how much telly do your lo's watch?- or does anyone NOT have one?

[bourneville]

My 2.3 yo watches at most an hour a day - not including Neighbours & The Simpsons which is mummy's tv time! (and she doesn't watch much of that). I grew up without a TV (and am pretty resentful about it tbh) but at least i have a healthy scepticism towards it and am determined to moderate viewing time... however i am also known to have the Tv (well, vids & dvds) on most of the day if i have a hangover or if i'm ill. My mum tuts and says "Don't you be mucking up your daughter's brains!" which really gets to me cos it's only once in a while and I feel guilty enough about it already..... I guess I'm just wanting some reasurrance that everybody else's kids watch as much as or more TV than mine does!!

Would be very interested to hear from people who don't have a TV too...

On the whole, DD is not allowed to just watch tv. We have a Tivo which records her fave programs, so she is allowed to watch an episode of balamory, teletubbies or fimbles when she asks. But after she watches it, it is deleted. Once its gone she has no more until the next day, when another one is recorded!

But, I have to admit too, if I'm feeling ill, had a lack of sleep, or just need to get on then from time to time, Cbeebies does just get put on... but it won't harm every now and again will it !?!

DD doesn't fully watch it when it's on either, though the older she's getting the longer her concentration span is. But I can see she gets such a lot out of it, all those characters & scenes she really enjoys, I can't believe we (me & my sister) were deprived of that as kids. I'm not criticising those who don't have a TV but having grown up without one I really wouldn't want dd to. It is so isolating. My social life at school consisted of: "Did you see... oh no you don't have a telly" then a back turned to me.

Having said all that, me & my sister gained a lot from not having a telly too - we were very creative, spent time doing lots of other stuff, and I also want dd to have plenty of time to do all that stuff too, not just watch TV the whole time...

rarrie, I personally think it's better for a child to watch the same thing over & over again, I can't remember where but I read something about repetition being good, they learn more .(Don't even know if it was about the telly, sorry.) don't mean to throw a spanner in the works re your way of doing things, but much as it drives me mad ,I feel better about the fact that she's watching something over & over & picking up more & more details from it every time, rather than just sitting in front of random children's telly .

Loooooads more, bourneville.

DD (18 mths) gets a dose of either Cbeebies or DVD in the morning as I organize myself. Probab;ly that lasts up to an hour. I am very first time mummish about it. At first I tried not to put her in front of it at all, without really knowing why. Now that she watches a bit, I am more sure of why I don't let her watch more - it would be so easy! I am terrible for having the radio on all the time and I would hate her to see TV as a similar sort of wallpaper. Already feel I am sliding a bit with the DVD thing - used to have a personal rule that we could only turn on Balamory when it was scheduled on bbc2!

Oops - always post before thinking. No TV, but lots of repeat video watchings of Bob the Builder, Mr Ben, Clangers, Hairy Maclarey, Teletubbies, Thomas Tank Engine (ahem, not all on same day).

spots yeah it's funny that, it's the fact that it's so easy, I feel very guilty about it. It's silly cos I usually only use it as a "babysitter" if you like if i really need to ,like I said if i'm ill or there's something I really need to do and dd is really NOT going to amuse herself (a lot of the time she is good at amusing herself). Otherwise I actually quite like to be involved in watching it with her, talk about what's on etc, so she doesn't become aware that the TV is a replacement or a cop out on my part... Also she learns more that way too, if i point things out to her.

jeez i sound so priggish or whatever the word is, i hate myself !

Bourneville, that is a good point, I am sure you are right about the repition being good. However, the reason we go down the Tivo route rather than DVD, is that DVDs last an hour, and it is difficult to turn it off halfway through! Whereas with the Tivo, it automatically turns off at the end of the programme, so she only gets her 20 mins, and it doesn't drag on and on. Personally, I'd prefer it if she had no tv at all, but this I can closely monitor how much TV she has, but not in a confrontational way more that she can't watch it over and over, or let it drag on for an hour at a time!! It makes living with a 2 year old much easier, even if not quite so good ;-)

Yeah good point rarrie. We have a Pingu DVD that has continuous random play. In one way it's fantastic cos I can stick it on and do nothing else for ages afterwards but in another way it's, well, need I say!

