Comments (6)

By Mom Unplugged, January 30, 2008 9:39 pm

For those of you who have not been keeping up with the blogs Shaping Youth or Corporate Babysitter (aka. Parents for Ethical Marketing), there has been a HUGE debate raging over a certain Target print ad. The debate even made it into a New York Times article! Since I have been away on another planet for the past two months (between the holidays and blog moving), I only just discovered this controversy last night as I tried to play a little catch-up with my Blogroll.

There has been enough said on all sides of this debate, so my two-cents on the intention or appropriateness of the photo would really be overkill at this point in the process. Besides, any intelligent remark would only be drowned by the endless sea of flaming comments that are bombarding these two unfortunate bloggers.

My point in bringing this up is not to stir up further controversy, but to mention my revelation when I first read about the Target ad: I must really be living under a rock to have not seen this ad that everyone else in the universe HAS seen!

Part of this ignorance or innocence (depending on your point of view) stems from the fact that I live in the boonies. The nearest Target is about 3 hours away so we don’t see billboard ads for anything much other than Cellular One and local businesses.

The other, and more major cause of my uninformed state, is obviously my lack of television. With TV, we would be exposed to far more marketing than we are now. This controversy made me think more about advertising and children.

Since the average child in the US is supposedly exposed to 40,000 TV-ads annually, it seems that parents ought to come up with some sort of strategy for dealing with this commercial barrage.

In my mind, there are three approaches to dealing with kids and TV commercials:

1) Don’t worry about the number of ads they see:

The easiest approach, but you still might want to read on. I have some suggestions further down for discussing ads with your kids and teaching them a bit about media manipulation.

2) Limit the number of ads that your children view:

Some practical suggestions for accomplishing this:

- Limit their network TV viewing time.

- Choose PBS over advertising channels. They’ll see some “brought to you by…” stuff, but that seems far less blatantly manipulative than mainstream ads.

Or:

3) Totally eliminate TV advertising from your children’s lives:

How to do it:

- Get rid of the TV (but this is awfully drastic and is not for everyone)

- Allow them to watch only PBS or any other commercial-free channels out there (won’t work if the “brought to you by…” bothers you too.)

- Have them watch only videos and DVDs.

- TIVO or videotape the kids’ programs minus the ads. Have them watch the recorded versions.

How to handle TV advertising and your children is a very individual choice and one approach does not work for all families. I am not preaching any particular philosophy here! Think about it, and decide for yourselves.

But whether your children see a lot of ads, or only a few, I think another important aspect of dealing with advertising and children is to talk to them about the ads that they see. Here are some suggestions:

For young children:

- Have them call out “Commercial!” whenever an ad comes on. Children under the age of 5 often have a hard time distinguishing between a program and a commercial.

- Have kids count the number of ads in one hour, or time the length of each commercial.

- Talk to children about what is being advertised and how it is made to seem appealing. Do they think that Barbie can really dance all by herself?

For grade-schoolers:

- Show kids that you are skeptical. Ask them who they think created the ad. What is the message? What information is missing from the ad? Do you believe what is being shown? Show them that many ads attempt to make the viewer feel that life would be better, or more comfortable, or “cooler” with the product in question.

For pre-teens:

- Mute the ad and have your child tell you what he or she thinks the ad is saying. Or have your child cover their eyes and then describe to you what they think the ad showed.

For better or for worse, ads are a part of our world and they aren’t going to go away anytime soon. So learning to deal with advertising and how it works seems to me to be an important life lesson, one that even TV-free kids will have to learn eventually.

LINKS:

Some of my suggestions came from PBS Parents: Children and Media

A related post of mine: Combating Commercials

Image thanks to Wikimedia Commons and photographer David Monniaux.

Comments (8)

By Mom Unplugged, December 8, 2007 11:28 pm

I still remember growing up and seeing TV ads with Barbie looking gorgeous and twirling around by herself and thinking that if I had that particular Barbie, she would dance around like that and be like a best friend to me instead of a plastic doll, and my life would be perfect. Well, Santa did occasionally bless me with that wonderously miraculous gift of the moment, but the wonderous gift never did what it seemed to in the ads, and it never changed my life.

