BabyWhispererForums.com
ACTIVITY => Activity Time & Toddler Activity => Topic started by: *Liz* on February 20, 2011, 07:39:52 am
-
When do you think they become suitable for a LO? I am thinking of the Disney type movies, I guess??
I know one thing is sitting still - and I think J would do that if something had his attention.
But i worry about him getting frightened by some parts, and don't want to expose him to something that would upset him.
Background to this (apart from the long dreary days with nothing much to do) is that we went to the aquarium recently. Jacob loved it. I brought him a pack of plastic fish in the gift shop and he played and played and played with them :). So then I got hold of a copy of Finding Nemo and we watched it. I was so worried he was frightened by the shark bits, but he loved it, and although he did jump and look worried he wanted to watch it again and again. I only let him watch it when was sitting with him to talk him through the scary bits, and never late afternoon. But it really fired his imagination. He made playdoh fish of Nemo and dory, read books about sharks, found any fish in Megans baby toys and wanted them back again.
I bumped into a friend yesterday who was off to the cinema with her 2 boys - age 4.5 and 2.5. Obviously driven by the 4.5 year olds needs, but it just got me wondering when this sort of thing becomes and 'appropriate treat'.
What do others do please??
-
I think T was about 2 when I started putting films on for him. If I remember right Disney Cars was one of the first and is still a huge favourite ::). We have had some that came with books like a Percy the Park Keeper cartoon which is about 30 mins long and just lovely, so ones like that he has watched while I am pottering around.
I had Monsters Inc which he found one day and wanted to watch, I was dubious but we watched that together and he loved it, wasn't scared at all. We can't watch that when DD is around though as she cries as soon as the film starts. I guess she has been exposed to films a lot earlier than him (seems to love Cars too ::)). I had Beauty and the Beast for Christmas and we have watched that together a couple of times, again he wasn't bothered by the scary bits. The only film that has really bothered him was UP! - he got very upset by the house being broken up, he spent about an hour after seeing it talking through what had happened to every one. He has chosen to watch it again and has been ok with it since.
I haven't taken him to the cinema yet whereas his little girl friend has been a lot because of her older brother. There is a new Cars film coming out in the Summer so I think I will leave it until then!
Laura
-
Ds1 was 3y 2mo when I took him to his first movie (Garfield 2) he liked it, but I made the mistake of going in too early & if we'd just been there for the movie he'd have been ok... but the last 20mins were a bit harder.
With DS2 he was 3.5yo, he fell asleep in his first 3 movies... timing wasn't great.
-
B watches films ALL THE TIME. Bad I know but with the weather being how its been and having baby D its been our only choice. He likes Finding Nemo, Bambi, Ice Age and absolutely adores Peter Pan. He talks about chasing his shadow all the time. :) He's getting into Toy Story now and has a Woody doll that he takes everywhere.
My friend has a DS that a few weeks older than B and he goes to the cinema all the time. I know B wouldn't take to it though. He takes what he likes from a film and leaves the rest! Like Peter Pan, he only likes the beginning when he is chasing his shadow and when they are flying to Neverland.
B also has a Finding Nemo obsession. :)
-
M was probably over 2 when she started watching films. Before that she hadnt really any interest. Finding Nemo was our first big hit too!! Now she's very into Cinderella and toy story movies. We have a couple of action songs ones which she loves and help get rid of some energy on rainy days!
I took her to the cinema to see toy story 3 just before the baby was born so under 2.5. She was actually really good although I'd brought plenty of snacks to keep her going. About 30 minutes to the end she asked to go home but did make it to the end with M's chatting her through it. Our cinema does kids films where it costs only £1 to go so I took her to that so that if she didnt sit we could just leave.
-
I'm just following really, O will only sit for about 20mins of a film and then has had enough, but my brother takes my neice (she is 7weeks older than O) to the cinema quite regularly I believe!
