“Did you watch a scary movie?” “No”, I told my new kindergarten friend during our conversation about the previous night. “I don't like to be scared. I like the Muppet movies and Walt Disney.” “Well, I watch scary movies”, he said, “I watch them all the time.”
I really wish I hadn't asked him what kind of scary movies he watched. I needed help to understand the gruesome content of the movies he named. Murders, cannibalism, severed limbs, buckets of “blood” and other horrors were the rule.
What is really frightening is this small boy has been watching R-rated movies in his own home. He is too young to rent these movies, too little to stay up for late viewing and too young to understand what he watches but not too young to be emotionally disturbed by what he sees. He must have parents or other adults in his life who don't know, don't care or don't understand the damage that is done by allowing children to watch inappropriate movies and/or television shows.
Young children struggle to understand their world in terms of what they already have learned; they make the new information fit in with what they know. We've all had times similar to that of hearing a young child say “doggy” while pointing to a cow. He organized new data according to the “files” he maintains in his head, and four legs, tail, animal, etc., all placed the cow into doggy category.
Children quickly learn to place doggies and cows in separate files and so on to the next new information. Not being able to fit new info into existing slots makes us uncomfortable. For adults as well as for children, not being able to make sense of our world is frustrating and scary. We who misplace car keys feel a bit lost, maybe feel our memory isn't working just right, and begin to worry a bit.
Children who view images and/or have experiences inappropriate for their age level of understanding experience similar feelings of frustration, fear and anxiety. The damage to children can be permanent.
Children understand the world in terms of what they see, feel, hear, taste and touch. They believe their perceptions, so it is almost impossible for young children to understand the difference between fact and fantasy. They are able to reason, think and make conclusions based on what they have experienced but these conclusions are often in error.
I once had a very bright child (age 11) tell me she believed in “Big Foot” because she had seen “real” pictures (photographs) of him. This child was so terrorized by the memory of movies and books she had seen at a very young age that she refused to go near wooded areas and was petrified of the dark. Nightmares were the rule, not the exception, and her many other problems seemed to me to be the results of “unreal” images which continued to be active in her unconscious mind long after she had viewed them.
My new young friend may have more problems than it seems. He was unable to sit quietly even for a moment, had closely bitten fingernails and avoided looking at my face while talking, which always concerns me. But more than that, he lives in a world which isn't guarded by vigilant adults who will protect him from harmful images and ideas.
Some people just don't know, but there exists a whole body of child rearing information that can help concerned parents learn and any library will gladly help. Childhood is a special time, and the wonder and magic must be protected by adults rather than eroded by poor parental choices. There really is only one time to have a childhood, and frightening movies with horror images rob children of childhood and of innocence.
Conversations with kindergarten children should be fun, funny, and rewarding, not just plain scary.
Darby Kethan has a master's degree in child development, and has experience as a social worker, educator of young children, educational consultant, and as a professional trainer for a national educational foundation providing professional development to teachers. Visit her website at darbykethan.com.
