1. Maurice Sendak's Little Bear- by far my favorite! all my kids have loved this show. little bear is polite and respectful and goes on all sorts of adventures with his animal friends. it's slow paced and has nice, calm music. i can't recommend it enough!
2. Maisy Mouse- again, all my children enjoyed this show. it too is slow paced, colorful and you won't find any bratty characters trying to teach your 4 year old some lame lesson. that is my #1 complaint about kids shows, they show a character acting horribly through the entire episode, then at the very end they learn some lesson about sharing or manners and a little child is suppose to be mature enough to think, "oh, i see! i shouldn't behave the way so and so just did for the last 20 minutes!" yeah right! i think a lot of those shows actually teach children bad behavior. what do you think?
3. Blue's Clues- great show. and i prefer steve, i was sad when he was replaced :D
4.Kipper The Dog- who doesn't love a little british dog? he is one of shane's favorites and i remember max loving the show as well.
5. Yo Gabba Gabba- this is not my favorite (for reasons listed in #2) but boy does marianne love it! the second the episode starts she is dancing until the end. actually, all the kids will watch this. since i have such a wide range of ages (an almost 14 year old down to a 1 and 1/2 year old) the older kids have to watch things they are too old for but since this show is funny and has current bands featured it will somewhat keep the older two entertained.
6. School House Rock- the best! from the awesome animation to the super catchy, educational songs it's a home run all the way! we have the DVD set and everyone loves it.
what are your thoughts about kids and tv? do you allow your children to watch it and if so what are your favorite shows?
♥anne
I love your honesty. I feel like sometimes we're all trying so hard to play super mom and forget that sometimes it's nice to just turn on the tv for the kids and get a few minutes for ourselves. My five year old Gus loves watching dinosaur and shark documentaries and I just don't feel that guilty about it (though there might be a view things on our recently viewed that make me feel a little less pious:)
ReplyDeleteyes, i don't feel that guilty over those types of programs either. i think that is the key, only using the tv for those short periods during the day when you need a couple minutes to yourself or get something done. otherwise everyone gets numb to it and it ends up being on much longer than you'd like. thank you for your thoughts :)
DeleteI don't have kids. But boy did I love Little Bear. Did you know that the author of The Hunger Games was a writer for Little Bear show? :)
ReplyDeletenauticalowl.blogspot.com
i did not know that! little bear is such a wonderful show, i can't praise it enough :D
Deletewow, never really thought about television for lucy! we don't have tv (cable) but we do watch a lot of movies since darin is such a cinephile. we once in a while hook his laptop up to the tv to watch something streaming online. (just watched downton abbey, woohoo!) but i am soooo out of the loop about television shows so it is nice to get this list. i think i will like the sweet ones like little bear. i grew up with sesame street and some of the sketches haunt me to this day (like one where they tour a farm and see the different seasons). i hear people talking about yo gabba gabba but never really knew what it was, just that it features hip music. well based on that pic it's certainly not very pleasant to look at haha! i am sure lucy will be into watching movies like her pops, maybe we'll make tv time special by having her pick out a dvd, and keep a few select shows on dvds. i worry about modern kids' unlimited access to technology. she looks at me (or the screen) when i use my computer or ipod. it's so sad, it makes me put it down. i don't want her to think that's just what adults DO!
ReplyDeleteyes, little lucy needs no tv! i'm sure the thought of it is pretty gross to you at this point. marianne doesn't watch it either, unless it's yo gabba gabba. i actually detested that show at first but i can take one episode every once in a while now and she really does LOVE it, so i'm cool with her dancing around for 15 minutes. picking out a movie was what we did for years and i really loved that. we haven't had cable (on and off) for about 5 years and life is so much better without it. too much of it sucks the creativity out of the wee one's (and the big people's) heads!
Deleteps- i love downton abbey too! i need to see season 2...and 3.
Hello Anne....I have a love/hate relationship with tv.....even that sounds wrong, like a "relationship" with an entertainment vessel? Anyway, yes my kids to watch telly, but we don't have cable or any Kid specific channel, so there is some children oriented shows on in the morning and in the afternoon (after 2pm to about 5 i think). We purposely limit their viewing time....and i am okay with that. A little is ok. in Winter time they will watch more than in Summer though. I give in more when it is impossible to go outside.
