Video Games and Television Marketed for Babies: Ridiculous!

Babies' brains are growing at an extremely fast rate. During the first years of life, young children are growing and developing more than they will at any other time. As I compare my own four year old and four month old, it amazes me how time has flown and how far they have grown and matured from the tiny infants I first held in the hospital. Our children should be spending their early years discovering play and imagination, not glued to a screen. This is why the new trend of video game systems and television for babies is extremely irritating to me.

Leapfrog now offers a Little Leaps Grow with Me Learning System that is marketed starting at age nine months. I find this astounding. I am actually supposed to sit with my nine month old who is learning to crawl, walk, and explore the world around him, and teach him to push buttons in front of the TV. Of course, parents are pulled right into the marketing ploy by the picture of the happy mom and baby and the item description. The Little Leaps Grow with Me Learning System is described as interactive and educational. Parents read the advertising or see it on television and imagine their young children learning the alphabet or numbers even earlier than they already do. Every parent wants their child to learn, and this seems like a fun way to do it.

Not to be outdone by Leapfrog, VTech offers the V-Smile Baby Infant Development System, similar to the system by Leapfrog. This product also encourages children to park in front of the television and push buttons from the time they are the tender age of nine months old. It is marketed as fun and colorful, and supposed to teach your baby skills including colors, numbers, sounds, animals, shapes, and music. Many parents who desire intelligent children would easily be lured into the hype.

I also recently noticed that my satellite television carrier is now offering an all baby television channel with around the clock programming for infants. It is called BabyFirst TV, and is an additional $9.99 a month. "This is the first channel dedicated to babies and their parents - transforming TV from its original purpose into a way for them to interact," said Sharon Rechter, BabyFirstTV's executive vice president for business development and marketing (according to Fox News).

We own a lot of Leapfrog and VTech products that my children enjoy greatly, and I do not mind them watching a little bit of television each day. Unfortunately, it seems like things are getting more and more out of hand with marketing to our children. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends NO television for children under two years of age. This may not be possible, but certainly there should not be television stations marketed to this audience. And video games at nine months old? Totally ridiculous! Sitting in front of a screen pushing a few chunky buttons is nothing compared to old-fashioned imaginative play. Everyone complains about childhood obesity these days, perhaps they need to consider if too much sitting in front of a screen could be part of the cause.

In the end, it is the parents, however, who are responsible to decide if these products meet the needs of their families. After all, moms and dads are being marketed to even more so than the children.