Raising Kids in a High-Tech World

If we parents are conflicted about how our young kids interact with technology – from Tablets and DVDs to iPhones, iPads, iPods and iDon'tKnowWhatElse – who can blame us? Not Hanna Rosin, who writes compellingly in The Atlantic this month about the plugged-in push-pull parents face.

Back in 2006, notes Rosin, 90 percent of parents said their children under 2 used some kind of electronic media. With over 118 million tablets sold in 2012, imagine how high much higher that number must be today.

The reality is our kids are exposed to technology every day. Rosin dubs them "the touchscreen generation," and explores the theory that banishing technology outright may be a simple, if dramatic, response, but perhaps not the most appropriate one. Maybe, she posits, technology – especially today's interactive technology - can be beneficial to our children.

“People say we are experimenting with our children,” Sandra Calvert, director of the Children’s Media Center at Georgetown University, told Rosin. “But from my perspective, it’s already happened, and there’s no way to turn it back. Children’s lives are filled with media at younger and younger ages, and we need to take advantage of what these technologies have to offer."

If we adults use technology not just to entertain, but also to enrich and educate ourselves, as you are doing right now, how can we help our children do that as well?

Rosin cites guidelines laid out by Lisa Guernsey in the book "Screen Time." Guernsey proposes what she terms the Three C's:

1. Content: "Think about the content of what your children see on screen." Programming or technology that is age-appropriate – designed for and directed to children -- and encourages the children to interact with what they see onscreen – by asking open-ended questions, for instance – may engage children more.

2. Context: "Think about the context -- who is with them, how are they talking about what they see, how much the DVD or online game dominates their day." Studies show that when parents sit with their young children as they watch and talk to their children about something that they are watching or experiencing together, they are enhancing their children's language-development readiness. One study showed that verbal media interactions between parent and child with educational programming significantly enhanced children's language skills eight months later. Researchers compare watching a video to reading a book, in that the experience is profoundly enriched when parents ask their children questions about what is on the page and what their children think might happen next.

3. Child: "Think about what makes sense for your individual child, whose needs and interests will be unique to him or her alone." What works for the neighbor's child may not work for yours, and vice versa.

The technological landscape our children have been born into is not likely to go away. Both Guernsey and Rosin contend that we parents ought not to try to run from it, but rather to find ways to help our children explore it so that media can enrich their lives, and maybe even teach them something useful, like a second language!

Mommy tech and CES - the best gadgets for moms and kids

Like many of you I'm sure, I've casually followed the Consumer Electronics Show from afar - seeing articles and tweets here and there, heralding the coolest new gadgets of the future.  This year, I was actually able to attend the show in person, and I can tell you that the future is 3D, tablets and - good news for moms - waterproofing! One of the coolest things to come out this year was a commercial pinball machine. I'm a comic book fan, so the idea of an Avengers pinball machine that takes up a fraction of the space of a regular pinball machine, sounds pretty enticing.

Crayola came out with a Light Marker, which uses an LED-tipped point to allow kids to draw on an iPad with a virtual pen.

Our partners from One Laptop Per Child just released a kid-focused new Android tablet called the XO, PACKED with great learning apps - including Little Pim of course!

The pick of the bunch though? A robot which massages tired moms. The line for that one was out of the door!

The iPad -- is it good for your kids?

David Pogue’s son is six years old. He’s a musician, an amateur filmmaker and loves brainteasers. It’s not that he’s a genius, it’s just that he loves the iPad. In fact, according to his father, he’s addicted!

This was the subject of a recent blog post on the NYTimes.com, and like any self-respecting parent, Pogue (tech columnist for the NY Times) is somewhat concerned by his youngest child’s newfound infatuation with his father’s toy. He’s concerned, yes, but he’s not worried.

Pogue makes a critical point: his child uses the iPad mainly for learning purposes. He plays mostly educational and creative apps: a program that lets children create animated short movies, write their own songs, or solve challenging spatial awareness puzzles. To parents who remember a world before computers, this may admittedly feel a little foreign. But the technological devices can be an invaluable tool for educational entertainment when used in conjunction with other, non-screen activities.

There’s good TV and bad TV, so why shouldn’t electronics be the same? There’s little doubt that technology like the iPad can be interactive and collaborative, and actively encourage children to think, learn and create.

Poll: What are your rules for electronics or TV?

5 Tips for Managing TV Time During the Holidays

It’s the holidays! That means fun things like family, treats, presents. But for many of us, it’s also darker, shorter, colder days. If you are like me, you might be asking yourself, “How are we going to keep the kids busy all day when they can’t play outside?”

