I think it depends on age of the kid? Like obviously ms Rachel isn’t a replacement for teaching your baby stuff. But my daughter learned all the songs and signs from ms Rachel when she was 18 months old.
I vividly remember learning how to count to ten in French from Canadian Sesame Street when I was 4. I think this Ms Rachel hate is unwarranted and like a little alarmist.
My younger son is 6 and until recently he’s been nonverbal. He actually does learn some from Ms. Rachel’s videos, especially mimicking opening the mouth, and how certain sounds are made. I also respect Ms. Rachel for being one of the only moms with huge platforms pretty consistently speaking up for Palestinian children (at least that I’ve seen; I’m sure there are others, or at least I’d hope there are).
Of course videos aren’t perfect lessons, and shouldn’t be used as a replacement, like you said, but videos can absolutely teach some things. We have a set of ASL DVDs we watch that teach our family a lot of signs which help our son communicate.
Hmmm let Ms Rachel get her coin and stay home with her kid…
The issue is still that we’ve not got any village/community/welfare support so we need someone to watch our kids whilst basic needs are met. Compounded by the fact it’s frowned upon to expose our kids to ANYTHING that isn’t perfect, and the minimisation of mothers’ needs (like how dare you put your kid in front of a tv for 15minutes so you can shower?! BAD MUM)
Agree we should all collectively acknowledge there is nothing educational about TV for kids, but let’s also agree that that’s ok. We should also be aiming for better social change and villages and all that stuff. Can’t blame Ms Rachel for all that
I'm a speech-language pathologist, and I am completely on the same page as you, Natasha. I'm actually working on a newsletter that talks about this very topic. Do you mind if I link to yours?
and everyone will be in their triggers “my kid learned something” yeah, no shit. kids are SPONGES. and mimics. they learn by mimicking in the first 7y, so of course it seems like they learned something. go ahead and take up a new habit and see how long it takes before they’ve ’learned something’ like the tiny geniuses they are, but we seem to ready to downplay)
the real question is why do we dog ourselves like this….there is nobody more qualified for our toddlers to learn from than their own parents, who live in their specific individual environment. why outsource something you’re qualified to teach simply by living daily life with your child? toddlers. don’t need. language learning programs. just talk to your child while you (drumroll please) hang out with the child, for the love of god. in case anybody wants to jump on me because ‘parents just need a break’ yes, yes indeed. i just get mine while my kids take a bath, fold some towels, put away some dishes, or…….go outside and play. wild i know. we do watch a movie sometimes….but id like my kids to learn life skills, which are NOT taught by putting on media entertainment for them.
This was a good one! I have been told (by family members) that I’m failing my children by not letting them watch “educational” shows like Ms. Rachel. So silly!
And now my sister-in-law talks to kids (hers and mine) just like Ms Rachel, and it drives me a little crazy. They were advised that their oldest is speech delayed and probably autistic on the basis of not speaking a lot of words by 18 months (iirc, the number of words the ped wanted was 200). They started watching Ms Rachel together, and she was speaking a lot more by 2.5. …But my kids always explode in language between 2 and 2.5, with zero Ms Rachel. Almost like kids naturally develop more speech over time as they get older.
We certainly still utilize screens occasionally. Some of our homeschool memory songs are on screens, but even something akin to Schoolhouse Rock can cause behavior changes in kids, especially very little kids. Heck, I can feel myself getting more ill tempered and less patient when I’m on a screen for an extended amount of time. We, as parents, need to go into this gig with eyes wide open.
As a Gen-Z kid, I just don't understand why you millennial moms don't have a stack of old DVDs from your childhood shows for your kids to watch.
Stop giving them an iPad & free reign of the dangerous awful internet & get a DVD player. I still have my Blue-Clues & Caillou on VHS & i was born in 2004 🙃.
