Baby Einstein

I´ve recently started putting on Baby Bach for my LOs in the evenings and they LOVE it! It´s helped so much during that pre-dinner witching hour. DD is the most attentive and is starting to imitate things the little girl does and points and reacts to images. DS also reacts to the images and dances to the music, I think it´s great!

However, I´ve read that exposing kids, under two years, to TV is not good as it hinders their communication skills. Have you used Baby Einstein with your LOs? If so, have you seen any positive/negative results?

TIA!

 

My girls watch Baby Einstein on occassion - more likely they watch the morning shows on Noggin. I have to be able to get stuff down around the house sometimes. They like it, sometimes they watch or sometimes they play around it. Everything in moderation is my opinion. :good:

 

My kids LOVE Baby Einstein. I agree everything in moderation as well(and I'll be the first to admit...the TV is on more than it's not at our house!). My boys have their favorites-Old MacDonald...Noah's Ark...

From watching the videos-they've learned all about their animals and animal sounds. There is a counting one as well and they have both gotten interested in counting.

Like I said-they LOVE the videos. We haven't watched them recently, but it instantly calms them down if they are fussy, etc. And I can get at least a 10 minute break!

 

I haven't heard that it's a problem with communication, more that if they are exposed to TV too much their brain tries to interpret the fast movements and eventually it can cause ADD. And the main issue I guess with shows aimed at young kids is that they will hold their interest, and as such they're more likely to watch them, than, let's say, an episode of Gilmore Girls or something, which they might just catch 5 minutes of before getting bored.

Mostly I'm not a TV person though and I'd rather try to keep them occupied with 'real' things instead of TV shows, especially as if they're getting used to it now, it will be harder to limit it later on, I think. If they never had baby TV, they'll never miss it, right?

That being said, the 5-6pm hour can be really awful.

 

QUOTE(aimeethomp @ Jun 24 2009, 01:28 PM) [snapback]1366887[/snapback]
My girls watch Baby Einstein on occassion - more likely they watch the morning shows on Noggin. I have to be able to get stuff down around the house sometimes. They like it, sometimes they watch or sometimes they play around it. Everything in moderation is my opinion. :good:


I agree. We haven't actually done Baby Einstein in a long time - we have some They Might Be Giants DVDs for the car that we LOVE. Because of our house set up, we don't do a lot of TV with the babies - we just don't end up hanging out in the room where the TV is so the kids watch less than an hour a week. My DH is worried that the babies don't get enough educational TV. I really don't see any problem with some educational television every now and then so mommy can get something done. Especially when you can literally see that your kids are learning.

 

QUOTE(Fran27 @ Jun 24 2009, 07:34 PM) [snapback]1366898[/snapback]
I haven't heard that it's a problem with communication, more that if they are exposed to TV too much their brain tries to interpret the fast movements and eventually it can cause ADD.


Oooh, I hadnt heard about the ADD side! Will keep that in mind! The communication "argument" comes from them being glued to the TV instead of communicationg with those around them - so they say!

Thanks for your input. Yes, I agree, everything in moderation and it gives me some time to get dinner ready without them crying for me!

 

My two love baby einstein. They don't watch much TV, and I try to keep it off when I'm home with them. I'd rather listen to music anyways. I don't see a problem with the baby einstein type programing, as long as it's in moderation.

 

Mine LOVED Baby Einstein videos. I too would use it in the evening when I was trying to cook dinner.

I would have to agree with what others are saying.....everything in moderation. Mine are right on target as far as their speech and language development goes. I had not heard about the ADD thing though. I just can't imagine that letting them watch a 30 minute video on ocassion (or even daily) that that alone would cause ADD. BUT....then again I am not an expert.

 

There is nothing wrong with them watching some tv before dinner everyday since that is when you need them behaving! If it works go for it! Its the people putting their kids in front of the tv all day with no other activities that are the problem!

 

We try to do everything in moderation, too. However, my DP is a TV addict, and the boys do watch a lot of TV. I personally never cared for the Baby Einstein videos (no judgment - they just annoyed me), so we don't do those... but we do a lot of Baby Signing Time and Sesame Street videos. They LOVE them, and have learned a lot from them. While I know they say "no TV before age 2", I do think that if you choose educational programs rather than non-educational stuff, it can be beneficial as long as you don't do it in excess.