With ds (now 11)he had no tv as an under 3, but he did love Thomas videos at his Grandmas so we got a tv and kept him on Thomas etc this was in NZ
When we moved over here he watched teletubbies (he was 3.5) but has never really been bothered about tv at all as an older kid, he plays a little bit of ps2, maybe a few times a month.

With dd (3)however... due to her speech delay we were advised to show her a popular preschool kids programme we chose Fimbles)and baby einstein type things, repetition, simple concepts.
So we bought dvds, she watches 1/2 -1hr 5 days a week at most, she loves them and has come on really well with them.
The 6pm or 7pm news is the first thing that goes on in the evening.
I was brought up without a tv as kid, so maybe thats why I view it as an occasional thing rather than a daily thing.
Although obv there sometimes are days and nights where I watch everything Wimbledon, rugby etc

That's interesting piffle, that you were advised to show her certain DVDs to help her!
Very refreshing to hear!

advised actually was possibly he wrong word
what the therapist said was that tv or dvds of familiar concepts and characters can make it easier for the child and parent with a regard to daily consistency. DD has taken Fimbles firmly to heart and the first time she used words for colours she used it for them!
Also as dd has mild special needs it does give me a break although I do try to watch it with her...

In the week,the t.v. is banned in the morning before school as I think its more important to spend that time together.
DD1 watches it for an hour most days after lunch while dd2 is sleeping and ds is in school. Then all 3 watch it for 45 mins before bathtime at night. Very occasionaly ds will watch it for 20 mins after school while having a snack-but thats only twice a week,when he doesn't have clubs etc to go to.So in the week dd1(3.9) watches the most per day at 1hr45 in total,while ds(5.8) and dd2(20mths)watch 45 mins.
At the weekend they watch slightly more as they watch it for 30mins when they wake up,which gives me time to shower etc,the ds and dd1 watch a d.v.d while dd2 is napping.They usually watch the D.V.D all the way through which are normally 90mins long.And then they all watch 45 mins before bathtime as usual

We didn't have a tv for years, DH finally cracked this year and now we have a tv card in the computer; other people have tellies that can play computer games (Playstations) we have a computer that shows telly.

Anyway, probably because it doesn't work like a "normal" tv, the kids only watch about 4 hours/week (plus maybe 1.5-3 hours daily of movies on dvd). DD actively dislikes cartoons on tv because of the recurring advert/presenter breaks in the story. TV tends to be Simpsons (maybe once a week at 6pm), the evening news, bits of the history channel, and a few hours on weekend mornings.

At the moment I'm quite happy about the amount they watch, "a little but not much".

DS1 was saying recently that his school-mates were playing "Batman" and some other action hero movie-inspired role play in the playground, "but I couldn't play because I didn't know how" -- because he hasn't seen the movies/tv programmes/whatever. He very clearly felt very left out (but I think he's still too young for some of those movies!).

DD (18 months) watches about 5 minutes a week. She is just not interested but will watch her teletubbies video for about 5 minutes if I sit with her. She loves the teletubbies and has them all (except Santa is bringing Dipsy) and has them for bath toys and loves going on the computer onto the teletubbies on the cbeebies website but just not into TV.

DS, on average, these days watches 1 sometimes 2 DVDs a week - usually a Disney or an original Star Wars although sometimes he will get out a Thomas/Bob/Postman Pat/Engie Benjy which were his staples when he was younger.

We also watch the dancing on a Saturday evening although we were out this week. So the last time DD watched TV was 5 minutes on Monday and the last time DS watched TV was Return of the Jedi on Friday.

We used to let them watch a bit of Milkshake in our bed on a weekend until we realised that if we didn't put the TV on they would wonder off and play.