Nailed it. The ONLY tthing TV/Video teaches children is to watch more TV/Video. Whether it's Rachel or Big Bird or the Playboy channel, it is the visceral addiction to lights, color, and spectacle that is the draw for kids. It has zero narrative or educational qualities and is a massive vraud,
I picked up on her nonsense within minutes of watching her show. My wife had put it on although it has always been incredibly rare that we let our little ones watch TV and they never had any interest in it until they were older with friends with phones etc. That being said, I picked up on how bad Ms. Rachel was very quickly. This particular one was sign language that she wasn't consistent with and downright wrong many times. I said to my wife "there is no way this is beneficial at all to children". Those bashing your article are just defending themselves as telling them what they've been doing is bad for their children is felt like an attack. Hopefully your article can reach people before they allow their little ones to watch so they won't be defensive and can take your advice and data. Good article.
I think your analogy to junk food is spot on. Of course it’s not educational. I put it on for a little while in a morning so I can get ready and distract my daughter for long enough for that to happen. Let’s just be honest, a few minutes of cartoons isn’t really going to do any harm in the long run just like the occasional fish fingers for tea won’t when you need to go shopping.
I have never heard of this YouTube person but I just watched her video and intuitively feel that she genuinely wants to and thinks she’s helping. I think it’s uncharitable to assume the worst in people. At worst it might be naivety. But actually by these comments, maybe she is actually making a positive difference?
I have a baby in my care twice a week that's been severely neglected as well as a toddler from the same home and my own child has watched Ms Rachel regularly and so I disagree.
My baby sings along to any and all new songs Rachel puts out and this baby has picked up 3 words in 3 weeks. It's an 18 month old boy who was nonverbal and non walking. I actually watched him mouthing the words as Ms Rachel was saying them the other day. His brother made the transition from single word speech to full sentences the first week. I think what's important in transitioning from Ms Rachel being 2D to 3D is a watching others interact with the show. It doesn't need to be constant whatsoever. Randomly I will break into dance and song and my kids will do this without my input. These kids seeing me and my kids doing it has lead to all of them doing it regardless of me leading anything.
The dopamine rise and ultimate crash, when the screen is turned off, JUST ISN’T worth it for me. That in itself is enough to convince me how terrible screens are for young little brains. As an exhausted mother of 2 under 2 I remember relying on it way too much freshly postpartum, and I hated myself for it because I felt it's so called "help" was short lived and developed a "Thomas The Train" obsession for my oldest. Sorry Ms. Rachel 🤷♀️ my boys were never a fan of you. The little blue steam engine wins again.
I suspect that real child experts such as Winnicott are rolling around in their graves. Yes, I know from personal experience that being a mother is not all just a barrel of laughs, fun and happy times. But you outsource your baby's brain development at your peril because babies have not evolved to the point where they can optimally develop without the more or less constant presence of an actual human to interact with. Virtual does not cut it for them. https://lucyleader.substack.com/p/donald-woods-winnicott
Now that my daughter is nearly 3.5 the tv is finally not having such a huge effect on her. I’m always been limited screen time. Very limited. But I had my days here and there where it was approaching the 2 hour mark. Now we cap it at 30 minutes a day. But not every day. Some Days we go with out any tv. And it’s always only tv. Old shows, usually in dvd or tape. (Little bear, me rogers, Weston Woods/Scholastic book movies? Puff the magic dragon…) Sometimes I’ll stream guess how much I love you or mouse cookie. And my daughter has been a peach with all that. I get a little chunk of time to take a shower or do something on my own devices. And like I said it’s not every day. On a day I have a grandma to watch her I won’t let her watch tv because I’ll be getting my break when she goes with them. But I’m not going to let myself feel like 20-30 minutes of a darling show every other day is the equivalent of these kids that are glued to the iPad/youtube all day. Momming full time is hard and when you don’t have a bountiful support system you rely on tv. I just try to make the best use of it. Miss Rachel isn’t THE problem, she’s just the mascot. Her and cocomelon 😂
I think it depends on age of the kid? Like obviously ms Rachel isn’t a replacement for teaching your baby stuff. But my daughter learned all the songs and signs from ms Rachel when she was 18 months old.
I vividly remember learning how to count to ten in French from Canadian Sesame Street when I was 4. I think this Ms Rachel hate is unwarranted and like a little alarmist.
