in that we do not have any gaming systems. We will not allow our children to have them. ;-)  Julie Gentry (5915) 01 Mar 2007 11:30 PMSTick to that, Valorie! We have a Wii, Gamecube, Sega, Gameboys, DS, DS Lite, and who knows what else. If I had it to do over, I'd have fought my dh harder against them. While they're certainly enjoyable, they have to be closely monitored :-(. Valorie Delp (49340) 02 Mar 2007 05:45 AMLOL! My dh desparately wants the Wii! I have a friend whose in-laws are very indulgent and so she only lets her kids play on the weekends. But at least right now, our little ones are very likely to destroy them. Community Tags children, television Discuss this article
|
Baby categories |