ReplyDeleteShows, movies...they can be entertaining, which is why people have tvs and screens right, to be entertained, and in that way - i like to watch TV sometimes too. I just don't want my kids to prefer it to healthier forms of entertainment - like playing. I loved Blues Clues, and I agree with you, Steve was better.
i totally agree teeny, a little is ok. teaching them that there is a time for it, but limiting that time.
DeleteI don't have kids, but I remember the shows I loved when I was a kid. Little Bear was especially one of my favorites along with The busy World of Richard Scarry, Babar and Rupert the Bear. They all teach kids about building community and the importance of friendship. Also, about making the world a better place.
ReplyDeleteright! and that's what they should be about. my kids have enjoyed busy town too, i forgot about that one :D they love the richard scarry books as well. thank you for you input!
DeleteYou are SO right! I would never take a picture of our tv or of Gus in front of it. Oh the pretty little lives we weave on the internet.
ReplyDeleteI feel like I'm at a constant battle with the television, or I guess a screen because we don't have cable.. We're a one car family and my husband has a decent commute. There are a lot of days when I am the only one in charge of Gus from the time he rises to the time he heads to bed and the fact that we can't leave the house or see other people...it can wear me down. And now that it's winter? And the snow is knee deep in most of the yard? Christ. I get a pass on the tv guilt, right? I *try* to put on planet earth and nat geo shows but I'm normally met with resistance to that. We do Charlie Brown and Sesame Street, and do our best to avoid the shows that make me feel like my brain is going to melt out of my head like Yo Gabba Gabba. It's a perfectly fine show...but the sounds of it drives me up a wall.
hahaha! the sounds, yes! i hear ya sista. i agree, some days it is impossible to guide our children through one creative activity after another especially when going outdoors is impossible. i *try* also to include my 4 year old in the daily tasks like preparing food and cleaning and such but that requires endless patience which i have been known to run short on. and i always think back to myself, i watched way more tv than any child should and i'm ok. right? right!? hehehe
Deleteso funny that you posted about this! I have been battling this whole tv thing in my house all week with my 3.5 yr old...and i finally canceled my cable TODAY! I totally agree with you that tv teaches bad behavior. I was watching an episode on Nick Jr. with my child last week and the program is supposed to "teach character" but instead I saw how it was teaching my child negative behaviors... and putting ideas in her head that she would never have thought about doing in the first place.
ReplyDeleteAfter much prayer, i've concluded that the cable must leave our home (at least for now) and we will just do movies (where I have more control over what my child sees).
BTW...sadly, I also see this happening in some children's books too.
yay! you will be much happier without it, trust me. when we first cancelled ours years ago it took some getting use to but after a week or so we were so thrilled with our decision.
Deleteand yes, the books! i have gotten rid of so many over the years that people have given us as gifts because of the horrible characters in them. it is sad.
thank you so much for joining in on the conversation!
i was just thinking about this the other day...that its rarely talked about...thank you for starting the convo!!
ReplyDeleteyou've been here, so you know we don't have a tv, but we do have computer screens and not a day goes by that fern doesn't ask for a movie. we try very hard to make it 1. not every day and 2. no more than 1 hour. she's had some fave films (totoro, ponyo, winnie the pooh) and we have been playing classic sesame street off of youtube, which she loves. oh, and the muppets of course.
but it's a big area of concern for me and i fret a lot about the world she is entering and how screens are flippin EVERYWHERE. it's absolutely no longer a debate as to whether or not tv is addictive...and we as a nation are JUNKIES. we're doing our best to stay away from screens ourselves, and to not give in to the temptation to 'veg out". it's so hard!
thanks for the recommendations..we will def try out little bear!
