Helping parents get it right

My mother-in-law is a teacher. She works with four-year-olds and sent me a very kind and thoughtful perspective on the whole TV-destroys-kids dilemma. She's a little shy about commenting on my blog, so I'm publishing her comment here for all of you to enjoy. I hope she doesn't mind:

I just read your most recent blog article and was thrilled to see you are still writing. And what a great topic.

We staff have found at school, or at least I have, that we are not very specific with parents at times and give the impression ALL TV is bad. I remember in the early 70's when many people got rid of their TVs because they were so bad for children....we did not, we chose to have moderation and give guidelines for what our kids watched.

We also watched programs with them, not always, but we did with new ones, to see what the content was all about. Sesame Street came on at the perfect time for dinner preparation. A babysitter? Maybe...Mr. Rogers was watched by multiple stay at homes mothers because he made them feel important also....Selectivity and moderation are vital and trusting parents that they are smart enough to know what that means in their family's life.

We seem to get down on our parents about movies, videos, computer games and TV and one wonders what is left......I made some guidelines last year for our parents and when I get back to school will find them and send them off for you if you would like....or perhaps bring them with me......finding them is another story. HAHA Anyhoo, a great article, thought provoking and right on target.

If she finds those guidelines, I'll post them. I'm sure we'll find that we are all doing okay with a little TV-helper now and again.