But this just strikes me as about the worst thing ever. We only ever watch TV during meals when we are having "movie night" and have made it a specific family activity. I would NEVER bring a television to a restaurant. It's bad enough that everywhere we go now, there are TVs on anyway! My husband is famous for getting up and turning them off, especially when they are showing something violent or inappropriate.

I don't let my kids watch much TV at home and I am opposed to portable TVs and video games in cars and other places. I expect my children to be able to sit still, converse, color, or look at books when we are out, and they do. It's what was expected of me - why shouldn't I ask it of them? And besides, I like their company!

For example, we don't own a portable DVD player.

But I'm not going to judge. Maybe this girl has been dying to watch the movie all day and it was her special treat and then there was a last minute decision to go out. Maybe this was a good compromise for this particular day.

But I would hope that at other times they all eat together without the DVD.

whose child just wasn't ready to go out to eat. So on the rare family outing to a resturaunt, (I mean SUPER rare) they brought the portable DVD. They used it to keep their kid calm in what was normally an overstimulating environement.

Now she's older and they have practiced at home and meal times go much smoother! They used it as a crutch till it was okay for their kid to go without it.

Now for the most part I am anti tv and eating, or car rides and DVDs, but I can see it being useful in certain situations, YMMV.

My kitchen table is covered in papers and things I need to file and put away. Sometimes we do art projects there. Before Lily we ate on TV trays. Post Lily we eat on tv trays and she eats at a little picnic table in the tv room.

It should also be noted that dinner is at the god awful hour  7:15 pm time because I don't get home until 6:45 ish. It's a combo dinner / tv / relax / veg time.

I know it's bad. I think about it every time we sit down to dinner. We haven't even purchased a booster seat for the dinner table because really, what for, we don't use it. It's exhausting to even think about trying to change this bad habit though.

And I love my portable TV player. Hell sometimes when we're shopping and she's feeling unruly she watches Mickey Mouse on my ipod with no sound. She knows the 6 episodes we have by heart anyway.

I admit, we do this at breakfast with the newspaper and our older son does it too with books he is reading.

We don't do it at dinner, but it's hard sometimes to pry the book out of our kid's hands.

I fall into the militant mother category.  no portable dvd players in the car, at the restaurant, on the plane.  well, they weren't even around then, so that made my decision easier!  But, no headphones either.  and by the time they were teens they CHOSE no headphones.  many a great conversation was had (and overheard as they talked with each other or their friends) my 3 kids were 4 years apart(eg. 4,3,1 years old; now 24,23, and 21).  

When the 4 of us went out it was about learning how to behave in a restaurant.  so the visits were short and gradually lengthened.  Crayons, talking, word games occupied us until food came. I've overtipped many a server due to messes we left or just for the extra napkins that appeared or just for not treating us like pariahs.

I've experienced the tantrums in public and left carts of goods in stores as we made a hasty exit.  when we went out with other adults, my husband took the kids outside to "look" at stuff until food came or used crayons, word games, etc.  we ate, conversed, shared then left.  the time was not about adults sitting around talking while kids got bored and ran amuk.  if we wanted to talk more we left the kids home or we all went somewhere after to talk.  as they got older this time in restaurants got longer.  now they converse and relate well to all age groups and can converse on many topics when necessary.

When I saw the title, I thought, well, I'd be OK with TV at dinner.  But it would be limited; for instance, when I was growing up, we watched the news while we ate, and often discussed it.  I credit this for promoting my early interest in politics and current events.  DS still eats earlier than we do, because DH often gets home late, and I do tend to have the news on when he eats.

But I'd have to say no to it at a restaurant.  I know many people eat out so often, it ceases to be a special event, but if you wouldn't let your kid play video games, be on the computer, or watch a movie with headphones at your home dinner table, I don't think you should do it in a restaurant.  Books or puzzles maybe, but come on, people. Can we just try to cut the media exposure a bit?  I think we'd all be just a little better off.

I mean, I think it sort of falls into the cell phones at a restaurant - where one person is eating and the other person is talking on their cell phone to someone they'd rather have dinner with...it's rude.   We're all here eating together and that means that we talk to eat other.  

and both rude and nice to do in public.  