-
Around 2yrs for us too I think is when T started being interested in films, and yes Cars is probably the most popular one. He doesn't seem to be frightened by anything. We watched Toy Story 3 which I was a bit worried about as I found it kinda scary at the end, but it didn't bother him. The only thing that I have an issue with is fighting, even in kids movies. For example I have Kung Fu Panda but I have been avoiding it because of all the fighting. I don't know, my cousins two boys who are 4 and 5 are so violent and I know they get to watch anything (including UFC! :o). I guess I feel ok having to talk him through scary bits but not ok trying to explain to him just yet that the fighting in movies isn't real and we don't act like that. Not that he's violent at all, he's completely not, but not something I want to start, kwim? It's hard though, I think every movie will have a little something that worries us. ::) I am thinking of taking him to see Cars Two this summer for his first movie.
-
we started around 2 yrs for films (had watched dvd's starting with baby einstein at 6-9 mo probably). so funny how many kids Nemo was 1st big one - Liv's favourite from 2- 3 1/2 but alex was always scared of it. we did not do cinema until 4yo partly because there was little on offer they would like (Madagascar 2 was the first one they saw) and partly worried about the lack of control of volume, action and no pause/fast forward button for scary bits (which liv always loved but alex seriously had to skip - it took years of viewings before she would watch cinderella the whoel way through b/c she did not like Lucifer the cat - is that his name??)
-
one time when we were visiting ILs & dd was around 18 months, MIL was babysitting & made her sit down to watch Cinderella. ::) she loved it, but it was several more months before she watched it again!!! ;D
I was (and still am to an extent) pretty picky about what I let them watch. We didn't let them watch anything until we pre-screened (which crossed things like Dumbo and Pinocchio off the list because they had things I didn't feel like explaining), and one of us (usually DH) would watch the movie with them the first time, to explain things.
didn't go to the movie theater until ds was about 4.5 yrs old.... some of the theaters around here have free older movies in the summer, so we tried a couple of those. i'm still hesitant to go to a paying movie because i'm never sure just what sort of content there will be.
-
I let DS watch madagascar two months ago for the first time because I needed to give him a haircut :P He sat still the whole time until he saw the scissors and wanted them! He loved it and liked the animal and we let him watch it again yesterday and when i mentioned the movie, he was already talking about what animals there were!!!
-
We've recently been letting Ava watch movies as well. We've mixed newer with some classics (the older ones are shorter and keep her attention a bit longer) She doesn't sit for the whole movie but she LOVES them and asks for certain ones over and over. Her favorite is Bolt. She's seen Dumbo, Jungle Book, Cinderella, Toy Story, Lion King, etc. (Maybe we'll go with Finding Nemo as it seems like it's a big hit with your LOs hehe) We watch them with her so we can talk her through any parts that may frighten her and if she were to be frightened we'd not watch them again until she was older/understood more. It also really started b/c we're feeling homebound due to the weather. The first nice day we've had recently we went across to the park for 1.5 hours! Can you tell I really want it to be spring??????
We are trying to dwindle down the amount of TV we've gotten into the habit of letting her view. I don't think it will be too difficult once we can be out and about, but that's also when baby is due to arrive so we'll see.
-
(which crossed things like Dumbo and Pinocchio off the list because they had things I didn't feel like explaining),
We have Pinocchio and Masyn will not be watching it...I had totally forgotten some of the stuff in it when I bought it. I've never seen all of Dumbo, only the part where the mom is caged up and singing to Dumbo.
We are big into Disney princess moveis, Spencer's fav is Cinderella (took me awhile to figure it out - she says lalalella instead!) Masyn does get a bit worried at the parts in most of those movies when the evil witch/stepmother/etc is causing mayhem, but she talks herself through it.
Up was one movie she didn't like at all because of the thunderstorms and the mean dogs.
-
Leorah wasn't ready to watch films until she was around 3 (did watch shows though ;)) Her favourite films when she first started to watch were Open Season (with Boogie Bear), Ice Age, Dumbo (but now she gets upset when they cage his mum), Madagascar, 101 Dalmatians and The Lion King. When she was a bit older she became mad for Shrek and Toy Story but her ultimate favourite is Peter Pan, we don't own it so she doesn't watch it often. She has never liked the Princess type Disney, she likes the ones with animals, the only exception is Snow white but that is because she likes the animals and the dwarfs!
