How to Co-Parent with the TV
Use the Television Effectively for Childhood Development.
Children can be glued to cartoons at a young age. This breeds an unhealthy habit of going autopilot while watching the television. Though there is plenty of educational material on TV, there are also plenty of shows that you do not want your young child to be exposed to. They could be violent in nature or contain adult-oriented content. To strike a healthy co-parenting agreement with your television, consider these following tips.
Hand-Pick your Child's Television Programmes
To co-parent effectively with the television, hand-pick the programmes that you see fit for your child. Educational programmes such as Dora the Explorer and Sesame Street are a good place to start. When doing this, only choose 1 or 2 programmes per day or else it would defeat the whole purpose of effective co-parenting with the television.
When you establish the habit of watching programmes rather than television, your child will begin to understand that she or he is allowed to watch the TV, but only certain programmes at certain times.
This will also help free up your parenting schedule. While your child is being entertained by Elmo, you may quickly prepare a snack for him or her.
Watch Programmes Together
Older children may be more insistent on watching the television as compared to younger infants. It can be harder to encourage them to dilute the watching habit. One way to do this would be to watch their programmes together, asking them thoughtful questions about the programme and talking about the importance of the different messages being sent by the plot or the characters.
Encourage them to differentiate between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour and "good" messages from "bad" messages. Comment and ask them thoughtfully, "Wow, that is not a good way to behave in a supermarket, what do you think?"
After a while, your older child might just decide that half the programmes he or she watches are silly or are of no value and will reduce his or her time in front of the television.
Give Your Child the Authority to Switch Off the Television
Asking your child to switch off the television and praising him or her for doing so will curb over-indulgence in television programmes. It also teaches your child that he or she is in charge of the television and he will soon learn to self-regulate television viewing.
Distract Your Child with Other Fun Activities
To effectively co-parent with the television, encourage your children with other fun learning methods such as arts and craft, books and sports. This will keep your child active throughout the day with other educational activities and associate the television with a limited number of programmes.
Take Control of Parenting Time
At the end of the day, the parent is the primary caregiver. There is nothing wrong with children watching the television for light entertainment or educational programmes, and to effectively co-parent with the TV is to be selective of viewing material. Allow children to watch the television when it benefits them most and use the other segments of the day to encourage other forms of development such as arts and books.