Well, as you know, we have a giant tv, but no cable, only our dvd player which also streams Netflix. We moved into our current home two weeks before I had Clover and made a conscious decision not to have cable. We haven't had it since. I totally agree about the commercials, they are the worst.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like our policies on kids and tv watching are pretty similar. It's definitely a highly monitored activity. Clover does watch it though, not every day, but I'd say usually more days go by in a week where she does watch something than where she doesn't. Like Fern, if she had it her way, it would be everyday.
For the past year she has been obsessed with the Nutcracker Ballet and there is a movie version on Netflix that she's seen countless times but the rad thing about it is that, other than a few scenes where a narrator speaks, it's all just a filmed version of the ballet, just classical music (Clover knows every piece of music in the Nutcracker Suite and can tell you which part of the movie it corresponds to when she hears it say on the classical radio station which is her preferred music while in the car "princess music" she calls it), dancing, and rad set and character design by none other than the magical Maurice Sendack! It's called Nutcracker The Motion Picture (1986), check it out :)
I'm stoked to check out Little Bear, Clover's never seen it. I think I've spotted it in the kid's dvd section at our library. We go once a week and check out about 15 books and then she usually picks one cd book and one dvd as well.
She recently fell in love with the Finnish character Moomin (you may recall Milla mentioning him before) from the 80's stop motion series that was remastered and recently made available on Netflix. Totally recommend checking it out, it's a trippy little show.
Ha! I hated Yo Gabba Gabba the first time I saw it too, did not get what all the fuss was about, but I don't really mind it now. It's not Clover's favorite but she watches it every once in awhile. Haha, this is what I'm imagining now: "I'm Marianne, and I like to dance!" So cute!
Do you guys ever watch Wallace and Grommet or Shaun the Sheep? Those are fun for all ages.
They just made a bunch of the classic Disney movies available on Netflix too and we watched Alice in Wonderland for the first time with Clover the other night. Richard Scarry's Busytown has been a favorite. Also, the Ken Burns Series on National Parks makes for great family viewing.
Ok, this is getting embarrassingly long, I'm gonna stop.
Clover likes Moomins, eh? Good to know. (insert menacing laughter)
DeleteReally interesting post. Growing up my mum was very strict about no tv. She sort of took it to the other extreme which of course only made us even more eager to sneak in and watch while she was out. I think it's great these days how you can pick what your kids watch and that it's ad free! That's definitely what we're going to do with our little one. Just no Wiggles, please no Wiggles!
ReplyDeleteI agree, I think t.v is totally fine when balanced with other (obviously) healthy activities. I let the boys watch a bit in the morning and one show before bed sometimes if they ask. I also allow it when I absolutely need to get something done, and I don't feel bad about that in the least. Everything in moderation. I loved television as a kid, and I think it helped shape my character and love of pop culture and my parents we're worried that I might be ruined by it :)
ReplyDeleteBut you're right, no ONE is showing any photos of their kid's watching. It's like a little dark secret or something silly.
Haha! I don't have kids, but of course, being a blabber mouth, I have so much to say about this subject. I was raised without TV, as was my 'sister' Mali. We both grew up readers and book lovers and I think if we'd had more access to TV that might not have been the case as much.
ReplyDeleteBoth of us got to experience movies though and watch things that were a little above our level at times, thanks to parents who wanted to enjoy something not too kid-like (remember when kids movies used to be super hammy?)
I got to watch a bit of TV at my grandma's and my cousins houses, but mostly nature programs and very tame kid's shows. It was always a treat and a special thing and I think having been exposed to long-form story-telling made me a more discerning TV-viewer.
Even as a kid, I had no tolerance for hammy plot lines (well actually, I WAS pretty STOKED whenever grandma would let me watch Matlock or Mcguyver with her...I take that back. I apparently loved a hammy plot line. I was six.). When we finally did get a TV I was 12 and my mom was very particular about what I could watch.
I think TV is fine for kids, as long as it isn't their main thing. I can't say that reading ALL THE TIME is good for a kid either (I speak from a personal experience ; ) An even mix of activities is healthy for most of us.
I've lived without a TV most of my life and actually have a pretty low tolerance for watching it. Actual TV that is, with commercials and a jumble of stuff. I'm really good at watching series on DVD, haha.