TV and daycare

[homefrontgirl]

This came out the week of Thanksgiving:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/11/28....tv/index.html



We send our DS to in-home childcare 4 days a week. We we're very upfront from the beginning about being tv-free at home and asked many questions about the tv/screen practices that our provider used. As a result, we're very happy with the very limited tv time that is used. Plus, our provider has alternative activities for our DS to do if the tv is on. My sister is in another boat entirely. In her in-home daycare, the tv is constantly. She never really thought about it until she heard this study on the radio last week.

Those of you who do daycare, do you find this study to be accurate? Did you ask questions about tv-time before you placed your child in day care? I'm really curious about daycare centers since my experience is with in-home care only. Any discussion or comments would be welcome. I can't ever talk about this issue IRL since no one I know is tv-fee.

[Nazsmum]

I'm not shocked! It is a sad but true.

[MamaMonica]

Moved to Parenting.

[MadiMamacita]

I am just about to start taking care of some kids in my home. I have a policy of no screen time. period. for anyone. a good day care should not park the kids in front of the set. they should engage the kids all day long and come up with fun activities to replace the tv.
I have worked in a tv free daycare, and its great. The director had a full schedule for us to do with the kids and we never missed it. (mostly crafts, and rotating indoor play with outdoor play. eating, story time, and naps eat up a good portion of the day as well!)

[spedteacher30]

If the daycare my son attended had children watch TV, the TVs were well-hidden. I was in every room in the center at some point or another, and never saw a TV. We never asked, because we never saw a TV in the center.

I know that the Montessori school he attends rarely uses the TV. They have elementary and middle school classrooms where they occasionally watch TV, but they always send a letter home to the parents prior to a TV-related activity (e.g. they showed the inauguration of Obama to the older kids). the younger children never watch TV.

[bscal]

The preschool that my younger 2 attends does not watch tv. The only exception would be if they have a guest speaker who brings a short video. For example if the firefighters come to visit they bring a 15 minute video on fire safety. Or the dental hygienist brings a 15 minute cartoon about cavities.

The parents know in advance about these things. In fact my older DD is in 1st grade and they use the tv for morning announcements every day for about 10 minutes and that's the only regular use. They will have occasional special programs, for example when the counselor shows a video for their sexual abuse prevention education (basically it's a 10 minute video about a cat with a really beautiful tail who doesn't like it when other people touch his tail... a lot of emphasis on respecting other ppl's personal space). We know in advance about this stuff too.

I think they'll probably have a movie the last day of school before Winter Break also, but haven't gotten notification of that yet.

As for daycare, I'd be ticked if my child was watching tv at daycare, either a home provider or a center. I kept a friend's children a couple days per week for several years and never felt the need to turn the tv on except for the occasional quick 30 minute PBS show for the older child when the younger one needed a bottle and rocked to sleep. But I was not a licensed provider either, I was doing a favor for a friend.

Beth

[mbm]

DD's daycare is mostly TV free. It is a home daycare and they own a TV but I have never seen it on. When I asked, the owner said she is TV free except for the occasional video on a rainy day, and I'm OK with that. We live in California so the kids spend a lot of time outside and there aren't too many rainy days!

[bumblecat]

Oh do ask! Don't assume anything just because you don't see any TVs. I worked in daycares for years and a couple had no tvs, but many did. They were never a permaent fixture in a room, but lived on a rolling cart so they could be shared between rooms. Every room except the infant room had scheduled time to have it, and when no one was using it, it was stored in a utility closet. It was rarely used during common drop off/ pick-up hours. Parents were not asked if it was ok for their child, or even told that there would be "movie day". I think the parents of older ones (3 and up) all knew, since the kids would talk about it, but the young toddlers parents may not have known. I was never in a lead teacher position so it wasn't up to me whether to use it, but I would usually host a quiet activity in another part of the room while it was on for any kids who felt like doing something else. I never really saw any "educational" stuff being shown - it would be feature length animated movies, or for the toddlers, barney or wiggles videos. From what I remember, it was usually once a week per class, but occasionally more.

[Llyra]

In DD1's preschool/daycare, there was a very specific policy about TV and other screen time. I was given a sheet when I signed her up that explained that they allowed up to 15 minutes a day for a child over 3 on the computer, but if there was any other screen time, I would get notification of it a few days ahead of time. That happened twice-- both times for the kids to watch a holiday special, once each year that DD was there. They didn't even have TVs per se-- the kids watched those two special shows on the computers.

[Aubergine68]

I strongly believe in keeping kids away from the tv. I run a no-screen-time home-based daycare. And I'm a provider with 13 years of university education, currently working on another college program by distance ed. (I don't like the "if you do childcare and especially home childcare you probably are undeducated /less educated" stereotype of the article)

I inform parents of my policies. The only time I might use screen time is if a child is sick and waiting for a pickup or I have to clean up vomit or broken glass, as I usually do not have another adult here during daycare hours.

It has been two years since I've plugged in a dvd for such a reason.

I do use a lot of books on cd for older children who don't nap, but no gaming, etc.

