The girls and I were on a playdate. It was wintertime and my little one was invited to her new friend’s house. Her friend had older sisters so we decided to make it a group playdate. The mom was really nice and interesting. They recently moved to NY from Senegal so it was fascinating to hear the differences in cultures.
Their native language is French and it wasn’t until they moved here that the girls started to learn English. Because they had so much catching up to do as far as English goes, they spent a lot of time after school reading and practicing English.
Just in passing the mom mentioned that her girls don’t watch TV during the week so they have more time for their studies. My girls’ ears perked up, mouths dropped and eyes widened in disbelief! NO TV UNTIL THE WEEKEND?!?!? How could that be?!? I was equally amazed that she could actually get away with this. How did she have such control?
When we got home, my older one actually brought it up. Maybe she thought it was a novel idea, or maybe she was just trying to get on my good sidle, but she asked if WE could try having a day without TV.
Was I hearing correctly?? Could this be MY daughter standing in front of me??
So we decided on Tuesday. Months later, we are still adhering to the TVless Tuesday rule.
Camp is done.
School hasn’t started yet.
The girls are home and it’s Tuesday.
It’s going to be a loooong day!
HAHAHAHAHA. Good luck with that one. That’s actually a pretty good idea. I take it they don’t have any tiny electronic boxes either. I’ll bring over a cocktail later.
No we haven’t started on the video games or anything else! Kept them out all day1
Good for you! Honestly it isn’t that big of deal. We are pretty much a TV free household. My boys (5 & 3) only get to watch about 1 thing a week if that. We don’t have satellite or cable or anything just today’s version of the bunny ears and a subscription to Netflix. It just isn’t our habit. They’d much rather be outside or playing Legos or building forts. I really appreciate life this way as it wasn’t how I was raised at all. Take advantage of the beautiful day!
That’s amazing Crystal! I started out really well with Olivia – didn’t let her watch a stitch of tv for the first 2 years of her life. Ruby isn’t into it as much as Olivia I did have rules in place but somehow they got lost. I warned them though that when school starts we”re going back to our original rules!
We don’t have TV. Well, we have a TV but no cable, so essentially no TV. We do have tons of DVD’s, DVD players, Wii games and DSI games, so it’s not like we’re not electronic. My daughter loves watching reruns of Doctor Who on Netflix. Some days it’s jut not possible not to do some for of passive entertainment, but on school days we have a pretty strong no electronic rule. Your children are little though. When mine were small I couldn’t have existed without Elmo!!!
Heather, that’s also great that you don’t have TV as well. One thing though I haven’t started with any other electronics like video games, DS, etc. I know some kids are just glued to their Ds’s and I even see some parents let their little ones play with their iPhones. Don’t get that one!! BTW, mine aren’t so little anymore – almost 8 and 5 1/2. 🙂