When I was growing up, “Muzzy” was this really popular series of educational baby videos that would teach your baby/child other languages. After that there was Baby Einstein and Bright Starts and Leapfrog…So what should your baby be watching?
Turns out, the answer is, NONE!
I know, that sounds kind of shocking, right? You would think that having your baby watch educational programs (at least in moderation) and learn things like colors, shapes, and even a new language…would be good for their stimulation and development.
That’s what most educational baby videos companies claim, RIGHT?
But according to Dr. Michael Rich, who is the director of Media and Child Health at Boston Children’s Hospital, having your baby sit and watch these videos is actually detrimental to their development!
He cites research showing that babies who watched educational videos actually had developmental delays, not the enhanced development that you might expect.
Sooo…why the heck is it bad for your baby to be watching numbers, colors, shapes, etc. on the screen? Shouldn’t that help them learn those things?
Well it turns out, babies under two aren’t old enough to understand what they’re looking at when they’re looking at a TV screen or computer screen, or able to distinguish it from reality!
They aren’t able to absorb anything that is coming from that stimulus. I was just as surprised as you might be, that it doesn’t help them learn the English language or any other language! But since they aren’t old enough to understand that they are supposed to “pay attention” to the TV, when they look at it they’re mostly not getting it and just zoning out. (Kind of like you do when something BORING is on, and then you didn’t learn anything, right? 😉)
So why is that “zoning out” so bad? Well…
According to Dr. Rich, the three most important areas of brain growth for a baby are:
- human connection and speech
- interacting with objects and learning logic through them, like building blocks
- learning creative skills, like with coloring when they’re old enough!
And even though you might think that educational baby videos, by illustrating these skills, would help stimulate some or all of the skills…the doctor says that it stimulates NONE of these skills!
So it’s important to keep babies away from the TV when you can, because this is when the brain triples in size, in the first two years of life. This is when billions of synapses in your brain are not only making CONNECTIONS, but also billions of synapses are being PRUNED and filtered out.
And this is done by interacting with the real world and severely limiting screen time, according to the doc!
So yeah, educational baby videos aren’t so helpful after all! But what if you’re running out of creative toy ideas?
Well, I’ve got just the blog post to help you out! In my “must haves” post I talk all about the items I could NOT have gone without, like the Lovevery Play Gym that has different activities for different developmental stages. This is how your baby actually learns! So, happy reading! (And who knows, maybe buying! 😉 )
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