interview with amc host bob dorian

Interview with former AMC TV host Bob Dorian

A while back I wrote an essay comparing the two primary classic movie channels on cable/satellite, Do classic movies need to be censored? AMC versus TCM. In the article I talked about former AMC host Bob Dorian and lamented his departure from the channel which, I still believe, was the beginning of its downfall. You can imagine my delight when a few months later I noticed I’d gotten a comment from Melissa Dorian, AMC host…Read More

Good adventure books for 8yo boy?

It’s very exciting to see my son G- learn how to read! Six months ago he was proud to sound out rudimentary street signs and newspaper headlines, and now he’s leaped straight to “level 4” beginning reader books, skipping the first three levels. Important caveat: my kids are in a Waldorf school, and the Waldorf educational approach has them starting reading later than more traditional pedagogical approaches, it’s typically not until 2nd grade that they…Read More

movie geek - 12 angry men

I’m a movie geek, I admit it

So here’s something weird: I’m a huge fan of the cinema, both for the classic films and the latest big productions. I average a movie a day and have seen thousands upon thousands of movies in my life. I have seen about 95% of the American Film Institute’s Top 100 Films, for example (I blogged a while back about having seen only 89 of them, but have seen more since). Go to the Internet Movie…Read More

AudibleKids: Fun new site for kid’s audio books

I dunno about you, but my kids really enjoy listening to books on tape / audio books, and so I was pretty excited to see that Amazon.com’s new acquisition Audible.com has launched a site specifically focused on children’s material called AudibleKids. What’s interesting is that the material is broken down both into categories (Animal Stories, Biographies & History, Classics & Poetry, Fables, Fairy Tales & Myths, Fiction, Mysteries, Nonfiction, Parenting & Teaching, Sci-Fi & Fantasy,…Read More

movie critic michael medved

Michael Medved and I are pretty aligned on favorite films

I’m actually in Las Vegas today helping organize Blogworld Expo, and one of the things happening tonight is a screening of The Kite Runner movie in advance of its national release. After the film, we’ll have film critic and nationally syndicated radio personality Michael Medved conducting a Q&A with The Kite Runner’s lead actor, Khalid Abdalla! Very cool. More cool is that I am hoping to grab a beer with Michael afterwards, so I thought…Read More

Fun magazine for 2-5 year olds: Tessy & Tab Reading Club

A few months ago we were approached by a small children’s magazine publisher and asked if we’d be interested in receiving a complimentary subscription to The Tessy and Tab Reading Club, their twice-monthly magazine aimed at very beginning readers in the 2-5yo age group. Given that K- is 3 (though she’ll be 4 in January!) we thought we’d give it a whirl. Three months later I can report that K- just loves the magazine, and…Read More

How to deal with the no-TV versus TV parents?

One of the more common topics of discussion here on the Attachment Parenting Blog is the issue of media. Should kids watch TV? Should they use computers or play video games? We have pretty strong feelings about the topic and even our ten year old only watches about one movie a month, if that. That’s why when the following comment from a reader who has a rather unique situation of her own appeared on our…Read More

Lots of TV viewing correlated with ADD. Well, duh.

Reading one of my favorite geeky Web sites, Slashdot, I came across a very interesting article entitled TV Viewing Linked to Attention Problems. The gist of the original source article in British publication New Scientist is that: “Watching television more than two hours a day early in life can lead to attention problems later in adolescence, according to a large long-term study.” While the researcher part of my brain, trained from years of graduate school,…Read More

frightening movie previews at kids children's films - zathura

One big reason I don’t take my kids to the theater

Linda and I went to the local cinema over the weekend to see Wallace and Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit and really thought it was a delightful, inventive and darn witty movie. We even thought briefly about bringing our children to see it in the theater so they can enjoy the big screen and the “cinema experience”. Until we remembered the previews that were shown prior to the movie. Most of them were…Read More

FTC touts kids see fewer TV ads selling food, but the study is predictably bogus

In a wonderful example of an overly myopic study result, the U. S. Federal Trade Commission announced that, hurray, kids see a lot fewer food ads on TV nowadays than they used to twenty years ago. In 1977, the typical kid saw more than 18 food advertisements each day, while today they are only exposed to 13. This announcement comes from a two-day government sponsored workshop exploring the effect of kids’ marketing on obesity and…Read More