A familiar situation:
The child is screaming, there is no strength to entertain him anymore, a phone with cartoons comes to the rescue. Children are silent, and parents are tormented by guilt: “Well, the child is back in gadgets.” Our blogger Victoria Sobko ponders whether parents should be condemned for wanting to distract their children with a screen.
The second week of covid quarantine
It was the second week of covid quarantine with a child. I learned by heart all the songs from “Kids”. They told me how to put a group of shilopops to bed (“Whoever lies down faster will dream of a pink elephant!”)
Children in a closed space
When you sit with children in a closed space for two weeks without even being able to go outside, the fantasy of games quickly ends. Moreover, the child is sick – he has no desire to get out of bed. When all the books have already been read and all the stickers have been re-glued, I give up – I turn on the cartoon.
Immediately, a memory pops up in my head: I am pregnant, my husband and I are going to courses for future parents, and nod vigorously when the lecturer says that it is better not to show cartoons to children under 2-3 years old.
As they say, I was a great mother until I had children.
A year later
A year later, in the optometrist’s office, we heard: “The child will most likely have hereditary myopia anyway. Do not aggravate – wait with the cartoons! “Easy to say!” I thought on the way back from the doctor, trying to calm the sobbing child in the car with songs and dances.
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Finally gave up
I finally gave up when we went on a seven-hour road trip from Moscow to St. Petersburg. It was impossible to survive without cartoons. Soon, cartoons in the car became a habit, especially in taxis. Because the poor taxi driver hasn’t done anything wrong to me yet to make him drive 40 minutes to the accompaniment of baby screams.
Strict rule
At first, we had a strict rule – cartoons only in the car. Occasionally – in a restaurant, if mom and dad want to eat at the same time. But illness has taken its toll. The son began to ask for cartoons more and more often. At 1.8, he even began to come up with clever ways to get them – for example, he brought nail scissors (yes, when I cut his nails, he also watches cartoons). In general, there are more and more screens in our lives.
Periodically, I tried to switch my son to my favorite games or books.
The answer is the cry of a wounded beast. I even began to worry that the child was addicted to screens. After all, it’s my fault. But then the disease began to recede, the son again became interested in the world outside the TV. He was tired of watching the same cartoons, the craving for knowledge took over.
I drew one conclusion
From this situation, I drew one conclusion – sometimes (in the case of children – often) you can relax and not fight the inevitable. Cartoons are not always bad. Sometimes they can be a salvation for a tired and also slightly ill mother. In addition, if the cartoons are chosen correctly, they can even teach something.
Soviet cartoons
We show our son only Soviet cartoons and educational Malyshariki. For young children, the pace at which the action develops is very important. It’s not easy for a toddler to follow the plot in Disney cartoons. And there is also a lot of cruelty that a child cannot yet perceive without shock. Soviet cartoons are kind and slow, they have wonderful songs.
After watching “Three from Prostokvashino”, “Gena the Crocodile”, “The Bremen Town Musicians”, “Gava the Kitten”, “Lolo the Penguin”, the son learned to distinguish all the animals he saw there in any drawing and unmistakably named them at the zoo. In the car, he can now be entertained by simply turning on songs from these cartoons.
The Malyshariki explained to him topics that I did not know how to approach. For example, they have a series about the exhaustibility of natural resources – the children were shown that if you do not turn off the tap and spoil the water, someone may not have enough water. Equally important to me are series about safety on the street and dealing with strangers.
Of course, cartoons are a last resort. Therefore, the child spends the time intended for learning the world by experience, on the screens. Now the screen-free movement is gaining popularity. Its supporters do not show cartoons to children at all.
The most radical ones even leave their children homeschooled – they are afraid that there will be too many screens at school. But are these very screens so harmful in the modern world, where most of the professions are related to working on the network?
No need to demonize cartoons. If an hour a day in front of a screen can save parents and kids stress, that’s a good price to pay. If cartoons can help a child survive a trip to the dentist, an illness, or the painful process of cutting their nails, why not use this tool. And the child can learn something interesting.
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