Then it’s school vacation! What to do? When you have run out of the art projects, cooking projects and sorting through old toys to make room for new ones, you might be tempted to resort to TV, the computer or handing over your iPhone/iPad. Or maybe you just want to sleep in, and the TV makes a pretty good babysitter between 6 and 7 am.

This can bring up feelings of guilt and questions about how much is too much “screen time”. I recommend a great book on the subject called “Into the Mind of Babes” which helps you sort through some of the best information – and misinformation – out there about the effects of TV on your little ones’ minds. In the meanwhile, here are some of my tips for keeping screen time in check and using media as a positive force in your kids lives.

5 tips for managing screen time during the holidays:

1. Decide in advance with your partner how much “screen” time is OK to have each day. Tell the kids what that is, and everyone needs to stick to it. If the kids ask to watch their second show you can say “we all agreed to one hour a day and you’ve already used that up, sorry!”

Make sure they know that screen time includes TV, computer and digital media players (iTouch, iPad, etc). That can seem obvious to us, but not always to them.

2. Teach your kids the expression “mush brain” from watching too much TV. This will help them realize there is a such a thing as TV overload (my kids have used the expression on their own since I taught it to them!)

3. Don’t only use TV as a babysitter. Make sure to watch special made for kids movies with them during the holidays (we recently watched “A Boy Named Charlie Brown” as a family and had a great time).

Make sure to talk about the movie with them after viewing. Movies can be great springboards for conversations about emotions and things kids think about. (How did Charlie Brown feel when they made fun of him? How would you feel if you had spell a hard word in a spelling bee?)

4. Use TV time for “soft teaching” – let them watch TV, but try to mix up the “eye candy” entertainment with videos about science, nature, language learning or music. Many parents feel good about Little Pim because their kids are having fun “watching TV” but parents know they are learning a new language.

5. Use TV time as a special reward (“after we read these 4 books… “ or “after we clean up your room”).

Happy Holidays!

Dan Zanes and Milkshake Help Your Baby Learn a Second Langauge

Giving your child the gift of a second language can start as young as 3 months old! While most parents know early learning is key, we don't always know where or when to start our children on their foreign language journey. Music is a simple first step to introducing your child to a new language, and hearing the music will get the rhythm of that language into their brains, making speaking it later on even easier and giving them a better accent. We culled the best of popular French and Spanish songs to create French Bop and Spanish Bop. The CDs will help your children discover French and Spanish through music, and the words in the songs reinforce many of the same words taught in Little Pim! We also included a 16-page book with all the lyrics, printed in the language being taught and in English.

Both CDs feature great kids melodies, sung by native speakers, and include beautiful lullabies and lively sing-a-longs. Spanish Bop and French Bop include three original songs by the popular kids' band Milkshake and the Spanish CD also has a guest song by Dan Zanes in Spanish. If you are a native Spanish of French speaker, you will likely recognize some popular songs from your childhood, and discover some catchy new tunes.

Play French or Spanish Bop in the car, put it on for an impromptu music party or make it part of your child’s bedtime routine. Soon you too might be singing "Frère Jacques" or "Los Elefantes"!

Little Pim Digital Downloads- Here, There, And Everywhere

You can watch it in a house. You can watch it with a mouse. You can watch them here or there. You can watch them anywhere! Okay, maybe Dr. Seuss wasn't thinking about Little Pim’s Digital Downloads when he wrote Green Eggs and Ham but I do share something with the whimsical author whose birthday was celebrated this month: a passion for educating and entertaining children. For our customers March is all about fun, learning, and…mobility! I’m pleased to announce that the Little Pim Digital Downloads are now available in all 10 of Little Pim languages.

The downloads will play on any Internet-connected portable player such as an iPod or iPod Touch. Download one 35-minute episode or enjoy a 10% discount when you purchase a complete language series.

My son Adrian loved being able to bring his favorite panda on a recent plane trip.

Oh the places you’ll go! More information please check our store.

What's your child's favorite Dr. Seuss book? Tell me in the comments!

There's an App for that! Little Pim Word Bag

I'm proud to announce our first iPhone Application or App: Little Pim Word Bag! Now parents can help their toddlers or preschoolers learn Spanish or French words on the go using an iPhone or iPod Touch. By marrying beautiful graphic design, our signature music, and the always lovable Little Pim panda, Little Pim Word Bag has already become a favorite in the blogosphere. iAppFun, a popular blog that reviews apps as they are released had this to say:

"With great artwork, music and sound effects these Little Pim interactive "flash cards" are the perfect way to educate and entertain young language learners on the go."

