So tomorrow marks the our 4 weeks of no TV. Now while it hasn't been 100% TV free its been pretty close.
It was wonderful. Ok the last while has been wonderful. The first week and a half I was near tears. They were lost, they had no idea what to do. They told me a million time they were bored, they picked on each other, they moped.
After a week and a half they accepted it is the way things are now. They would talk and leisurely eat lunch because there was no "toons" awaiting them. They played without me giving them ideas on what to do. At 3 and a half weeks it was the "magical" days of catching toads, building forts and working together. Racky will read a book now unprompted by me!!!!!!
They learned how to play Monopoly and Skip-BO. They heard lots of fairy tales from Grimm's Complete Book of Fairy Tales by both the hubby and myself. But mostly they learned how to play!!!!!!!!!!!!
I didn't drag them all over town so they wouldn't be bored, I wanted them to be bored. They needed to learn how to play. I kept them home with few occasions to socialize, not a lot of neighbor kid visits, so they could learn how to play. At times I thought poking myself in the eye with a fork would be more fun but they needed to really learn how to PLAY. I am thrilled with the results.
They watched Richie Rich yesterday while I ran to the store and the hubby napped and I think Racky could repeat the whole show to us. This just reinforced the point to us that the TV makes too big of an impression on them. My kids were falling into the statistics (hanging head in shame.). It was easy to justify. I'm home with them all day, I need a break. Or I know what they are watching it's okay. Or they're bonding with daddy. Well their childhood was being lost to the TV.
We haven't come up with hard and fast TV viewing rules for the future but with the grace of God we will hold fast and spend their childhood time more wisely. Now if I can just get rid of those worthless Webkins!
Thanks to the hubby for helping me stick to it. I know there were plenty of day when he came home from work and wanted to just veg and turn the TV on. Thanks baby we love ya!
2 comments:
So true! I have a rule no tv at all during the day and typically it's not on at all until 8 ish at night. It is amazing how much they learn and soak up from it. Course when I'm not home I'm sure it's on. Thanks for posting this I will re think my tv viewing rules for the summer. Truly amazing how creative they can get when their bored:)
Webkinz are worthless?!? What? That is just crazy talk. :) I love the whole no tv thing, although I definitely need to be more strict about it. We have been slacking the last couple weeks.
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