Influences on children

Two new subversive influences on children. First, apparently, children are happy to eat pretty much anything if it is in a McDonald's wrapper. As I have said before, parents should rejoice at this since it will make their task of getting kids to eat healthy stuff alot easier.

More worrying is a Wash U. study that suggests that Baby Einstein can impair speech development. Hard to see what the mechanism is here but it is not good news for those products. From my perspective, Baby Einstein gave our children a whole sentence of vocabulary: "I want a DVD now."

Re-living the 80s

The other week I picked up the first season of Mork & Mindy on DVD. I fondly remembered it from my childhood; especially the performance of Robin Williams. My hunch was that my 8 and 6 year old might enjoy it in a wholesome sort of way.

Well that turned out to be definitely true. They loved the humour. "Oh he keeps sitting on his head!" and of course, "Nanoo nanoo" which has become a new greeting around the home.

But what was more interesting was that they liked the storylines. When it comes down to it, they identify with Mork. He doesn't understand how the world works and is working it out as he goes along. Much of what he doesn't understand are things kids also have trouble with. How money works? Why people date? Why people lie?

Mork amusingly stumbles through this and eventually ends up with a little life lesson to Orson at the end of the day. It is hockey but right at their level. I can highly recommend it as family viewing all round.