We don't even have a dinner table, DH doesn't get home from work by the time DS needs dinner.  So the SOP is to sit Kid Sparky down at his little table (aka the coffee table) in front of Noggin while I cook dinner for the adults.  That doesn't happen every night, and often once he's done eating he helps me cook.

When we move we'll have a separate living room and tv room, plus a dining area and a bar in the kitchen.  And DH will be on nightshift, so he'll actually eat dinner before he leaves for work.  So the habit might change.  We had dinner in front of the tv at home from middle school on, but never at Grandma's house.  So I think different ways can all work.

I want to preserve one time every day when everyone in the family is together - not just physically together, but together.  In our household that's the dinner table.

Communication isn't going to get easier when my kids hit adolescence.  So expectations have to be set now, while I still have a hold on them.

We rarely eat out, but I actually think using it in a restaurant is not a bad idea, if it keeps your kids busy and lets the adults get some grub and a bit of conversation.

OTOH, your point about teaching them how to act in a restaurant is also a good one.

At home, I have totally different feelings, as in not a good idea!

No, a four year old shouldn't be glued to a tv during every meal. Yes, the parents should take time to teach the child the proper way to behave in a restaurant. This wasn't the "family" dinner table, though, and we have no window into their lives to see if this is their typical behavior.

I can think of dozens of scenarios where it would be most expedient to plunk a video in front of a kid in a restaurant, even if it's not the first thing in my own toolbox. We can't judge other people's choices, only observe and decide if it would be right for us if the situation came up. And hope we can do the best we can when we're faced with similar choices.

And ultimately, even four year olds with crappy parents can turn out to be decent people.

believe you me, on the 22 hour journey between Melbourne and NJ, that portable DVD was a lifesaver. We have subsequently used it on car journeys lasting more than an hour, and it works well.

But I draw the line at TV at the table. Weekdays, I make dinner for Jess for around 5.45 (anywhere between 5.30 and 6, really), and I turn off the news and sit with her to chat. If I leave the TV on, her attnetion is totally distracted, anyway. DH gets home around 7, and we eat together. Sometimes the TV is on, sometimes Jess is playing games on the computer, most of the time she's sitting near us or on DH's lap. Weekends, we eat together, and TV is off, no ifs, ands or buts. It's important to us that we have family dinners whenever possible.

While I voted "awful", like others have said, we don't know what's going on with that family, so I'm going to say YMMV. Who knows?

In a restaurant?  NEVER.  If my kid couldn't handle restaurants, we'd just eat at home.  Depressing and limiting?  Yes.  but that's life.

In the car?  Depends on the length of the trip.  When SIL was here, my nieces insisted on having a DVD in while we drove to lunch, not even twenty minutes away.  Ridiculous.  But long car rides?  Oh yeah.

Dinner time?  No tv.  We all sit down together and we talk.  That's dinner.

I wouldn't do this in an everyday situation.  However, if (for example) the family is traveling, the wee one is a little stressed and out of sorts from the change in surroundings, and the family simply isn't able to grab enough downtime before the meal, it could probably be a wonderful thing.

My bro-in-law used a video iPod for this, and he kept short educational-type videos (think Sesame Street) and various photos of the family and their adventures together.  It was an absolute godsend for plane travel when the niece was tiny (meaning 2ish), shrieky, and super-squirmy.

I already take the DVD player out with us, at least the times I remember to bring it. We all eat together, then it comes out when ds is finished eating, and wants to get down - a good 20 minutes or so before dh and I are finished eating.

I couldn't care less what other peeps in the restaurant think. From all indications, they think it's pretty clever actually. I've never seen a snark face or gotten a judgey comment. I have gotten a lot of smiles about it.

Obviously, I don't do this at home, although once in a blue moon,  he does get TV at dinner. It has to be a bad day for that to happen though.

Don't knock it til you try it - it could change your life :).

I've done some things as a parent that on the outside seem awful to some, and I don't know their entire situation.
I hate to admit it, but Noggin has "babysat" for my 16 mo DS quite a bit while I finished up nursing school.  (I graduate tomorrow! Yippee!!!!!)
We have a portable DVD player for 11 yo DD.  We go on these crazy long drives for feis every summer, all over the Midwest.  The DVD player is a life saver!  She gets sick if she reads to long in the car.  It's nice to have in the hotel too.  I can use it to unwind after driving or whatever after she goes to sleep.  I rarely have time to watch an entire movie, but when we're on the road, I can.  I've been known to pop a movie in for myself while waiting for her next competition to come up.  We don't go to feis without it.