Also cocomelon is garbage.
My younger son is 6 and until recently he’s been nonverbal. He actually does learn some from Ms. Rachel’s videos, especially mimicking opening the mouth, and how certain sounds are made. I also respect Ms. Rachel for being one of the only moms with huge platforms pretty consistently speaking up for Palestinian children (at least that I’ve seen; I’m sure there are others, or at least I’d hope there are).
Of course videos aren’t perfect lessons, and shouldn’t be used as a replacement, like you said, but videos can absolutely teach some things. We have a set of ASL DVDs we watch that teach our family a lot of signs which help our son communicate.
And yeah, Cocomelon SUCKS. ;)
Ms Rachel using her platform to speak up for Gaza is what every major parenting influencer should be doing, I love her for doing so.
Yes, I know a 2 year old who has adopted a lot of phrases from Little Bear and it’s frankly adorable.
Hmmm let Ms Rachel get her coin and stay home with her kid…
The issue is still that we’ve not got any village/community/welfare support so we need someone to watch our kids whilst basic needs are met. Compounded by the fact it’s frowned upon to expose our kids to ANYTHING that isn’t perfect, and the minimisation of mothers’ needs (like how dare you put your kid in front of a tv for 15minutes so you can shower?! BAD MUM)
Agree we should all collectively acknowledge there is nothing educational about TV for kids, but let’s also agree that that’s ok. We should also be aiming for better social change and villages and all that stuff. Can’t blame Ms Rachel for all that
I'm a speech-language pathologist, and I am completely on the same page as you, Natasha. I'm actually working on a newsletter that talks about this very topic. Do you mind if I link to yours?
Please do!
and everyone will be in their triggers “my kid learned something” yeah, no shit. kids are SPONGES. and mimics. they learn by mimicking in the first 7y, so of course it seems like they learned something. go ahead and take up a new habit and see how long it takes before they’ve ’learned something’ like the tiny geniuses they are, but we seem to ready to downplay)
the real question is why do we dog ourselves like this….there is nobody more qualified for our toddlers to learn from than their own parents, who live in their specific individual environment. why outsource something you’re qualified to teach simply by living daily life with your child? toddlers. don’t need. language learning programs. just talk to your child while you (drumroll please) hang out with the child, for the love of god. in case anybody wants to jump on me because ‘parents just need a break’ yes, yes indeed. i just get mine while my kids take a bath, fold some towels, put away some dishes, or…….go outside and play. wild i know. we do watch a movie sometimes….but id like my kids to learn life skills, which are NOT taught by putting on media entertainment for them.
This was a good one! I have been told (by family members) that I’m failing my children by not letting them watch “educational” shows like Ms. Rachel. So silly!
I’ve had folks imply the same.
And now my sister-in-law talks to kids (hers and mine) just like Ms Rachel, and it drives me a little crazy. They were advised that their oldest is speech delayed and probably autistic on the basis of not speaking a lot of words by 18 months (iirc, the number of words the ped wanted was 200). They started watching Ms Rachel together, and she was speaking a lot more by 2.5. …But my kids always explode in language between 2 and 2.5, with zero Ms Rachel. Almost like kids naturally develop more speech over time as they get older.
We certainly still utilize screens occasionally. Some of our homeschool memory songs are on screens, but even something akin to Schoolhouse Rock can cause behavior changes in kids, especially very little kids. Heck, I can feel myself getting more ill tempered and less patient when I’m on a screen for an extended amount of time. We, as parents, need to go into this gig with eyes wide open.
As a Gen-Z kid, I just don't understand why you millennial moms don't have a stack of old DVDs from your childhood shows for your kids to watch.
Stop giving them an iPad & free reign of the dangerous awful internet & get a DVD player. I still have my Blue-Clues & Caillou on VHS & i was born in 2004 🙃.
I don't trust that baldy weirdo.
Nailed it. The ONLY tthing TV/Video teaches children is to watch more TV/Video. Whether it's Rachel or Big Bird or the Playboy channel, it is the visceral addiction to lights, color, and spectacle that is the draw for kids. It has zero narrative or educational qualities and is a massive vraud,
I, of course, have known that screens were bad but I didn't know they actually inhibited learning!!