Hoe could I forget A Sharks Tale? We didn't have anything else but that film on for about 3 months until it got scratched and kept stopping (no I didn't scratch it though I did feel like it :P)
-
Ava likes Up. She doesn't remember it's called Up and asks for "the one with the balloons" hehe
-
Mine have never been bothered by the scary bits, so I don't really worry about that. M probably started watching films at about 2 (certainly close to when E was born), although I don't remember her sitting through a whole film very often at that age. We have all the usual suspects - Nemo, Monsters, Cars, Ice Age etc. Beauty and the Beast is the favourite, although I have a similar problem as Martina with the violent bits (as an aside, we went to see a stage version of B&B and at the end where the Beast kills Gaston, E piped up "Beast hit Gaston. Say sorry!"). Fortunately we seem to still be in the 4yo black and white world where all she thinks is that it is naughty to hit.
E still won't sit through a whole film. We quite often put one on for 20-30 minutes and therefore watch it over the course of a few days. I haven't taken them to the cinema yet - I think M would be okay (but probably only just in the last 6 months or so), but I'm pretty sure E wouldn't be.
-
I wouldn't dream of actually going to a theater...Masyn is super sensitive to loud noises and who knows how Spencer would react. It good either be a really fun time, or a total disaster and as we have to travel over an hour to go I'll wait until they are older.
-
Maybe I am being a bit over protective then? I will have to try a few more to see if he likes them - but I will certainly watch them myself first to check what is in them (and so I know where the scary bits are).
I've seen pinocchio so many times - but can't think what bit you are all talking about. So best refresh myself ::).
Perhaps he is actually too young to really be scared yet?
Actually I worry about classic fairy stories as well - yk with wolves gobbling up littke red riding hoods gran etc?
I probably need to man up and help teach him that stories aren't real.
-
TBH, they all have different thresholds for what is scary - and in my experience it is the very imaginative kids who are more likely to be scared (mine aren't imaginative at all, lol!). One of M's friends can't even sleep with The Gruffalo book in his bedroom, so his films have to be pretty closely screened.
I think that in a lot of the Disney films, the scary bits are often quite vague - so we know that they are scary because they are meant to be, but if you don't have that preconception then it won't be so frightening, yk?
-
Yes I'm sure it is very variable, and DS does have a good imagination. But i doubt he really understand what 'eating a person up' actually IS either. To a child that should be a silly concept, rather than a scary one I guess.
-
So far nothing has yet to scare T, but then again he is not very imaginative! :P
-
Maybe I am being a bit over protective then? I will have to try a few more to see if he likes them - but I will certainly watch them myself first to check what is in them (and so I know where the scary bits are).
I've seen pinocchio so many times - but can't think what bit you are all talking about. So best refresh myself ::).
Actually I worry about classic fairy stories as well - yk with wolves gobbling up littke red riding hoods gran etc?
I probably need to man up and help teach him that stories aren't real.
we also have dumbo and pinocchio and am wonjdering which parts reomive it from peoples' list - in dumbo i know those stupid crows say dumb things...
i go with the teaching aspect myself (Bratz and anything overtly violent or realistic with the "bad" stuff (ie not amimated / pretend) are the only thing banned in this house). a lot of old shows have what was ok at the time (racism, sexism etc) but i always use that as teaching moments with my kids and they have a great understanding of how unfair judging people is and that we are all the same inside and being unique is a good thing etc.
we are currently watching loads of little house on the prairie which i watch with them as EVERY episode requires comments from me - this week alone saw us discussing the native american indians (which i then extended into the australian situation with Aborigines), poverty, literacy and access to education, consumerism (how they had only a few possessions) etc. I was grateful when soemthing i was hoping not to have to explain got brished over by alex - someone sent a hooker up to Charles' room at a hotel during a conference (while Mary was there) and he had to send her away etc. Alex declares after the hooker goes "well that was an awkward meeting" without asking more questions about the clothes the woman was wearing or what she had said LOL quite a lot of the more subrtle "bad stuff" goes over their heads.
-
To a child that should be a silly concept, rather than a scary one I guess.
Exactly. And a lot of the scenarios are so ridiculous I think that children will often see them as silly rather than scary.
-
Liz, we are probably the only ones who do not watch too many...essentially only Cars.
primarily as I do not see the point of DS sitting in fornt of a movie for 1.5-2 hrs and also because DS doe snot like any hint of violence. So no mean/bully like chracater is accepted and make him sad and unhappy so we avoid.
We will go for Cars 2 in the cinema and he will be 4.5 by then.