We use our DVD player for plane travel, even if it's just a 2 hr flight.  Even a well intentioned 7 and 5 year old can be a bit much for the other passengers.  For a car trip of 1.5 hr we've decided no, but we might use it for something longer.  

It has been a godsend on the 2 occasions when I had to either bring my younger son to a class or skip it altogether.  He burst out in a fit of giggles in the middle of a dreadfully dull lecture on statistical estimation of sampling error; the young professor turned around and said, "I wish he could come to every class".  And my husband has done the same when he's needed to bring a sick child to his office for an hour or two.

So I'm not opposed to using a DVD player as a babysitter.  I just think that social situations should be treated as social situations, regardless of age or maturity.  (Though I understand that for an autistic or severely disabled child the rules change, so I agree that when we don't know we can't judge.)

I would not bring one into a restaurant, and I resisted buying one for the car for a long time.  But on long car trips, it's a great way to keep a kid from going nuts.  We don't use it on any trip shorter than two hours, and we have the added bonus of taking it into the hotel if necessary for some kid-friendly entertainment.

The integrated systems in vans cost over $2000.  The portable DVD we purchased was under $100, and can be taken on planes, too.

One problem with our van is that it is a loud vehicle on highways, so it is difficult to have decent conversations on highway trips.  If we had a quieter car, I might feel differently.

Crayons for restaurants, for sure.  But I'm with those that wouldn't judge this particular situation.  When my kid was 3-4, it was near impossible to get her to behave in a restaurant for any length of time, so we didn't go out much.  While it's not a choice I would make, I could see how someone else might reach the end of their rope.

My kids have always managed to comport themselves in restaurants without incident.  When they were small, careful choice of restaurant and arriving at off-peak times meant we could eat quickly and without incident.  It probably helped that eating out was a rare treat and my kids knew that if they misbehaved, we would leave and they wouldn't get to eat out again for a long time.

As for travelling, I have no objection to a DVD player during long trips, but my kids manage a 14 hour drive four times a year without one.  It is easier know that everyone knows how to read, but lots of little travel toys and fun snacks we don't usually eat at home was enough for them.  That and books on cd - our library has a great collection.

so DS could watch movies when we were having political meetings at dinner. Grown-up conversation as necessary, child interruptions were not welcome (esp since DH and I were running the meetings), and sometimes entertaining your child is simply an act of mercy.

DS is now so fantastically well-behaved, polite, and kind (I take little credit for this, as it is his general nature), I can't say it harmed him or his manners much.

but I refuse to judge others that do.  

Part of the reason we try not to park in front of the TV for meals, in restaurants or otherwise, is that I think that eating while doing something else makes it easier to overeat.  It's so cool that kids start out life with a decent understanding of when they're full and when they're hungry that we try not to de-program that if possible.  I'd love to be able to stop eating halfway through dessert because "I'm full".  DD routinely does that.  I always eat her leftovers.  Oops.  

--R

i wonder if part of the reaction to a child watching a DVD in a restaurant is that it is simply jarring?  i often get annoyed by someone in a public place yakking on a cell phone too.  for example, last weekend a woman got into an elevator and conversed on her cell phone..why did i find that so annoying? i believe i have read that people find cell phone conversations disturbing because they can only hear one side so it disrupts our system.

what struck me about erika's story  was that the child sat through the entire meal absorbed in the movie without interacting with anyone else. don't you all find folks who sit through an entire meal without talking to one another a bit sad. and of course it is all up for discussion given that part of the whole restaurant experience is people watching.

technology is disrupting all kinds of social rules. and society will begin making new rules as we go along.  i wonder if part of the negative reaction is the notion of increasing disconnection in our own self made bubbles.

i think it is premature to judge this family based on one encounter,especially since you don't know them and didn't speak with them.  there are countless reasons why what you saw may have been acceptable or even necessary.  let's be careful to support each other rather than criticize.