I picked up on her nonsense within minutes of watching her show. My wife had put it on although it has always been incredibly rare that we let our little ones watch TV and they never had any interest in it until they were older with friends with phones etc. That being said, I picked up on how bad Ms. Rachel was very quickly. This particular one was sign language that she wasn't consistent with and downright wrong many times. I said to my wife "there is no way this is beneficial at all to children". Those bashing your article are just defending themselves as telling them what they've been doing is bad for their children is felt like an attack. Hopefully your article can reach people before they allow their little ones to watch so they won't be defensive and can take your advice and data. Good article.
I think your analogy to junk food is spot on. Of course it’s not educational. I put it on for a little while in a morning so I can get ready and distract my daughter for long enough for that to happen. Let’s just be honest, a few minutes of cartoons isn’t really going to do any harm in the long run just like the occasional fish fingers for tea won’t when you need to go shopping.
I have never heard of this YouTube person but I just watched her video and intuitively feel that she genuinely wants to and thinks she’s helping. I think it’s uncharitable to assume the worst in people. At worst it might be naivety. But actually by these comments, maybe she is actually making a positive difference?
I was a parent duped by baby Einstein!! 🤦🏻♀️ my oldest is 20 now, but I thought 30 minutes of that annoying shit a day was good for him.
I have a baby in my care twice a week that's been severely neglected as well as a toddler from the same home and my own child has watched Ms Rachel regularly and so I disagree.
My baby sings along to any and all new songs Rachel puts out and this baby has picked up 3 words in 3 weeks. It's an 18 month old boy who was nonverbal and non walking. I actually watched him mouthing the words as Ms Rachel was saying them the other day. His brother made the transition from single word speech to full sentences the first week. I think what's important in transitioning from Ms Rachel being 2D to 3D is a watching others interact with the show. It doesn't need to be constant whatsoever. Randomly I will break into dance and song and my kids will do this without my input. These kids seeing me and my kids doing it has lead to all of them doing it regardless of me leading anything.
The dopamine rise and ultimate crash, when the screen is turned off, JUST ISN’T worth it for me. That in itself is enough to convince me how terrible screens are for young little brains. As an exhausted mother of 2 under 2 I remember relying on it way too much freshly postpartum, and I hated myself for it because I felt it's so called "help" was short lived and developed a "Thomas The Train" obsession for my oldest. Sorry Ms. Rachel 🤷♀️ my boys were never a fan of you. The little blue steam engine wins again.
I suspect that real child experts such as Winnicott are rolling around in their graves. Yes, I know from personal experience that being a mother is not all just a barrel of laughs, fun and happy times. But you outsource your baby's brain development at your peril because babies have not evolved to the point where they can optimally develop without the more or less constant presence of an actual human to interact with. Virtual does not cut it for them. https://lucyleader.substack.com/p/donald-woods-winnicott
Now that my daughter is nearly 3.5 the tv is finally not having such a huge effect on her. I’m always been limited screen time. Very limited. But I had my days here and there where it was approaching the 2 hour mark. Now we cap it at 30 minutes a day. But not every day. Some Days we go with out any tv. And it’s always only tv. Old shows, usually in dvd or tape. (Little bear, me rogers, Weston Woods/Scholastic book movies? Puff the magic dragon…) Sometimes I’ll stream guess how much I love you or mouse cookie. And my daughter has been a peach with all that. I get a little chunk of time to take a shower or do something on my own devices. And like I said it’s not every day. On a day I have a grandma to watch her I won’t let her watch tv because I’ll be getting my break when she goes with them. But I’m not going to let myself feel like 20-30 minutes of a darling show every other day is the equivalent of these kids that are glued to the iPad/youtube all day. Momming full time is hard and when you don’t have a bountiful support system you rely on tv. I just try to make the best use of it. Miss Rachel isn’t THE problem, she’s just the mascot. Her and cocomelon 😂