My girls are TV junkies. When I am busy with work, the TV is my most reliable babysitter. I guess even if I were to send my kids to a nanny who has other kids to babysit, she too, will rely on the TV to babysit the kids while she goes around to do her chores. My girls are so addicted to the TV that I call them TV addicts. I always nag at them to do their homework and to read a book when they choose the TV over other activities. I want to stop their addiction over the idiot box and encourage them to read more. For drug addicts, they can do heroin detox but for TV addicts, what’s the treatment? Maybe I’ll need to drive them out to the library or book store to break this ‘addiction’ in them!
Have always said that those “child experts” who say TV is bad probably don’t have any kids! I did try to limit TV watching after dinner/ homework for an hour on school days. It was also a great way to teach them how to tell time on the clock, time management etc.
Now, don’t forget that the TV is a great bribe too! Like if they don’t finish dineer..no TV. If they didn’t get good enough term results, limit TV etc etc. Of course if they did something well, an extra hour of TV!!