How do we explain to kids that what is in the ads they see, is not what would come in the package under the tree? The easiest way is to have no TV, so they see no ads.

Barring that more radical approach, the book Unplug the Christmas Machinehas some good suggestions for how to teach your kids about TV commercials:

According to this book, studies have shown that children under the age of 5 cannot distinguish TV commercials from actual programs. (Thanks for the link Dana!)

The authors suggest that parents watch at least one hour of TV with children, in order to discuss commercials.

+ Have young children call out “commercial” whenever an ad appears.
+ Talk to children (especially older children) about what is being advertised and how the product is made to seem appealing.
+ Have older kids count the number of commercials in one hour, or even have them time the length of each commercial.

Here are some ideas that grabbed me from the website PBS Parents: Children and Media:

+ For Grade Schoolers:

“When watching TV with your child, question the commercials.Voice your skepticism by posing questions such as these: Who do you think created this ad? What do you think the message is? What might the advertiser not be telling us? Do you think you can believe what you see? Start with obvious targets—ads promoting high-fat foods, for example—then move on to more subtle ads, such as those promoting a cool or attractive lifestyle. Explain how advertisements are often meant to make people feel that something is missing from their lives. “

+ For Pre-Teens:

Try muting an ad and have your child tell you what he or she thinks the ad is saying. Or…have your child close their eyes and tell you what he or she thinks it is showing.

There are so many more wonderful ideas grouped by age at PBS Parents: Children and Media, that I shall just have to link to them by age here:

Preschoolers
Grade Schoolers
Pre-Teens
Teens

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Quote of the Day:

“Adolescents, youths, and even children, are easy victims of the corruption of love. Deceived by unscrupulous adults, who, lying to themselves and to them, draw them into the dead-end streets of consumerism.”

- Pope Benedict XVI, quoted today while talking about Christmas (heard on tonight’s NPR All Things Considered)

Sorry this is so “heavy.” I am not Catholic, nor do I usually get into religion on my blog, but I did think this was a quote worth thinking about, no matter what one’s beliefs.

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Read all the Christmas/Holidays Unplugged posts here.

Comments (1)

By Mom Unplugged, October 26, 2007 9:34 pm

Here are some more TV-free activity ideas for grownups that were left in the comments of yesterday’s post, TV-Free Activities for Grownups. I repeat them here for all to read and consider:

* From Amanda (The Rowdy Pea) -

- Spend quality/quantity time with partner.

- Podcasts.

- Sewing.

* From Becky (Boys Rule My Life) -

- Play trains (she thinks they need to branch out though!)

* From Wishy (Wishy the Writer) -

- “If you can’t think of at least ONE more activity, you’ve been married TOO long! tee hee!”

* From Woodmouse (Woodmouse Loves Crafts) -

- Volunteer more.

* Andamom (Andamom.com) -

-Visit a museum.

-Go on a hike through a National Park (and get your Passport Book stamped).

-Check out a new gallery.

-Go swimming.

-Go on a boat ride.

-Take a dance or cooking class.

-Practice yoga.

-Unclutter your home, car, and office.

-Photograph your family, community, or another location.

-Paint a picture or your home.

-Take up knitting or crochet.

-Fix things in your home or your clothes that are ripped.

-Take a long drive.

-Join a team (softball, soccer, etc.).

-Take up pottery, glassmaking, or jewelry making.

-Go fruit picking.

-Try a new restaurant.

-Get checked up by the doctor or dentist.

-Go on a hunt for ruins, artifacts, and other old things…

Thanks for all the additional “Unplugged Ideas!”

Thanks to morguefile.com and photographer Dawn M. Turner (“xandert”) for this photo! (Her website: The Turner Zoo).