[St. Margaret]

My mom does child care in her home and TV is very limited. I think every once in a while they'll do a yoga kids dvd or something like that, but that may have been more back when she had more older kids, when the weather was bad and they needed to move a bit inside. Day to day, the TV is zero. She told me about this study and we were all pretty disgusted, b/c of how much it all adds up to, when you think about the TV at home, too. I teach, and I show a video maybe once a month on average (like if I'm sick or at the end of a unit), maybe 4-5 films a year, but they are things like performances of Romeo and Juliet, which I think is vital to studying Shakespeare, to see if performed. The kindergarten up the street shows 30 min of TV every darn day all year, like PBS kids. What is up with that?

[ashleyhaugh]

the 2 centers ive worked at have been tv free, but the random one i chose to do some observations for some ECE classes had centers in all the rooms except the infant room

[LynnS6]

If you read the article, there is considerably more screen time, on average, in home based daycares. That's why it's so important to ask about tv policies, and to pop in occasionally at random times to see what they're really doing. A lot of daycares have tvs running during 'nap time' to keep the non-nappers quiet. That's not OK for m.e

That's one of the reasons I chose a center based daycare. They are tv-free. There is a small amount of computer time sometimes, but it was sending Mom and Dad an e-mail. I'm OK with that, and it didn't start until after age 3.

[EnviroBecca]

My child attended a home daycare until age 2, then a center, and we just recently chose the home daycare where he'll go 2 hours a day after kindergarten in the fall. We asked about TV in all of these places. It was particularly important to us that he not watch any TV when he was under 2 years old.

The lady running our first home daycare assured us that she did not allow TV unless parents requested it and then only if she could arrange for their child to watch while others were napping. She said she'd had some parents who insisted that their child could hardly survive missing "Sesame Street" or whatever. As far as we could tell, she never did let our baby watch TV. However, after a while she had her sister move in with her and help with the childcare, and one day when she forgot I was picking up early, I came in to find her not there (she'd gone to the post office--but she never told us she'd go out and leave her sister in charge) and my toddler watching TV and sucking on hard candy!! That was the point at which we began looking for a new childcare. TV wasn't the only issue, but it was part of the whole incident that made us feel we might not be able to trust her.

The center where he goes now has educational computer games for limited use by 3-year-olds and older, but they do not have TV.

I believe there are plenty of other ways to occupy young children, so TV should be very limited, especially when I am paying people to care for my child.

[swisscanmom]

I run a home daycare and I was not surprised at the study, as I know of providers that have the TV running all day as "background" noise, which is disturbing to me.

I purposely do not have a TV in the playroom. But the playroom is downstairs and my kitchen upstairs, so I usually let them watch about 10-15 minutes while I make lunch, so they are near me. That is it for the day.
I think providers that leave the TV on miss out on important elements, like music, singing, reading stories, or just talking with the kids.

[Fuamami]

My kids were in very part-time daycare (about 5 hrs a week) for almost a year, and they watched a ton of TV. I pretty much condoned it because my youngest was only 1.5 at the time and he had a hard time separating and the TV helped. He would usually wander off and play after about 15 minutes, but my oldest would watch the entire time. We don't do TV at home, though, so while it wasn't ideal, I felt like it was OK. But I'm not surprised by the study. I know many of the home daycares I have looked at have huge TVs and just assume that you don't mind if it's running all day.

[JL83]

My DD has been in a center for the last 18 months. They watched TV once a week for 30 minutes. There was 1 TV for the entire center which was on a wheeled cart. It was used for the staff to have a "for sure" planning time to figure out the plan for the next week. None of the shows were things like Dora. And the show had some connection to that week's theme.

As it worked out, because DD was part time, she actually never watched TV at daycare.

When I did daycare in my home before I did use a small amount each day. I had 3 toddlers and 1 preschooler. I had to put all 3 toddlers down for their naps one at a time using slings. So the preschooler got to watch something (her parents could have cared less about screen time) while I did that. It was never more than 20/30 minutes. If I was to do it again, I might well get books on tape from the library instead.

[RoadBuddy]

DS doesn't go to daycare, but he does go to a one day a week (9-1) moms day out program. They have 30 minutes of TV and are upfront about it. It comes on after lunch, which ends at 12:30, and before the parents arrive at 1. There's a list of approved shows. It's mostly Nick Jr or PBS kids videos (Dora, Sesame Street, Blues Clues) and some kids song sing-a-longs. If it were totally up to me, I'd vote no TV, but it really doesn't bother me. DS watches a small amount at home, too, so I can't be hypocritical!

What would bother me is a TV constantly or frequently on. In our house, TV has a time - it comes on when DS is ready to watch his show for the day, then it turns off for the next day. We have it in an armoire with doors in the living room, so unless someone is specifically watching a show, the doors are closed and the TV is out of sight/out of mind. We also don't have cable, so DVDs are pretty much it. The way they do it at his class is similar (tv comes on after lunch only, no exceptions), so I'm OK with it.

[thatgirliknew]

I've worked at four daycares and one was completely TV Free, one allowed TV for movies on occasion, one allowed TV for the school age kids during naptime on summer break and one the TV was on constantly.

And now that I'm thinking about it, the completely TV Free daycare also was more family friendly and the children seemed so well behaved and they were always having fun. The other ones I worked in were not enjoyable experiences. Coincidence?

[Girlprof]

I would be really mad if I were paying someone to watch my child watch TV. Our kids go/went to a lovely daycare that is TV free. But my friends whose kids go to in-home places - all those kids watch at least some TV every day. I can see why. At our place, there are multiple teachers so they can have someone set up snack or help the kids fall asleep while the other people do story time or whatever. It's really different with more than one adult present.