We don't need no education

Apparently there were a few outbursts in Coventry last week during the riots. Nothing on the scale of violence seen elsewhere.

As I was out walking at the weekend, this caught my eye:

I've heard of an educated guess - is that an uneducated prodiction?

Going TV free

In less than a month's time my TV will stop working. Or rather, it will stop working as a TV with channels - I will be able to watch DVDs and videos (yes, I do still have a video player!). 

I have been putting "buy digital TV" in my diary since March when they started going digital in my area and finally got round to looking at them last weekend. A chat with the sales person at John Lewis led me to choosing the following qualities:

• LED (back lit so better picture)
• 32" (don't want it to swamp the living room - some of them are massive and become such a feature in a room. The current one is about 24” and I like the modest size.)
• slot for memory card (for videos/photos)
• able to play BBC i-player etc (if I also get a £50 dongle** - the way the living room is set up would make it impossible to lead a USB cable across to the TV)

**Don't you love the word "dongle"? Who came up with that one???

I'd also like to be able to record programmes and something along the lines of a Humax TV recorder looks good - though I've heard friends talk about how they can go wrong. The guarantee is only for 2 years suggesting that even the manufacturers think they don't have long lives. The TVs have a 5 year guarantee.

All in all the sales person and I worked out a package that would cost me about £800. Perhaps a different shop or a sale would cut that cost – but we’re still looking at a sizeable sum of money.

Fortunately J was a good excuse to leave (he was having a great time trying to pull leads out of the TVs) and "have a think".

So ever since Sunday I've been thinking on and off about whether to get a new TV at all.

My reasoning is as follows:

Why it’d be good not to have a TV

1. J is only 15 months old. We can get a TV at some future date. I am not saying he’ll be in some anti-technology household and the butt of jokes at school about never having seen X on TV. However, I have a golden opportunity now to put off the whining requests about wanting to watch television. Once you start allowing it, children want more. J won’t miss it at the moment.
2. J has so far had almost no exposure to television. I put it on occasionally in the evening for me to have some "flop" time, but the sound is muted and I use the sub-titles (J is surprised when he's at other people's houses and sound comes out!). We have watched parts of Countryfile and Springwatch and pointed at the tractors or animals - but he hasn't seen much at all.
3. The nursery comment on J’s long concentration span. I have NO evidence to link this to the lack of television, but I have read that if children watch a lot of television they can have a shorter concentration span (they're used to images changing so quickly). You may shoot me down with examples of your children being very good at concentrating despite being keen on TV, but if there is a possibility of it having a negative effect, then why chance it?
4. We can still watch DVDs. We don't have many toddler ones at the moment - and J shows almost no interest in sitting and watching them when I put them on - but if I think I'd like him to start watching something at some stage, then I can choose that. It gives the advantage that I remain in control. Plus there are no adverts. I could write a long blog about the inappropriateness of adverts (eg the pinkification of all things to do with girls; the make-up (!!) offered to entice 5 year olds to buy certain shoes; the violence of certain characters) - I’ll save that for another time. 
5. My will-power is very low at the moment, so although I would like to have more time to read, it is far too easy to just put on the TV and sit in front of anything that's on once I’ve put J to bed and got things ready for the next day. If it’s not there, I won’t be able to watch it. It could be an interesting experiment if nothing else!
6. I don’t *want* to start watching huge amounts of television. So why spend lots on fantastic sound and picture quality?? My current TV was £70 from Tescos about 5 years ago. The picture and sound quality are probably rubbish – but there is nothing we watch that necessitates anything better at the moment. I haven’t got time to watch an entire film (haven’t watched one since J was born except one outing to the cinema for a mums and babies session with the lights on!). There are occasionally times when I see adverts for films I’d like to see (The King’s Speech or the last Harry Potter) but even if I got them out on DVD I don’t see that I need a cinematic experience at home to enjoy them.  

Why it’s not so good not to have a TV

1.     There are times when it *would* be useful to put J in front of something and know where he was while I get on with other things. Like an electronic babysitter. Am I making my life harder by not using a television for this purpose? A small amount of this is not going to harm J. It’d be a question of making sure it didn’t displace other activities for J.

2.     There was a girl at secondary school who was a couple of years above me - Jenny. Her mother didn’t let her watch commercial stations (I think there was more to the restrictions than just that, but that is one I remember). It was seen as odd by other pupils – but I wonder what effect it actually had? Jenny had “wacky” hair and clothes later on- was her slightly rebellious appearance down to anti-parenting sentiment, or could it be that she had a stronger sense of self because her mother’s stance helped her develop her individuality? Not sure that’s very clearly written. I’m thinking as I write. Anyway, we’re talking about teenagers not toddlers.

3.     I would hate to become evangelistic about it! The danger is that I could start feeling virtuous about neither of us ever watching TV. I’d like to make it clear that I’m not particularly anti TV – there *are* some great programmes. But for now, there is a window of opportunity to experience a different kind of life!

4.     I would like to be better informed about what’s happening in the world and TV news is easy to access – though at the moment I don’t even watch that unless my “flop” time happens to coincide with it! I may listen to snippets of Radio 4 in the car and see the odd half hour of Sky News when I’m at the gym but that’s it. Is that shocking? When J was having swimming lessons at the Hilton, I used to take advantage of the free newspapers, so would at least read of one of them once a week. Whether or not I buy a new TV I think I need to find ways to be better informed – making an effort to watch the news online maybe or buy a newspaper regularly (and make the time to read it! ).  

Alternatives? I could get a set-top box I guess so we continue to have a TV with minimal outlay. But the whole “how much TV do I really want us to watch?” question isn’t addressed by that – and if I am going to get a better TV in the near future it’d be daft to pay anything extra.

Conclusion: I think we’ll try to live TV-free until Christmas - and perhaps even until J's second birthday. I’ll keep you posted!

Welcome!

Welcome to my new blog!

I am the mother of J - a wonderful, gorgeous and amazing little boy.

The intention in setting up this blog is to have a space to:

1. Think about parenting
2. Record our family life in all its richness
3. Reflect on life in general
4. "Keep" the quirky things that are so easily lost, but which brighten up the day

I already have a blog:  http://infantilescoliosis-diary.blogspot.com/
That has a different purpose - it is a record of my son's treatment for infantile scoliosis - and although some posts could fit in either blog, I will try and keep J's scoliosis ones separate.