This week is “turn off the tv week” at our school or otherwise named “we hate parents week”
“Do you want to earn an EAGLE AWARD?”
“Are you ready to take the challenge?”
Considering the “Eagle Award” is a piece of paper and the challenge means losing my mind? No thanks.
Now before you get on my case about how kids watch too much tv, don’t.
Until your 3 year old can tell the man at the museum that maybe the space alien is a fish eater like the Pteranodon? Don’t tell me that tv isn’t the best freaking thing ever to teach my kids the things that frankly, I’m just not going to do.
Let’s not even mention that telling my older son that no tv equals no video games. This might make him combustible.
That’s one hefty clean up in aisle 2 at school.
Basically, I’m saving the janitor from cleaning up one hell of a mess.
I understand the school is just trying to encourage kids to do different stuff.
Here are some ideas they suggested for us for the week:
Play cards
Listen to the radio
Go fishing
And my favorite: Go bird watching.
Hmm. Maybe the school should turn off their own tv’s. and study up on the latest technology. A radio?
So who’s going to do all these things with my kids? I didn’t see the part where they provided me a sitter all week.
Now *that* I’d sign up for.
So my kids will be watching tv this week. I expect that other kids are going to be melting down from withdrawals. I also expect the teachers will notice my kids are even keeled and unusually pleasant.
It’s a win/win.
Now excuse me I’m going go take them up on the idea of “Reading magazines” by myself while Word Girl teaches my kids about “autonomous”
"Now excuse me I’m going go take them up on the idea of “Reading magazines” by myself while Word Girl teaches my kids about 'autonomous'"
LOVE it! Leapfrog tv taught my kid to add (he's 3). He came in one day & told me & his dad that 3 + 2 = 5. It was a shocker to us (simple addition doesn't usually shock us, but the fact that he knew it did). Thank you TV!
Damn straight! We love the History Channel and all of the other nature shit that is on tv.
I have tried to convince many friends about the benefit of watching tv. My dad used to call me Lisa TV after we read Willy Wonka together. I grew up watching PBS–kids shows and adult, the news and 60 Minutes. It piqued my curiosity and led me to read a lot of different things on many different topics. I don't think I would be a reader or a curious adult that likes to look things up if it weren't for the TV. If I saw something on TV I had questions about I would ask my parents and we would talk and sometimes I would be told to look things up. And let me say I was brought up in a time when there was no cable. I can't imagine how many more things I would find to be interestred in with all that TV offers now a days.
So funny! We tried to go without TV during Spring Break. It worked pretty well if we were out. By Thursday when I had reached my breaking point and I announced that they could watch Tangled there as a mass stampede. Peace.
Turn on the Closed Captioning while your kids watch — then they'll be reading!
I thought I'd be all high and mighty and do no-tv week. We did it for five days. During spring break. It was purely my stubborn streak that got me through- I told my kids that it was going to be no-tv week before I actually remembered the whole spring break thing.
Now we're back to PBS kids in the morning. The Cat in the Hat is amazeballs.
OMG! No tv is a painful death. I turn off the ps3 and make them watch tv…lol Now I do end up taking over my tv when I want to watch something and make them go play with their toys (I find it to be a waste of money to buy them otherwise) and my kids will give up tv and video games in a heart beat to play outside in the dirt and ride their bikes. My kids learn a lot though from some of the shows they watch and it has helped their imaginations grow. That and the books we read.
Yes. Exactly. I'm pretty sure the other parents in the school are with you here. So, perhaps there won't be too many kids out of wack.
I am fairly certain my son is under the impression that our TV does not turn off.
And I am not fighting the battle to prove him wrong.
I'm surprised they didn't suggest you work together with your child on some XYZ "project" while you're at home with the tv off. Do you think there is some educational think tank where they think up this stuff?
In case you couldn't tell, having to help 6 kids do various "projects" has my eye twitching at the mention of that word.
Wait, is it spring break for you, like it is for me? Not allowing tv would be a death wish. Can't stand those "I don't own a tv people", either.
Here's the greatest post I've ever read about the awesomeness of TV: http://mydadhomies.wordpress.com/2009/07/27/tv-is…
I just changed my depends. thank you.
I am so with you. Our tv will never be off. And the bird watching? Makes me think of the post over at In Pursuit of Martha Points. Birds are not that great of teachers, unless it's Big Bird of course.
When my youngest was 2 years old he learned the alphabet by watching Super Why.
Any way you cut it, that’s a win.
You said it! Long live PBS Kids!
I agree with Alexandra. I get all twitchy when I think about saying no to tv. And the piece of paper is so not worth loosing your mind.
I think that turn off the TV stuff is for other families.
Not ours.
I used to give kids extra credit to turn off the tv for a week. But eh…. I'm too tired to even attempt this struggle from a teacher's standpoint these days.
Really? Bird watching? How about watching grass grow? Collecting bugs?
Seriously.
Craziness. I hope that someday JD will sit still long enough to watch an entire episode of something.
:stands and slowly claps:
Screw school. I'm almost convinced its not for my kid since I will have to help with home work. The only reason I am still teetering on the edge is becuase I am paying for it anyway and it will be a few hours a day away from my child that ensures I stay some what sane. I'll lay off the TV when they quit with the homework.
I especially love when people declare their disapproval of TV in the car. "You are missing out on learning opportunities and chances to talk to your child!" Believe me, the only thing I'm missing out on by letting my kid watch the Diego DVD for the 3rd time in a row while we drive through the black hole of civilization, also known as rural Oklahoma, is my sanity flying out the window. Go you for standing your ground.
Science Channel, History Channel, and BBC America – the channels my sons have always watched. Oh. and Nick. Because I LIKE Nick.
TV is educational. Just ask Burt and Ernie.
NO WAY I would turn off the TV because the school asked me to. Along with not giving unlimited texting to my kids so their coaches can inform them of meetings and practices. Besides, I am sure the school is not going to turn the TV off at school. They watch more movies at school that at home.
Is it wrong that I watched Word Girl before we even had kids because my co-workers called me that all the time and said I resembled her cartoon self? Also, my husband and I maaaay have invented a drinking game with the show.
Meanwhile, my child has learned far more Spanish on TV than from me speaking it to her. So I'm kind of sold on it.