Do You Watch TV Shows With Your Kids?

January 26th, 2009 by AmyL · 7 Comments

I’m sitting here typing while the boys watch shows on the television. Currently we’re giggling at an episode of “The Suite Life With Zach and Cody”. Other favorites of late include “Ben10″, “Hannah Montana”, and “Star Wars: Clone Wars.” I was discussing it with a friend recently and realized that most of my television watching includes the kids. Heck, we even just finished watching the first season of “MacGyver” together as a family.

So how many of you also watch TV with your kids? Do you enjoy it? I gotta admit, some of the acting is just terrible, but they’re hilarious at the same time. Is that the majority of your television time? I’m assuming you have a television – I know some families don’t.

‘Fess up now: what show do you enjoy watching that you would NEVER admit to watching if you didn’t have kids?

by AmyL

Photo graciously provided by rockcreek, through a Creative Commons license, some rights reserved

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7 responses so far ↓

STL Mom // Jan 26, 2009 at 6:43 pm

Extreme Trains.
I don’t think I would watch any train-themed TV shows if it wasn’t for my son’s obsession. But actually trains are pretty interesting!
Usually the kids’ TV time is my internet time, so I don’t pay that much attention to most of their shows. I do let them watch some of my grown-up shows. They both like Mythbusters and Sell This House, and my son will comment on how pretty the ladies are at the end of What Not To Wear. My daughter often prefers their original outfits. It’s much more fun to watch these shows with my kids than by myself.
Rocket Science Mom // Jan 27, 2009 at 6:52 am

I am there with you. I grew up on Star Wars (it helped shape my career choice), and am thrilled that the kids like Clone Wars.

Actually, I rarely watch anything on TV that I don’t watch with the kids. If the TV is on, it’s on something they like, or the news so we can catch the weather. Mostly, the favorites are cartoons, not live action, so I’ve been spared the bad acting on Hannah Montana.

The grown up shows (24, Lost) have to wait until after the kids go to sleep on DVR delay.
Chris // Jan 27, 2009 at 10:31 am

We don’t watch commercial TV, just PBS Kids, most of which I’ll watch, what we rent from Netflix and the DVDs we own. We have a separate Netflix queue for the kids and right now have Wallace & Gromit out–which my kids (almost 6 and almost 3) like a lot. They enact scenes from Were-Rabbit all the time. (”Com’on Grommy, a bit more annuring!” my 6yo exhorts her little brother. She’s even got the British accent down.)

She also enjoys more grown-up fare, especially the period pieces with all the girls and women in beautiful dresses–she and I watched all the Jane Austen dramas on Masterpiece last year.

Because I do often watch with them, I don’t allow much that I don’t enjoy myself.
Anita B // Jan 27, 2009 at 4:21 pm

I like Handy Manny! I like that it teaches kids Spanish without having the annoying voices of those other 2 characters on Nick. All in all, however, we watch Veggie Tales videos and not a lot of other stuff. I watch my few shows, but always after he goes to bed.
Thimbelle // Jan 27, 2009 at 8:05 pm

We always watch what Twinks watches – always have, ever since the first time we allowed her to watch TV. Even now, as she teeters on the brink of 15, we watch with her.

We also censored and time-shifted our own viewing of any shows that we thought we might be uncomfortable explaining to her, or that would be clearly inappropriate.

We watched a lot of “Allegra’s Window”, “Gullah Gullah Island”, “Sesame Street”, “Mr. Rogers Neighborhood”, and “Blues Clues” when she was little!

And, FWIW – we didn’t allow “SpongeBob Squarepants” until she was in the *6th* grade. We felt that The Sponge was sometimes a bit loose morally… and we didn’t want to have to turn every episode into a lecture of “Don’t do what SpongeBob did!”. Whenever we decided to add a program to Twinks TV schedule, we *always* previewed at least three separate episodes before allowing her to watch, so that we can get the “feel” of the show.
AmyL // Feb 27, 2009 at 8:19 pm

STL Mom, great shows! We love Mythbusters and also the one about how things are made. Tornado week on the Weather channel is popular as well.

RocketScienceMom we avoided the Disney Channel for years, but they got tired of other offerings, so it’s now Hannah Montana and Zach and Cody. It’s not too horrible, really. I’ve noticed that they watch in phases, so if I just wait this will pass. There are certain shows and movies that we just will NOT have them watch so we reserve our vetoes for those situations.

Chris I remember the PBS days! Unfortunately i couldn’t get my older boys to watch most of that. They loved the Nick Jr shows, but hated Sesame Street and Mr Rogers, etc. Can you believe it? Someday they’ll have kids of their own and discover some of these shows and ask me why I never told them about them. At which point I will clap my hand to my forehead and say “Oy.”

Anita I have never seen the phenomenon that is Handy Manny. I’ve heard of it, and I’m assuming it’s a daytime thing. I’ve managed to ban TV until after school every day, which has been a blessing. Except for the part where I miss out on the new shows.

Thimbelle, we do the same thing with censorship and time shifting. SpongeBob is one of the shows we’ve never allowed them to watch. I don’t even have a concrete reason…I have tried but I make it through about ten minutes and just can’t take it and shut it off. There’s another show on CartoonNetwork that causes the same reaction. I forget what it’s called now. Hubby has been playing a game with the boys where if we’ve seen the show he says, “oh boring…we’ve seen this 4 times” and changes the channel. Lately I’ve noticed the boys doing that. Hooray!!
Anita B // Feb 28, 2009 at 10:13 am

Sponge Bob just reminds me of Ren and Stimpy (a show that my husband used to watch), just mindless stupidity. Handy Manny is on in the mornings and we’ve recently gravitated to Imagination Movers which is on right before. We will watch one or two shows in the morning and then the TV is off for the rest of the day until Robbie goes to bed. That’s been our routine for a while now. But I have to admit it’s very difficult for me to watch a pre-recorded LOST-sometimes it seems I can’t wait an extra hour to watch it!