Ideas For My Pocket: a Support Group for Families: Let Me See…Too Much TV?

My children used to habitually come home from school and turn the TV on first thing, after dropping backpacks in the family room. It was a struggle to change this routine. I found myself thinking, “Oh well, it won’t hurt for today. I have things I need to do, and this keeps them occupied. Maybe just one show.” So first I had to change my attitude. When my resolve to change and enforce limits was firm, I announced to my kids that TV day was Friday, when school was out for the week, only Friday. I explained to them that there were so many other things they could and should be doing in the afternoons and rehearsed to them prophets’ counsel to limit TV. Even this did not work well until I did one more step. Helped by a prompting from the Spirit, I announced that if anyone came in and turned on the TV during the week, the whole family would lose their Friday TV watching. I had to enforce this only a couple of times, and no one got to watch that week. But soon, the kids reminded each other not to turn it on at the wrong time and developed some self-control.

I love it. Now, when someone turns the TV on during the week, all I have to say is, “Is this going to be your Friday?” “No!” they will answer and turn it off quickly. (They know that if they watch now, it will just be a short time, but Friday a longer stretch is allowed.) Or, even better, a sibling will do the reminding: “Turn it off so we won’t lose our Friday!” Actually, TV watching has gone way down, even on Fridays! We just have gradually grown out of the habit!

Even on Fridays, there are some shows I insist “we do not watch in our home.” For one thing, I don’t want to feed our kids a diet of sarcasm. Wanting to keep my kids sincere and sweet-talking, I monitor the shows and movies carefully. I love the analogy that Mom is the “Lioness at the Door” to keep out anything we don’t want in our fortress home. (Julie B. Beck)

Studies show that pornography addiction starts most often from something a child has seen early in their life. https://www.lds.org/friend/2014/02/finding-help? Parents need to be vigilant to know what their children are watching.

The Larsons realized that one TV was all their family should have, for it was impossible to properly supervise TVs that were in back bedrooms or the basement. The TV and the computer were both right in a place near a traffic area of the house where monitoring could be constant. They also set up a firm rule that kids could watch You Tube only when an adult was in the room. What their children saw on a screen was important enough to always be visible to them.

Troy and Sara Rowley were invited into the home of their favorite college Professor. When they walked into a nicely furnished living room and then family room, they admired the homey feeling. There were bookcases, but nowhere could they see a television set. After searching around a minute, they found a closed cupboard that must have contained the family TV set but noted that it was not the focal point of the room. Troy and Sara determined that in their future home, they too would have the TV set behind cupboard doors or at least not as a distraction to conversation in their own family room.

3. Only Planned Shows

Roberta taught her children not to surf channels by telling them that it was like saying, “Satan, come on in!” when they do that; for he can come into your home through improper pictures, morals, and attitudes displayed. The family planned what they would watch. When a certain series or the Olympics were on, their favorite thing to do was to tape the show. Then, Roberta could choose when to play it, (not after bedtime!) and every commercial could be fast-forwarded. She wasted a lot less time viewing what they really didn’t want to see.

Plan movies too. Be careful when your kids are very young. Under 18 months old, in fact, kids are so much better off not to watch TV or movies at all. They cannot easily process what they see, and it can bring bad dreams. During this time of their lives, their ears are so in tune to language development. For this season, it would be better for them to listen to the best of language, even scripture language, rather than put downs or sarcasm or crudeness that is often found on TV or movies.

Cynthia liked to sit her children down for a movie when things got hectic. But she realized that even if a movie is good and teaches a good moral, it may not be the best thing to show to a child often. Most shows fill most of the movie with the conflict and the negative, with a very small section of the movie that is happy and positive. Cynthia would make sure the movies she rented or downloaded were “of good report,” by asking trusted friends who shared her standards or checking the movie out on a website. She liked to show a movie to her kids once, then talk about it thoroughly with them. They talked about what they liked and didn’t like. They talked about what the characters learned and how they resolved the problem. Most of her focus was on the good that resulted at the end of the movie.

Cynthia was extra careful that any movie she purchased was something that she really did want her kids to memorize, for she knew that they would take into their vocabulary what they heard. She knew she would hear it over and over!! But even more so, that it would become a part of them.

4. Teach Them to Turn it Off!

Linda picks a Commercial Police! She always has one or her children ready to switch off bad commercials, if the family ever watches TV with commercials, for there are always inappropriate commercials that try to push their way in. The other children help that child catch them quickly.

Annika uses a puppet on a stick who can drop into his own tin-can body. This puppet helped her teach her kids about not wanting to see bad pictures. When the puppet would encounter something inappropriate, it would quickly drop into the can and shut out the bad picture. When her children got the concept, Annika found that they were able to better police themselves and turn off raunchy things on TV. Another thing she did was to teach her kids the song “Stand Up, Walk Away” by Janice Kapp Perry from “Songs from For the Strength of Youth,” a wonderful tool about watching what goes in our minds. http://www.allmusic.com/song/stand-up-walk-away-mt0019805560.

Rob and Laurie’s family decided they could not trust the TV at all, but they chose not to cut the cord. After being disgusted with shows and commercials, they talked it over as a family. They considered not having a set at all. Still, they wanted to watch General Conference on TV. Laurie remembered a friend of hers growing up whose family had no TV set. The boy her age had come over to their house to watch TV! She didn’t want her kids to do that—then she had no supervision at all! So, instead her family limited TV watching to only movies they purchased or rented. That and the educational channels they decided on were the only choices in their home and even these were limited.

Some TVs are equipped with blocks on certain channels, helping limit the poor selections. There are also filters available to block out profanity. Other families place locks on the TV.

5. Replace TV watching.

If TV is not something you want to promote, don’t use it as a reward. Choose instead a new book or a special activity as the reward, and spend time reading to children to replace TV time. Choose a book that interests you too, and all will enjoy it more. A book on tape from the library is a great change of pace.

Why are books better than TV? Children make their own pictures in their minds about what is happening in a book, instead of being given the pictures. In their own heads, they conjure up only what they can handle; whereas often on TV, they see more than they can readily understand and process, which brings insecurity, bad dreams, and fear.

In the movie Gifted Hands, my kids saw a wonderful example of the power of limiting TV. When Ben’s mother turns off the TV and makes her kids go to the library and read books instead, their grades soar. Soon, they can answer every question on Jeopardy and become brain surgeon smart! It was a second witness to my kids that there are better ways to spend time than TV.

Jenna tried to provide outside toys and activities for her kids and send them outside to get exercise and air. She loved to go along and play basketball or go on a bike ride with them, the little ones in a carrier she got second hand. Whenever she possibly could, Jen promoted imaginative play by collecting dress-up clothes and props. This kept kids creative, happy, and healthy, without so much need for entertainment.

Grandmother liked to have noise going in her room, so the TV often got left on when she slept. But Mary decided to replace the TV noise with music. She filled an ipod with soft, inspiring music and played it in Grandmother’s room. The result was fewer bad dreams, more calm, and a great spirit in the room! Mary noticed that the TV got left on during mealtimes as well, so she made a point to turn it off, and found that the family conversation increased and tensions decreased.

Noticing that Sunday worship was much harder after a late Saturday night watching movies, Rob helped the family see that it would be better to limit movie night at their house to only Friday nights. Laurie determined to bring out board games and card games for their Saturday night evenings instead. The family learned to enjoy the time playing games as much or more than just being entertained.

See also: "Setting Family Standards for Entertainment, by Carla Dalton
https://www.lds.org/ensign/2001/06/setting-family-standards-for-entertainment?lang=eng