For a few years now my 6 year old has been asking for a television in her room. She sees other kids her age with them in their room and thinks that is pretty cool. I have a hard and fast rule that there will be no TV’s or computer’s in their rooms… well… ever. And, so far, I have stuck to it.
Now, here is an interesting debate.
Bed time is a complete nightmare in this house. It always has been. I have tried so many different things that I could write the book, “101 Things NOT to Do When Trying to Get Your Three Children to Bed at the Same Time.”. I fail at everything except final exhaustion that sends them to sleep and me to tears.
I have asked and asked moms who have no issues with bedtimes and a recurring understanding is that their kids all have televisions in their bedrooms. They are only allowed to have them on at bedtime, only for 30 minutes, and only with a DVD. No remote, no kids control. They all say that they let the kids watch a program, the sleep timer turns it off, and then when the TV goes off, the kids close their eyes and fall into a peaceful slumber.
I am SO tempted. SO, SO, SO tempted to let this happen in my house.
Despite that I hear it is terrible for kids. Despite that the saying is “TV is the plug in drug!”. Despite my own beliefs.
Because I am tired of the 2 hour fight at bedtime that has resonated through my house for at least 5 years. And I am tired of tired children that don’t get enough sleep. And I am tired of being tired and dreading bedtime.
So, I am turning to you. My RESPECTFUL and honest readers.
Do you have TV’s in your kids rooms? If so, how do you see it helping or hurting them? And for those of you who are adamant, how do you get three kids, under 6, all to bed at the same time without a battle?
Please be respectful of comments. There is more than one way to raise a child. I know this is a heated subject! :)
Our 4 year old has a TV in his room. We DVR shows on the discovery channel that are about sciency stuff appropriate to his age, and he never fights going to bed. The other day he woke up excited to tell me about gravity and how it’s holding the people and houses down while the earth spins around and around. I don’t think it’s hurting him at all ;)
Both of my kids have always had a tv in their rooms, and I have NEVER had to fight with them to go to sleep. They are 5 and 8. We do have certain programs and channels that are blocked for safety reasons though. They also have their own DVD players and VCRs. They just go to bed every night and are asleep within the hour. Occasionally they will come down for a snack or potty break.
http://goo.gl/iwquj
My kids do not have a TV in their room….. and they’re not going to, either. They do get to watch a cartoon before bedtime, as long as most everything is picked up and they are already ready for bed (pj’s and teeth brushed). I tell them if it takes too long to pick up or brush teeth or whatever, that they won’t have enough time for a cartoon. That usually works. After the show, they get a book read in their room and tucked in. They share a room, and sometimes I have to remind them that it’s bedtime, but it’s not so bad. They are 5 and 3.
My kids don’t have a TV in their room. Now, they are quite small – 3 1/2 and 21 months old. They share a room, and I have (almost) no problems getting them to go to bed at the same time. We’ve been pretty consistent with bedtime rules, and while we have plenty of other problems, sleep problems aren’t one of them. They nap at the same time in the same room as well.
I don’t plan on my kids (I’m about to have my 3rd boy) ever having a computer in their room. We will have family computers in the family room where content can be monitored. But, I would consider a TV with a VCR or DVD player for when we have company or for another special time, but not to be used daily.
We don’t have cable or satellite either, so content monitoring is kind of a non-issue.
Eventually, I’d love to have a house with a playroom that has a TV in it for that purpose, but since their room *is* the playroom, I might consider it.
I have raised 4 kids (ages 23, 21, 18 and 15) and we never allowed any electronics in their rooms (we didn’t have them anywhere else in the house either, unless you count the original SEGA that I had when I was a teen). I’ve also had over thirty foster kids in my house too and many of them were in the habit of falling asleep to a TV. I personally feel that kids benefit by having a limited amount of TV/electronic game time. Do you have a bedtime routine that is consistently followed? We did and this makes the biggest difference (and my oldest daughter was a challenge–think Strong Willed Child difficult). If you aren’t consistent, you are confusing and frustrating yourself and your kids. My daughter didn’t want to go to bed or take naps, so periodically I would sit out side her door at bedtime or naptime to put her back to bed if she got up. If you come up with a bedtime routine that helps your child relax, that’s half the batle. We would do baths, read in a room where the lighting was low and no TV. We also had low, soothing music playing when they went to bed and would do bedtime prayers while they lay in bed. We started this when they were toddlers, so it was much easier than starting when they were older. Another thing that helps is to have a consistent wake up time and nap time for younger children. There are lots of good parenting books (Gary Smally has some good ones) that can give you more tools to use. I understand that it’s hard, but it’s worthe the effort to hang in there. All of my kids have great sleep habits and are very healthy and research shows that people who get a full nights sleep have fewer problems with their weight. I know it’s hard, but you can do it. It also helps to have a friend to be able to call when you are at your wits end. Also, it helps if you can tag team with your spouse. Good luck!