Child Mode also reviewed the app:

"The clean and clear format makes this app fun and easy to use and it is also an excellent way to keep children occupied while on the go or during a trip. If you have an iPhone or iTouch, I highly recommend purchasing this for your children. It has become my toddler's favorite kids app out of the 10 I have downloaded!" The $1.99 sticker price for the app makes it an affordable way to support your child's language acquisition and the perfect compliment to our DVDs, CDs, and flash cards.

I hope you enjoy! Please let me know what you think.

Media Literacy

Our world is becoming more and more crowded with media. Whether in our living rooms, on our commutes or in our classrooms, every waking moment can be occupied by consuming media. Whether it's looking up "what causes earthquakes" on Google with my eldest son Emmett and finding a video to explain it, or the news feeds in stores and in elevators, media is here to stay, and will only get more ever-present. So how do we address this as parents? I attended a presentation about Media Literacy for Kids at a National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) teacher's conference this past year and wanted to share a few important lessons I learned, along with some of my own thoughts as a mom who has been making media for more than 20 years.

1) Media is not inside you. Make efforts to teach your child from an early age that media is "outside of their bodies." That may sound obvious, but research shows that young children often think that what they are watching is not only real, it is inside their heads. I told my four year old last year that what he sees on TV is on the screen, which is different from what is inside his mind. We went over it several times. I wasn't sure he understood, but a few months later (kids are amazing how they store information, like nuts for the winter) he told his friend, "What you see in the movies is not inside your head!" and really seemed to have taken in the message. He went on to assure his friend that scary movies (we were talking about Avatar) are not that scary, because they are only on the screen, not inside your head.

2) Watch "good media" with your kids. Make a point of watching some educational media with your children, especially if you let them watch both pure entertainment media and educational media. If you watch the educational media with them, you'll be sending a message that it's more important (i.e. worth your time, which is precious to them) and help them create healthy viewing habits. I watch Little Pim about twice a week with my two year-old, and he can see that this is something I make time for and enjoy with him, unlike the "Sing Yourself Silly" videos he watches, which I don't usually sit down for. I also watch nature and science programs with my five year-old.

3) Talk about the media they have seen. Whenever possible, ask your children to comment on the media they watched. This way you can make sure they aren't taking away distorted messages (and help to correct it if they are) and can establish a dialog with your kids about what they have seen. This will become even more important as your kids grow older and see more and more challenging and sometimes disturbing media. When they are young, you can ask them to look for certain things in a show, like "see if you can find all the ducks" or "who is the kindest character?". This teaches them active viewing skills, which is one of the most important cornerstones of media literacy.

This is especially important for girls, who will be bombarded with messages from the media about how they should look and act.

In short, help your children learn to be active and critical media consumers. Visual media has a strong sway on young children and can be much more mesmerizing than print and audio. If you teach your children to make healthy media choices, they will gravitate toward fun, educational shows when they get old enough to make their own choices. Media is here to stay, so let's get smart about teaching media literacy to our kids. It's likely they will be teaching us how to use the media of the future, but right now there is still a lot we can teach them.

How have you introduced your kids to media literacy? Share your stories with us at Little Pim.

Zanes en espa ol

This Sunday, rather than listen to Emmett's favorite French CD for the 1,199th time, we popped in Dan Zanes' new ¡Nueva York! CD and gave it a whirl. The disc features songs in both Spanish and English, all with a fun, modern sound that makes it as listenable for adults as it is addictive for kids. Zanes is one of the most popular childrens' singers around -- along the lines of Raffi --- and is local to the New York area (I think Brooklyn). I find listening to music in another language is a great way to familiarize your kids with basic words and phrases in a context that can last a lifetime. Think about how long you hold onto song lyrics, even those you heard as a wee child. Sometimes by the end of a crazy day I can't even remember what I ate for breakfast, but I'll never forget the words to "Frère Jacques," which I learned in grade school in France, or the entire Carly Simon repertoire, which is burned into my brain, for better or for worse.

My interest in Zanes and his music is of course an extension of my fascination with fun language learning, and the planning that is going into Little Pim's CD project. What's really great about ¡Nueva York! in particular, for both existing fans and those new to Dan Zanes, is his decision to use the album as an opportunity to work with many talented artists and musicians, including Barbara Brousal, an accomplished vocalist and frequent Zanes collaborator who taught Spanish at St. Anne's grade school for nine years and may very well be the Spanish singer on our Little Pim CD. We are so thrilled at the prospect of working with such a talented musician on our project. But until our CD is ready, I suggest sampling ¡Nueva York! For Parents trying to teach their kids Spanish, this is a lively creative selection to add to the mix. Hasta pronto!