Does DVD watching in car confuse non-tv households?

[Hippoharbor]

I do not know if that Subject line really conveys what I am trying to ask. Yes, it does sound contradictory. So far, we have been fortunate that DS, now 12 months old, has not really shown too much of an interest in TV watching at home. We want him to play with his toys and not rely on TV as source of entertainment.
However, he is now forward-facing in the car and I play a DVD each time he is in there. He really loves watching the Baby Einstein videos and it makes our car rides much more peaceful. I do not mind him watching "tv" in the car b/c I understand it is hard to expect him to entertain himself back there.

Now that he has been watching DVDs in the car, he has started to show an extreme interest in the TV at home. I did relent a couple of days last week and turn on Sesame Street (he was not feeling well after his MMR vaccination). Now, instead of happily playing with his toys, he whines and continues to ask to get on the couch (for tv -watching, I presume.

Am I confusing the kid by having a different set of rules/expectations in the car vs home?

Michelle

[deannanb]

I can't comment on the car watching - we don't have that in our car.

But DS is almost 16 months. He didn't really have an interest in watching TV until 2 weeks ago - he was sick with the stomach flu and we watched every Baby Einstein video we had (a box set) several times over 4 days!

He has recently learned how to turn on the tv in the living room - so I have Baby DaVinci playing all of the time. Basically - he turns the tv on and that is what is on the tv. I don't need to worry that something is on that I don't want him to see.

There are days when he never watches it... and days when he could sit for a few hours (I never let him) - and watch it. He has learned his body parts from watching it... so that is a plus!

I suppose there is some give and take in everything. If you find that you have played with DS all day and you need 15 min. to get dinner ready, let him watch the DVD.

[Momof3Labs]

We allow TV in our house, and do not have a DVD player in the car, but wanted to throw out a few thoughts.

If you watch the Baby Einstein at home with him, you can reinforce concepts (e.g. body parts in DaVinci) with him while watching and later on, after the TV is turned off. So it does become a more educational experience, versus just entertainment/distraction (though I'm not above TV for entertainment or to give mommy a break, especially at 38.5 weeks pg!). But it definitely takes some adjustment time and distraction techniques to curb the watching after DS has been sick.

If you turn it on for every car ride, he's missing out on the world around him. He doesn't need to entertain himself necessarily - even though we're up front and he's in the back seat, we spend a lot of time pointing out things to DS out the window: trucks, fire stations, construction equipment (yeah, there's a theme here, he loves big trucks lol), horses, cows, what have you. We talk about how red lights mean stop and green lights mean go, and now he's learning about different road signs. He loves to look for billboards too, and recognizes many store logos, even though he isn't reading quite yet. DS also likes to listen to his music in the car, though we also sing silly songs together too. Granted, my DS is older than yours, but even at 1 year of age, DS could be distracted for a looong time looking for trucks!

Another thing that I wanted to mention is that 12 months is the bare minimum for forward-facing in the car. He's much safer rear-facing at this age; if you want more info on it, there's a lot over on the car seat board.

So, just a little food for thought. Obviously what works for us isn't what will work for everyone, and I respect that!

[Hippoharbor]

Yes, I do know that 12 months is the bare minimum for FF. When he was a smaller baby, I swore to myself that he would stay RF until the newly recommended 33 lbs. I even bought the BV carseat wanting him to be as safe as possible. However, I "gave in" and turned him around on his Bday to avoid some of the fighting/crying that we have had with carseat and car-riding. I wish sometimes that I did wait longer, but I feel there is no turning back now (no pun intended!).

Michelle

[o_mom]

We have not had any problems. We do not have the TV on during the day unless there are extreme circumstances (someone's sick or needs a nebulizer).

We don't have it on regularly in the car, but on long trips we do. For everyday trips, we do the things that PPs have mentioned - look for trucks, bridges, stop signs, etc. Sing along to CDs, etc. On long trips, I try to limit it also by driving during nap times, bringing "new" toys, etc. We drive about 3 hours each way to see grandparents and only watch one DVD about half the time if there are no traffic slowdowns. We didn't even have the DVD in the car until he was 20 mos, so we never knew we "needed" it, LOL.

I do notice that after he has seen it a few times in a row, that he will whine for it for a couple of days. I guess I would stop using it in the car so much. At that age, it is much easier to have no TV at all, than to try and limit it since they don't understand "just one show" or "a little bit" at all.

[Momof3Labs]

A lot of one year olds do scream in the car if bored - they don't like the confinement; it's not really about RF vs. FF (particularly since they don't know the difference). So maybe you could experiment with different non-DVD ways of entertaining him in the car, and once you find something that works, flip him back rear-facing.