Mummascribbles – The banning of certain tv programmes in our house – Mummascribbles

It’s probably safe to say that Zach watches too much television. I have always been pretty careful with how much he watches but then Oscar came along and suddenly the TV was a huge helping hand for me, especially in those early days when the littlest man was so poorly with a cold that he literally spent every single moment attached to me. 

I don’t have a problem with him watching TV and in fact, over the years, the amount of stuff he has learnt through watching Cbeebies has been pretty impressive. I remember picking him up from my mum’s once after work and him telling me about how cheese was made, and another time when he told me all about nectar and bees. He is four and a half now and he knows a lot of stuff so I can’t ever be negative about television programmes that expand his knowledge. 

Just recently though, his viewing habits have changed. He is now beyond Cbeebies and I can’t remember the last time he watched it. Mr Tumble, In The Night Garden and The Bedtime Story are a thing of the past (except for when Tom Hardy is presenting and then it’s a must watch for me him), and they have been replaced with programmes that do far less educating and instead, give him a right bad attitude! As the effects that such programmes have on him have been uncovered, I have been banning them from our TV screens! 

First up is Peppa Pig. It took him a while to actually get into Peppa, far longer than I expected and at the beginning he would just watch it every now and then and it had no real impact on him. Then he became obsessed with it like most children and I started to notice that it was making him be a lot ruder than he was previously. I think we all know that Peppa has a serious attitude problem, always wanting things to go in her favour and throwing a hissy fit if they don’t. Well, this has happened with Zach and as soon as I put two and two together, that programme was off of our screens. He still manages to catch a couple of episodes sometimes if he is watching Milkshake on Channel 5 but otherwise, it is never on! 

The second thing I banned very, very quickly after he discovered it, was Horrid Henry. Ok, I should have known from the title that this probably wasn’t the best programme for him to watch but he very quickly fell in love with it and so I allowed him. That lasted for about a week. It took about a week for this programme to give him a dirty stinking attitude and when I heard him reciting some of the stuff he was hearing and realising he was getting it from that show, it was banned! 

He has a new favourite programme now, which is PJ Masks on The Disney Channel (I think it is anyway, he watches it on YouTube!). As far as I can tell this is mostly ok and I haven’t noticed it having a detrimental effect on his behaviour. There is one character that seems to say “never” a lot and sometimes if I ask Zach to do something, his immediate response is “never”. At first I didn’t know that’s where it was coming from but as soon as I realised, I told him that if he continues to say it in the way that he was, I would ban PJ Masks too. This threat has been the worst for him and now, if it accidently slips out, he immediately apologises or gasps that he’s accidently said it. That boy loves PJ Masks and he doesn’t want to lose it! 

We seem to be ok again now. I mean sometimes his attitude does stink but it no longer has anything to do with TV programmes and everything to do with him approaching the grand old age of five. I was talking to the hairdresser in the salon that I take him to and she was saying that her daughter of the same age is literally making her tear her hair out! Ignoring everything, refusing to do everything, not listening to anything she says. This is Zach down to a T and it was refreshing, as always, to hear that in the most part it is completely normal. But equally, I can absolutely see the effect that certain programmes have on him and I don’t think we need to enhance his already iffy behaviour with them. 

Are there any programmes that you have banned from the TV screens in your house or are there any that I need to be aware of, that may cause him to act out after watching them? Whilst he is still so young and so influenced by what he sees, I shall keep banning the things that I think are inappropriate! And I can’t be alone right?!