Comments (10)

By Mom Unplugged, October 25, 2007 2:07 pm

I spend a lot of time on this blog writing about TV and kids: What is TV’s effect on children? What are TV-free kids like? Without the “Babysitting Box,” how does one ever cook a meal?

But what about adults? For grown-ups who are in the habit of unwinding at the end of a hard day by channel surfing, or watching a favorite show, the prospect of a long and empty evening without the TV might be somewhat daunting to say the least.

If you are considering eliminating your TV, or at least reducing its use and are worried about how to fill your evenings, then here are some ideas:

- Read a book. (When is the last time you read a book? A recent, well-publicized poll found that 1 in 4 Americans read no book at all last year. If we take the glass half-full point of view, I suppose this statistic means that 75% did read at least one book last year. That has to mean something I guess.)

- Take a relaxing bath.

- Play a board game.

- Do a jigsaw puzzle.

- Take up a new hobby.

- Subscribe to a new magazine…and actually READ it!

- Write a blog.

- Write a novel!

- Write old-fashioned snail-mail letters to friends with whom you are losing, or have lost touch.

- Cook or bake.

- Organize that enormous box of photos that has been sitting there staring at you for years.

- Volunteer.

- Scrapbook.

- Sell all your old stuff on Ebay and make a little money (in addition to all the money you are saving by not having cable anymore!)

- Go for a walk, hike or bike ride.

- Take a class at your local community college.

- Work on a political campaign, or for a cause you believe in.

- Learn a foreign language with some books and tapes.

- Listen to NPR, or a podcast.

- Listen to music.

- Listen to a book on tape.

- Read aloud to your spouse or kids.

- Plant (or plan) a garden.

- Sit and chat.

- Play (or learn to play) a musical instrument.

- Obedience train your dog, or teach him tricks.

- Linger over dinner or dessert.

- Have more dinner parties with friends.

- Start a bookclub.

- Sit on your front porch and chat with the neighbors or simply watch the world go by.

- Plan a vacation.

- Stargaze.

- Call a friend.

- Do a crossword, or a Sudoku puzzle.

- Do the Unplugged Project with us!

Any other ideas?

Thanks to morguefile.com and photographer Jane M. Sawyer for the photo.

Comments (4)

By Mom Unplugged, October 17, 2007 9:17 pm

There is another blogger out there who is trying to turn off the TV for one week, just to see how it goes. Becky of Boys Rule My Life (mom of three boys!) and her family have decided to try going without TV for one week. Becky says:

“Jeff and I have been talking about this for some time and after reading this post on Unplug Your Kids and seeing a tv commercial today showing a child coming home from school and the parents being too “busy” for their kids we’ve decided that it’s time: We are unplugging the tv for a week. ”
-We’re Going Unplugged, October 10th

One thing I think is clever, but perhaps obvious to most besides me, is that Becky actually physically unplugged the TV in order to avoid little fingers turning it on. Of course even the littlest children know how to push buttons and could turn on a TV with no problem. Plus, as Becky says: “…it is truly unplugged, which also means that I have to make a conscious decision to turn it back on.”

Becky is also trying to cut down on the amount of time she spends online. I must admit that the computer is also my weakness. During my TV Turn-Off Week Blog Challenge I cut back too, but it was hard.

Read about Becky’s first unplugged day here. It sounds like it was a pretty good day. Her oldest boy Will (age 5) was thrilled to play more trains, and Nathan (age 2) was a bit perplexed, but all was going fairly smoothly as of the time of her post.

She also posted an update today:

“Mornings have been less hectic. I don’t have to remind Will *quite* so much to get ready, brush teeth, etc. because the tv is not on to distract him. We’ve played trains or read books before school every day this week. The house is quieter. It’s nice.”

They have not been completely TV-free. The family has turned it on for a little while around 3PM, but only for a bit. The reduction in the amount of TV her family has watched seems to have made Becky pretty happy so far. She and her husband Jeff have been able to spend more time as a family, which was their main goal.

Becky’s “unplugged week” continues. Please stop by Boys Rule My Life to follow her family’s progress and wish them well!