We have a TV in our boys’ room. They are 3 and 5 and share a room. They aren’t allowed to watch TV all day, we play outside, play games inside together or work on workbooks. They do have a computer downstairs that they are allowed to play educational games on, but nothing by themselves (I have to turn it on and watch them play). At night, they shower, we read a Veggie Tales Devotional, they say their prayers, we read some (sometimes it’s 1/2 an hour sometimes it’s an hour). After reading, if they are still up, they get their TV with a movie we pick. They usually fall asleep within minutes.
my kids are 5 and 3 and they do not have a tv in there room. i had a tv in my room growing up and i know i watched thing i shouldn’t have and stayed up way to late making school the next day hard. My kids will never have a tv in there room. my daughter some nights watch a 30 min program before bed and then i turn on a cd for them to hear with a night light some idea as the tv and imho i feel like its safer. we have a routine for bed time and and there are night when we still fight but that is part of life. Thats just my 2 cents.
My kids do have a tv in their rooms, mostly bc it used to be our room & we had one. Honestly though I don’t like it. I just had this discussion last night with my hubby, and am probably fixing to make some good changes. The satellite was already in there when they got the room, again bc it was our room until I rearranged whole house :) When it became their room & I left the television in there, I went through all the parental controls stuff and locked up everything except pg stuff. The thing with that is there are ALOT of tv shows that are pg that are what I call “teenager shows”. My daughter is 8 and very impressionable. So while there is no “sexual content”, bad language, or violence in it, there are still confusing emotions that I’m not ready for her to be paying attention to yet. I went back & changed it all to “G” rating. Even with that though, the kids channels still have commercials of the other shows & little music videos from those shows. One argument about that is in the little songs it still displays those more grown up emotions. Another is my little girl (who by the way has a teenage sister who she thinks is awesome!) wants to be bigger than she is, so she sees the commercials ~ starts asking for the millionth time to watch the shows ~ and here comes a battle…that I do eventually win of course, but it does leave me feeling like the mean mama. I understand that some of her friends get to watch some of these shows, (which truly are not bad shows & most have little lessons in them) but I just don’t want my baby growing up too quickly. As far as bedtime, I am big on routine and I think bc of that things run smoother. It’s the days that are not routine that make it more difficult at our house! I think whether they know it or not ALL kids crave routine and do better when on a routine. Actually, that goes for me too! ;)
I have 4 children, ages 4, 20 months, and 10 month twins. The two older ones (boys) do have a tv in their room. However this is an old tv hooked up to satellite via the main satellite box in our living room. The only way they can watch tv is if they have the remote. I have the remote and I determine when and for how long they watch tv. They are not allowed to watch tv before bed because the 4 year old will make a fuss if a show that he likes is on when bedtime comes. I am proud to say that all my kids go to bed at 7 pm and wake up at 7 am. (the twins started sleeping through the night 2wks ago) it took time, effort, and tears (both theirs and mine) but being firm with them and getting into a routine with them, a good sleep habit has been accomplished. I let them watch tv while I make dinner (usually 30-45min) and then we turn it off and eat. After that they play or color while I clean up then hubby and I brush ther teeth, wash their faces, and lay them down. They might not immediately go to sleep but they will drift off within 20 min or less.
My son is 6 1/2 and has had a tv in his room for quite some time. We turn it on when he gets in bed, he has control of the remote, and he knows what he is allowed to watch, and what he is not, and he knows we check to see what he is watching. He is like my husband and I and has trouble sleeping, so I allow him to watch until I go to bed. If he’s not alseep by then, I turn it off, and tell him it’s time for bed. But I always leave him the remote, because he gets nightmares from time to time, and gets up and turns on the tv, so he can fall back to sleep.
We catch a lot of flack for this, but, honestly, I don’t care. We home school, and my son doesn’t go to bed before 10:00p.m., and the way I see it, is we all parent in different ways, so you parent your way, I’ll parent my way, and lets all keep our noses out of each others business! :)
If you think it will help you kiddos, give it a try, you can always remove it if it doesn’t help! :)