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> If a kid watches 30m of Mr. Rogers every day, they’re going to be fine We try doing that with 20 min of Paw Patrol and it's impossible. Give a finger, they t
by stef25 7y ago
> If a kid watches 30m of Mr. Rogers every day, they’re going to be fine
We try doing that with 20 min of Paw Patrol and it's impossible. Give a finger, they take an arm. It's impossible to regulate the quantity.
No matter how many different options they have available to play or what promises you try to make before hand, it ALWAYS ends in a total meltdown. We get 20 min of peace, followed by 40 min of hysteria.
Before streaming media (YT, Netflix) we could watch something say Sunday 6PM or Saturday 7AM, and that was it. Now everything's on demand and they know perfectly well there's always more as long parents say ok.
The only solution is to stop. After a few days of no TV, they stop asking and happily draw, leaf through books, build stuff. But nothing says "peace" like a kid watching TV.
- jacobolus 7y agoMaybe try watching full-length ballets or operas instead, or nature videos, cooking shows, videos of people doing carpentry projects, videos of people playing music, ... Or something along the lines of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Life_of_Machines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Secret_Life_of_Machines Dunno.. I tend to watch video with my 3.5 year old rather than leaving him to watch video while I go do something else. We only watch videos occasionally (maybe 3 hours/week on average), and don’t really end up with meltdowns when we stop. But that method doesn’t help if the goal was to get some time alone as a parent.
- exikyut 7y agoThis is because Paw Patrol is designed to a very specific formula that is designed to get kids super-hyped up so they a) become mesmerized by what they are watching and b) want more of it - which just so happens to be possible, courtesy of the toy store. (The "there's always more [content out there]" component you mention - something I am very familiar with as someone with ADHD :X - folds nicely into the mesmerism/relive component described above.) Where I learned about this recently: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/television/whats-paw-patrols-secret-how-it-captivated-children-and-conquered-theworld/article37417532/ https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/television/whats-paw-pa... Linked from: https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2020/02/how-toys-are-marketed-kids-without-cable-tv/605920/ https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2020/02/how-toys-... / https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22259025 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22259025 (9 days ago)
- lunias 7y agoAgreed. I don't think many kids could make it through 2 episodes of Mr. Rogers w/o wanting to do something else. I remember being really bored with my choices of shows / movies growing up. If I was a kid today, I think I'd be on YouTube every waking moment.