As for DS's imagination its fortunately HUGE and not because of movies but because of books...
-
Dumbo I didn't like because he gets drunk (on accident), which is when he has all those hallucinations/dreams, and I didn't want to have to explain why drinking something made all that stuff happen. J is also a rather sensitive sort, and when she was younger the fact that he was separated from his mother would have really upset her; it would still bug her now.
Pinocchio, w/in 5 minutes of the cats showing up they are immediately calling each other 'stupid' & other names. i didn't keep it on much after that, so don't have more specifics.
i agree with teachable moments, and they have seen a wide variety of stuff. for example, i only recently let them see beauty and the beast, and they loved it, and although there are violent parts towards the end, i felt that at their current ages they could understand better what was going on & could process it. i guess what it comes down to is that IMO some things are better than others at presenting teachable moments; lessons can be learned w/o putting certain images into their heads.... i feel like i'm not explaining myself well.... :-\
i do admit to being a bit gun-shy.... DH showed them the wizard of oz at a ridiculously young age (around 2 & 4?) when i wasn't home, and I was cleaning up that mess for months...
-
TBH, they all have different thresholds for what is scary - and in my experience it is the very imaginative kids who are more likely to be scared (mine aren't imaginative at all, lol!). One of M's friends can't even sleep with The Gruffalo book in his bedroom, so his films have to be pretty closely screened.
When my DD was around 2.5 years she enjoyed watching the dinosaur movies like 'The Land Before Time', 'Journey to Big Water' etc but now is completely scared of any movie, and she is very imaginative. She too has stopped reading 'The Gruffalo' and 'Going on a Bear Hunt' and other such books because of this. She loves listening to the disney stories like Snow White and Cinderella though, but when I tried to show her a Barbie movie of Rupunzel she wanted it off because of this little green dragon in it. At the moment her Kindy Theme for the term is 'Toy Story' and they do lots of creative art based on this and other activities. Because she has never seen Toy Story I bought her a storybook of it which she loves. I haven't told her it's movie yet as she keeps telling me that she will watch movies, 'when I'm older'... One of her best friends is the same, and she too is very imaginative as well. DD enjoys watching Dora and other TV. For DD I think a lot of it is the dark shadows and the larger than life features on the different creatures, even some of the music. I would imagine this is just a phase though. Most children her age seem to love movies though - she is 3.5 years old...
-
wow, most of you have such brave kids, lol.
we took ryan at about 2.5 and he was petrified. he didn't like the dark, he didn't like the noise, he didn't like the movie. the only thing he did like was the popcorn, hehe.
we're still stuck at winnie the pooh, though he loves the classic cartoons like tom and jerry and roadrunner and such. but finding nemo, shrek and all those are still frightening to him. i guess he's a bit sensitive. he didn't even like the non scary parts in shrek, just donkey and shrek talking set him off.
we've not been back at the movies and he hasn't asked. i'll go with his best friend next time, i'm sure he'll be fine. he IS almost 5 now... at home he just watches short shows like franklin, little bear, penguins of madagascar, etc.
if your son will sit through it and isn't afraid of loud noises or the dark, take him. he'll likely love it! and don't forget the popcorn! :-)
-
I do understand what you mean Jaime.
Actually J hates cartoons like Tom and Jerry (oh no mummy, bump down bump down, stop stop, hurt etc). He does like monsters and aliens in books but is kind of wary of them. Loves the funny bone books, but some bits need a bit of explaining, like them liking the monsters and ghosts.
He does have a wonderful imagination, no idea where from though!
-
It is funny at 2 Leorah wasn't scared by anything but after watching The Gruffalo film halfway we had to turn it off and we didn't read the book for nearly a year purely because she found the sound of the woods creepy! She understand so much more now and her imagination is wild though I would say books are worst than films for her! Leorah likes the baddies like Captain Hook and Cruella De Ville but hates the deep laugh Mr Happy has on the original Mr Men series, it is not always the obvious that scares them!
BTW even now Leorah doesn't sit and watch a whole film unless she has a huge bowl of popcorn ;D We will try out the cinema if somthing appropriate comes along though.
-
Pinocchio, w/in 5 minutes of the cats showing up they are immediately calling each other 'stupid' & other names. i didn't keep it on much after that, so don't have more specifics.
