The great Baby Einstein scam

By Parenting on Shine

"Of course it was too good to be true.

The New York Times reported Thursday that Disney is offering a refund to buyers of its ubiquitous “Baby Einstein” videos, which did not, as promised, turn babies into wunderkinds. Apparently, all those puppets, bright colors, and songs were what we had feared all along—a mind-numbing way to occupy infants.

This news has rocked the parenting world, which had embraced the videos as a miraculous child-rearing staple. Videos that make your kid smarter while you prepare dinner? Genius!

Or not. According to the article, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that children under two years old stay away from watching screens. In the letter threatening Disney with a class-action lawsuit for 'deceptive advertising,' public health lawyers hired by Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood cited a study which found a link between early television exposure and later problems with attention span.

For many parents, this was the most unsettling of 'duh' moments, and a confirmation that nothing, when it comes to child-rearing, is as ever easy as we'd like to make it. So why were we so quick to seize on Baby Einstein videos as technological tutors?

Call it the perfect storm of parenting. Who doesn’t want to believe that there is a magical, wondrous, no-parental-guidance-required product that will turn their kids into Mensa members? The combination of our lack of time, our paranoia over our kids performance, and our faith in technology primed this generation of parents to accept the clever advertising around 'Baby Einstein' as truth, just as parents before us have seized on corporal punishment, or the teachings of Dr. Spock.

Still, the idea that a caper this big could be pulled off (according to the Times, in “a 2003 study, a third of all American babies from 6 months to 2 years old had at least one 'Baby Einstein' video') is mind-boggling. Disney’s refund is about as close as we’re going to get to an actual admission that we were sold snake oil, and it casts a pall over the other 'educational' toys out there."

VIDEO: How to Get Your Kids to Eat Healthy

Courtesy of fit365.com

Prevent your kids from becoming obese! These tips will have your kids beggin' for more veggies.

VIDEO: How To Make a Where the Wild Things Are Children's Halloween Costume

How To Make a Where the Wild Things Are Children's Halloween Costume on Howcast

Mom and dad make scary movies even scarier

By Linda Carroll / msnbc.com (CLICK to read more)

"Parents have been told over and over not to let kids watch TV alone. But now a new study shows that advice can backfire: Researchers found that children who watched television with their folks were almost four times as likely to be frightened by scary programs as those who viewed alone.

As the season of ghouls and gore (and horror flicks on cable) begins — and as some parents worry the new film “Where the Wild Things Are” may be too intense for their youngsters — this new study highlights the confusion many parents experience as they try to ease kids’ fears.

The findings were perplexing even to the authors of the study. They had expected to prove that parents had a comforting effect on their kids, according to the report in the upcoming issue of the journal Child: Care, Health and Development. Instead they found that parents’ attempts to offer solace to scared kids may just make matters worse."

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How to Occupy Kids When You Are Teaching the Other Ones

By Linda Wooldridge

Creating a school box that contains Lego blocks, crayons and coloring pages is a great way to keep a child occupied, while homeschooling other children. Provide fun activities and assignments for preschool children with tips from a homeschool teacher in this free video on education.