Watching together, and why every guideline lands on it

Nearly every piece of guidance about children and screens contains the same line: watch together. In the Dutch guideline it is one of the characteristics of healthy screen use — screens used in company where possible, with a parent or a friend.

It is also the advice that gets followed least, for an obvious reason: you usually put something on precisely because you need to be doing something else.

Why it matters so much when they are small

The younger the child, the more of the learning sits in the conversation rather than in the video. A toddler watching a clip about colours mostly learns from the adult beside them saying "look, that one's red too". Without that it is mostly a clip with colours in it.

It is also why "educational" as a label says so little. A video can name anything; whether it lands depends on whether someone picks it up. At two that is almost the whole story, at six a good deal less.

What it means in practice

Not that you have to sit through it. Asking about it afterwards counts. Being in the same room and answering occasionally counts. At four the question "did that really happen?" is half the work, and it arrives on its own when there is someone to ask.

Wordless shows are unexpectedly good for this: Pocoyo explains little, which leaves room to narrate it yourself — and that works at any age and in whichever language is spoken at home.

When you can skip it

There is a version of this advice whose main effect is making parents feel bad, and we are not going to write that one. Twenty minutes in which you can cook is a legitimate reason to put something on. That is not a moment for watching together and it does not need to be: not every minute has to teach something.

What matters is that it is not every time. If there are also moments when somebody is watching along, the rest counts for less than the ceiling in the guideline implies.

The part we cannot help with

KidsTube is a site you leave a child alone with. That is what it is for and we are not going to pretend otherwise. What we can do is make sure they do not end up somewhere else while you are gone — which is what the checking is for — not put somebody in the room.