Deschooling/unschooling teen, T.V. and baby - Page 2

[sincitymama]

I think it sounds like you're doing fine with the older child. I'm planning to unschool my baby and have been reading about it a lot. Since you're still deschooling, I can understand why you'd be hesitant to start setting rules again that might, to your son, seem arbitrary. But he's part of the family and does need to know that the baby has needs too. I would not be comfortable having my 7mo ds exposed to that much tv.

13 years is plenty old enough to understand your concerns. Have you talked to him about it? Does he know about he recommendations that babies don't watch any tv at all, and why?

Another poster had good suggestions to present, about recording shows, planning things around baby's typical naptimes, etc.. I bet your son would have some good ideas too, if you go to him with the problem.

Like I said, this seems to be more of a meeting the needs of the whole family, rather than some random rule you decided to impose about how many hours per week he can watch or whatever, so I don't think it would be detrimental to the unschooling.

BTW, anyone freaking out about hte idea of not controling his tv time or not understanding what deschooling and unschooling are should check out unschooling.com, lots of good reading there to help you understand what it's all about.

[anythingelse]

dragonball I would not let an under 10 yr old watch because of the language they use & the the humor which is self deprecating and insulting to women, the female charators are often the butt of jokes on that one.
Having a baby in the same room as TV is going is not gonna affect your baby IMHO except engage them in watching the colors and sounds which is a passive way to play

the other show I totally HATE Biily and Mandy because it is all stupid- insults & gross stuff & mocking not 'normal' kids constantly- the dark humor of the grim reaper trying to get on in todays world my ten yr old changes the channel to watch other stuff cause he know this one is BAD
We have sat down together and dissected this show to explain why it is totally inappropriate for him. He watches Pokemon & Yu gi Oh, likes the science discovery kids shoes, the animal planet stuff- loves games like Kirby, Mario Party, LOTR
again not for the under 10 crowd- both of the cartoons you mention are not ones I like my kids to watch &
we do watch TV, kids each have sets in their rooms and are into video games etc..

I can not give you POV as unschooling parent, my kids are self-directed in their days homeschooling and can sit and watch TV all day and night if they want and it is not part of deschooling either but these are movie/cartoon choices not viewed as 'good' ones in our house

We just went through this as someone gave my oldest ds a gift of 007 James Bond video game, you go on a mission and shot up bad guys. Not that horrbile a gift for a kid his age BUT I did not want my 4 & 7 yr old watching their big bro blow up and shoot people for 30 minutes with the guts all over the big screen TV

sometimes when you have more then one dc, the protection of the younger one is more vip then allowing the older one the freedom to sit and watch whatever he chooses I don't think those shows are bad for your baby now but this would be a great time to talk to your older ds about how his choices are going to be observed and imitated by younger siblings. which you prob already have done
I found it best to sit and watch with my kids what they were watching and mute during commercials to talk about what we see.
It is obvious you care a great deal and are wondering what to do, when I am not sure I usually go with my gut choice. If that contradicts our parenting method'guideline' or homeschooling method' guideline' so be it .
(part of the reason i strongly dislike labels in mothering)
You can be 'AP' and use a crib or stroller, you can be 'unschooling' and set a limit on watching bad TV.
You can't erase your child's past experiences, but you can teach him how to make good choices and you can model to him by having him observe you with younger child the importance of making good choices in everything that surrounds them. Food, toys, tv shows etc.. you could get your older one involved in this decision. Ask him what he thinks about the baby watching this, go to the library together and have HIM read the book on toddler development and TV viewing.
I wish you luck sorting this out.

mom to ds 16, ds10, ds7, and dd 5

[Dar]

I don't see a problem with the baby being in the room, then. I think it's a question of balance. If you were plopping the baby in front of the tv and going off to do your nails for 3 hours, that's not good... and if the baby was watching tv all day I don't think that would be good either... but when Rain was little we'd watch tv together, and I'd point stuff out, and she'd sing and dance with the tv. Oh, and she learned all about earthquakes from cartoons... actually there's a lot of into in some of those cartoons. If your older son is up for it I can see it as a potential binding experience - my brother and I were 10 and 12 when my sister was born, and we would watch our shows with her and tell her who to cheer and who to boo, and get her to look for certain things, and stuff like that. There are all kinds of ways to watch tv, no studies I know ever differentiate.

I would use the other ideas, too - tape some shows, plan some activities with baby when you know your older son's favorite shows are on, etc. I just wouldn't stress on the baby watching some Dragonballz or whatever. He won't understand enough of the plot for that to be an issue right now, anyway...

Dar

[Dar]

Originally Posted by Vanna's Mom

[url]
PS thread hijacking here--------
I'm out in the boonies but we are in so cal, we have fire in our backyard orange grove mountains tonight and I can not sleep, Vanna has been coughing off and on all day from crud in the air

Wow, scary! I hope they get the fires under control today...

We have a lot of small fires this time of year, but we're very ag with just isolated stands of trees near the houses, so fires generally just burn one field and die out... generally the winter wheat fields where the wheat has been harvested. The other fieleds are too wet still... but it's scary to be driving home and seeing a huge cloud of smoke right around where the house is, even know it;s probably just a field.

Dar

[MarineWife]

Originally Posted by klothos

especially for a baby, exposure to a great deal of television will affect their language development and their ability to communicate, as well as how they think (not to mention what they think about). at 6 months old, babies need to not be watching tv, no matter the content

Thanks you, Klothos. This is exactly the type of opinion/info I was looking for. I'm glad you understood what I meant in my original post. I worry that I don't make myself clear but I try not to make my posts too long. As you can see from my last post, I can be quite longwinded.

I will definitely look into the AAP recommendations on this. It hadn't even occured to me to look there for info on TV viewing. I do like the idea of taping shows to watch at a time when baby is napping. I will definitely discuss the issues of how these shows may affect my baby with my older ds and see what kind of solutionswe can both come up with.

As far as being exposed to advertising, I totally agree that advertisers try to brainwash consumers. I remember reading a report several years back about subliminal messages in ads. I think this is one of those places where we have to take personal responsibility for talking with our children about the trickery involved in that stuff. My older ds is not fiercely loyal to brands, never has been, and does not fall for all the stereotyping that he sees. I don't think he'd even know the difference between most brands even if he does recognize the various logos. I have always been the type to make comments about commercials and big business and stereotyping and so forth. It's quite wonderful now when he tells me about a commercial or other ad he's seen that is biased in someway. The only times he has ever been strongly influenced into wanting only a certain thing is from his friends. For example, right now he's begging for a skateboard but it can't just be any skateboard. He wants to buy all the parts seperately so he can build the ultimate skateboard and all the parts have to be of a particular brand. He did not learn of this from TV. He learned it from a friend who skates and with whom he went to the skate shop.

This goes hand in hand with the content of shows. I do not like most of the shows on TV, including Dragonball Z and Billy and Mandy and such. This is exactly why I don't want to tell him he has to watch this stuff by himself or that he can't watch it all. I'd much rather be able to watch it with him so that we can discuss the issues presented and he can get my point of view.

SarahNH, I posted this exact same question on Unschooling.com so that I could compare answers. I figured I'd get vastly opposing view points. This way I could see all sides and make a more informed decision about this.

[MarineWife]

Originally Posted by thistle

Even without TV she still managed to learn who Spiderman is! She is only 2!!

This is an interesting dilemma to ponder.