Well, if you keep watching, when Pinocchio and the other boys get kidnapped and taken to Pleasure Island, they end up drinking, smoking, gambling, not to mention they all turn into donkeys, which they refer to as jacka$$es. Not exactly what I want my kids to see! DH of course did let her watch it partway through once, so I hid it on them.
Oh, and my kids never, ever sit through a movie...not sure if that is because we've watched them all a million times, or just lack of attention span. The only time they are a captive audience is in the van when they have no choice but to stay still!
-
My DH has banned Pinnochio from our house because as a kid it really freaked him out when they turned into donkeys, I must admit I don't remember that at all but I maybe saw it once, there was no such thing as video/dvd when I was Leorah's age, I think I was about 7 when my uncle got his betamax and the first film I saw on video was Texas Chainsaw Massacre :o :o
-
I think I was about 7 when my uncle got his betamax and the first film I saw on video was Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Yeah, I think I was that age when I first saw Poltergeist! My family has banned me from seeing scary movies...I slept with the lights on for weeks after seeing Signs (the one with Mel Gibson, and aliens) and it wasn't even very scary, just one shot where someone is filming a home movie and you see the alien walking in the background...
-
I'm glad to be reminded of what is in Pinnochio That will not be on my list to show DD. Dumbo was fine as she hasn't asked about the drinking part (over her head for the moment) and most of the rest of the movie is fairly mild. The crows, ehhhh we just talk a bit about what things we are allowed to say and what things are not nice to say and she is working on processing that. She does come out with "bad words" every so often, but generally she doesn't really understand them so we just talk about replacing them with nicer words.
I think she is too young for the theater though. I think maybe next year she'd be alright. We'll see. She gets up and wanders away from movies to go play and comes back as they are a bit long.
We did go to see Toy Story on ice....(she hadn't seen the movie) and it was dark and loud and whatnot. She was scared at the beginning of the show and then warmed up and thought it was fantastic! I liked that it was people in costumes and required a bit more imagination and was a fun experience/outing. I would do that again!
-
I know this will be an opinion that alot of people don't agree with, but I am going to share it anyway. DD has never watched a movie, for many reasons. But for me, and IMO, those films just weren't made for toddlers or preschoolers, and IMO the themes can be just too intense. I don't want to start a debate, because everyone is entitled to thier opinion, and everyone should do what they feel is best...but for us, there are a myriad of reasons that we haven't watched...we wonder about looking at the tv for that long, dh and I can both recall being frightened as kids at some of the Disney movies, and plus I am opposed to the whole Princess theme in general. I know I might be in the minority, but just wanted to offer to OP that it doesn't neccesarily mean that you are "over protective" if you think the movie is too much for your lo....I mean if you think it is, then it is! We can all make decisions that we feel comfortable with, and if you have a little doubt, then that really is ok. Everyone is different. :)
-
DS also has a very good imagination so we have to be careful not only about TV but also about which books he reads too. I don't have a problem per se of him watching something that I know is not scary but TBH he's lost interest after 20/30mins anyway so it really doesn't bother me if we put on an "approved" film for a bit He certainly won't be going to the cinema anytime soon - he'd hate the loud noise!
-
I think too, it will also depend on what's happening in your family at the time.
Andrew is 'subjected' to way more than Matthew ever was at the same age. When he was 3.5 Matthew would watch Shrek, Madagascar and cars. But only at weekend and he'd see half on Saturday and then the rest on Sunday. Now though, Matthew is old enough to see a whole thing from start to finish in one go and gets the plot etc, but he's 7 and he and Daddy will relax together - so cute both cuddled up on the sofa. The knock on effect is that Andrew now often sees a whole movie as opposed to half - he is free to wander off at any point and often does but he won't accept being taken away if Matthew is still watching KWIM.
I am struggling with finding appropriate TV for both of them. Its wet and miserable outside, its the holidays, we do arty stuff, we do playdough, lego, they have the train set out, we read, we play games so balanced in other creative and imaginary stuff. Matthew doesn't want to watch Thomas the tank engine - he wants scooby doo. So, they both end up watching both - not good for Andrew watching Scooby - but not sure what to do :-\ So, we do watch movies instead that both are interested in - but theres a limit on how many times we can watch some ;).
Alex