 

my first mommy and me teacher really pushed all that research on me so i am not going to let them watch tv until they are 2 or 3.... if we ever get our photos videos on to dvd's i'd make an exception, but so far, we have not had a need for tv.

that said, i know about the witching hour. i also know that when myboys have seen tv while we've been out of the house they've loved it and been very attentive. so i certainly undertsand how effective it can be when you need some time away from them!

 

I let mine watch Baby Einstein once in a while. Today, it's been almost all day, because they are sick and it's calming for some reason. They don't really watch it at this age. It's kind of on in the background while they play. Abby is the one that will sit and actually watch it. Ellie could care less. I think anything in moderation is fine. We all grew up watching tv and we are fine. I try not to get too caught up in all these studies. You know what is best for you and your kids. I've seen other kids become addicted to tv, so I won't ever let that happen.

 

My boys LOVE baby einstein. I agree w/PP's about all things in moderation. It isn't on 24/7 but we certainly use it during the witching hours!!!! In my opinion it has to be a little better than the TV because generally speaking the images aren't as fast moving and flashing/loud as regular cartoons. I think it is a little more soothing if that's possible!!!

 

My twins are almost 17 months old and have been watching Baby Einstein videos for about 4 months now. They love them. I recently started buying Sesame Street videos and they love those even more.
When I was deciding which movies to buy I found it was very helpful to go to Amazon.com and read the customer reviews. The customers write about which movies their children like most and at what age, so it made selecting movies much easier.

 

first of all... can't believe I'm posting on "The Second Year" forum!!!

My girls don't seem to like Baby Einstein much and I'm not sure why... but they LOVE Yo Gaba Gaba! Maybe they'd like the Baby Einstein dvds for older babies. I tried them on a couple of dvds that were meant for 3 months and up when they were about 8 months and they didn't pay attention for long. Actually, they liked the body parts one okay, maybe that was a little more age appropriate. Also, I read a lot about the ADD thing during bed rest as well as the higher risk for preemies having ADD. It definitely shaped our decision about tv watching! Shortly after the girls arrived DH and I decided to shut off our cable mostly as a strategy to help financially as we found that we hardly had time to really pay attention to our shows anyway. Plus, having done research about early and frequent TV exposure, I thought... well this will make limiting their tv time easy!! With all that said, they STILL watch TV in moderation. Maybe 3 days a week they watch an episode or two of Yo Gaba Gaba or this Scholastic Farm Animals dvd. Sometimes more depending on how much I NEED the break or how crabby they are during the witching hour! According to what I've read on here, I may buy some sesame street dvd's next! Oh, that reminds me... on youtube you can find clips of episodes of Sesame Street and the girls LOVE watching the musical performances on our laptop (it's tricky to keep their hands off of it though)!!

 

Ours loved Baby Einstein when they were infants, we have not used it too much lately. It came in handy when I needed to get something done for 20 minutes or so! Now what keeps their attention is Yo Gabba Gabba (I swear there is something subliminal with that show), Sesame Street, and Backyardigans. We will also play nursery rhymes for them on the computer and watch children's shows on demand (nursery rhymes, Sesame Street, etc). My DH is a TV addict, he has to have it on, so when he is up usually the Golden Girls or the Phillies are background noise.

 

I have been thinking about this a lot. When my husband was deployed this past year (he just got back Memorial Day weekend) and I was alone with the kids, tv was on, mostly baby einstein but also movies and noggin whenever they got too fussy and for some down time and definitely while eating. I always felt guilty but knew it was keeping me sane. My DS was just evaluated for speech and the therapist saw me put it on for them during dinner and said "I have never met an autistic kid who didn't grow up watching baby einstein". I flipped out. A. Are you calling my child autistic? B. What kind of comment is that? Who says things like that? Needless to say the guilty part of me threw them all out as I was so angry. I do NOT agree with her at all and wished I hadn't reacted that way, my kids loved those dvds and now they are gone.....we do watch tv, a lot of noggin, the baby channel, etc. I try to turn it off when they are happy and not fussy and listen to music instead but they do love tv.

 

I LOVE Baby Einstein and the peace it creates in this house. My oldest son who is now 10, started watching these way back when you called Julie Clark yourself and ordered them from her. Man I am old. LOL Anyway he was a very high need baby but loved those videos. He's in no way ADD, in fact he's a super smart and motivated learner. So I have had no qualms in using them for my younger DS or my twins. The twins loved them as babies and now we mostly use them at bottle time. They sit in their bouncy seats and it keeps them still long enough to finish a bottle or sippy cup.