I am writing this in a happier state of mind after we have now had our 3-year-old without TV shows for three or four days now. To be clear, this isn’t a brag (I can get me kid to stop watching tv isn’t that amazing!) because it came about over frustration.
Our little one isn’t much in the way of trouble except for the usual things, but because she has our TV in the loungeroom AND a Google device in her room, she was just getting WAY too much screentime. I really noticed that it was affecting her mood, especially with her demands for “more shows”.
The modern age of streaming doesn’t help at all either with all the devices and streaming services generally autoplaying shows continually until everyone in the house has gone insane.
It was really hard at first because we had to face full-on tantrums when we denied a show, especially “he who shall not be named” (I mean “Blippi” – and if you don’t know who Blippi is then you lead a blessed life!) However, despite the tantrums you have to remember that you are an adult and you don’t need to be only surrounded by kids shows all day.
As I said, we had a rough start weaning her off of TV shows, but even after a couple of days, there was a definite improvement in behaviour. It was such a rewarding sound to hear her now listening to instrumental versions from the Bluey show and singing along to the melody.
I have found her to be so much more creative now that she isn’t watching so many TV shows and definitely more talkative. We’ve all had little ones turn into micro zombies while they stare at Baby Sharks or Emma Wiggle on the TV so it’s a nice change to see them more interactive with their environment.
BUT, I have to say that as parents our children also copy our behaviour too. I love film and television (it’s part of what I studied at University) and have Netflix AND Amazon Prime. I also work online predominately so all day sometimes can be screentime if I’m working.
So hopefully I can learn from my daughter here and also try and cut down on the screen time. The irony being of course I have to be sitting here on a screen typing this out right now.
Thanks for visiting my Dad blog, Daderoo. I hope you can share my writing if you enjoy it (don’t share it if you didn’t of course!)
All the best with controlling your child’s screen time!
-Kevin