Decent/safe youtube/other for my 7 year old?
January 26, 2025 2:39 AM   Subscribe

My kid is court ordered to spend a 3rd of his young, impressionable life with his clueless, irresponsible dad. His 'parenting' amounts to putting him infront of a screen nearly always and sometimes alone. i am the literal opposite of this so this hurts and scares me a LOT - I suspect that's part of the intention.

Kid is fed a diet of entitled spoilt brat youtuber teenagers - themes of disrespect for others/authority/smashing things up/teenage pregnancy, sport cars being ripped open with weapons etc and endless buying unnecessary, overpriced shit, vast privilege and entitlement are flaunted. It sometimes impacts kids behaviour at home and school. I have advised school.

Kid thinks these self promoters are wonderful and associates visits to duds with free reign with them.

The only hope I have of encouraging better influences is of finding stuff he likes more. In life he likes Scouts, music, making stuff, his mates, cycling - he makes friends everywhere we go. He is very active. He has a brilliant sense of humour, enquiring mind and has a theatrical/dance bent but the few vids I find (I m shit with tech) don't seem to grab him.
He loves Bluey and even enjoys some of the 70s stuff I watched but can only watch them so much.. He is curious about Amongus/Minecraft.. even these seem to have dark/violent themes?
Can anyone recommend safe fun that might grab him? Might be good if it had good older kid role models, especially boys/young men.
posted by tanktop to Computers & Internet (21 answers total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
YouTube Kids gives you a lot of different options for filtering what videos are shown, from a simple age range filter down to selecting a specific list of videos they can watch.

PBS Kids has been pretty solid. There's also PBS Games to go with it.
posted by Pockets at 3:00 AM on January 26 [1 favorite]


Jeez, what a mess. I had a similar ex; the good news is that my kids remember their time with him as incredibly boring.

Have you thought about becoming the fun mom? Instead of more senseless screen time, why not pick a football club and start following them? You can also start playing together and possibly find other kids or families to play with. Then your tv time would be special because go Spurs or whatever.

If not football, then cycling, or tennis or something active.

Be so much fun that when he visits his father, he will turn off the tv and says he bored. I wouldn't try to fight this with more tv.
posted by yes I said yes I will Yes at 3:28 AM on January 26 [7 favorites]


Response by poster: I mean I hope to find things he can hopefully want to watch instead when he s there. We do loads of stuff together, I can t stand screens... and tbh probably try yo be mum and dad.

Sorry.. I didn't explain myself well.
posted by tanktop at 3:40 AM on January 26 [2 favorites]


Maybe something like Survival Builder would appeal?

There's also stuff like American Ninja Warrior Teenagers that features (older) kids but is less likely to have the "spoiled brat" behavior.

In the YouTube algorithm, the latter is probably closer to the teenage influencers who might be doing challenges like bottle flips but will also prank each other in ways you might not want your kid to copy. (Still sounds better than what he's watching today, though.)
posted by demi-octopus at 3:52 AM on January 26 [3 favorites]


I'm sorry you're dealing with this entire situation. I will say, in case it makes you feel any shred better, that if your kid's father wasn't doing this...school/peers/current kid culture would have him desperate for this content in the next couple of years, and there is some merit to not making it more appealing by according it forbidden fruit status.

Top suggestion: I think you want Mark Rober. YouTubery gimmick concepts put to teaching kids physics and engineering. A hit with 6 & 10 in my house.

Minecraft is also worth looking at as a more active past time, although a lot of Minecraft YouTube content is super obnoxious. It is like digital Lego. There are bad guys, but the violence is...extremely pixellated and blocky. It's less than cartoon violence.

You said he likes Bluey, so I'm wondering if getting him into some episodic TV -- which kids in this age range who have latched on to YT seem to have missed entirely! -- might offer a good alternative to at least break up YT-watching. We got our kiddos into Avatar: The Last Airbender a couple of years ago. It was the first show that the whole family genuinely enjoyed together, and the other kids in our circle who appreciate it are exactly the ones I want having more influence, not less.
posted by LadyInWaiting at 4:54 AM on January 26 [3 favorites]


I’m so sorry. You’ll get great suggestions here. I have advice that’s broader, hope it helps. I’m not sure you can change your kid’s media diet remotely quickly. That stuff is very compelling in part because it’s new and different. Minecraft might. But it is okay because you are playing the decade-long game here.

1. Introduce your kid to really good art, movies, theatre, books, etc. It doesn’t have to be constant (except maybe books.) just 1-2 times a month. Theatre/dance is great. You know how some Jewish families have a tradition that when kids start studying Torah they get something sweet? Your child will not always love gallery trips, noon concerts, Shakespeare in the park immediately. So bribe the heck out of them and keep it short. Galley - ice cream. McDonalds happy meal in the park. Family movie/show night (on preview, Avatar was one series we watched.) Etc. Over the pandemic I had appetizer hour during “spa reading time” when we all, me too, sat and read a book for 30 min a day. Also kept reading out loud with character voices etc.

My kids are 13 and 19 and they do watch garbage sometimes but they also consistently gravitate to good stuff. I think it’s partly because they know the good stuff.

2. You are now a media literacy teacher. This next is very important. Don’t pick what your kid loves as your first point of critique, no matter how bad it is (exceptions below). And don’t push it at moments your kid needs connection and calm. But start taking just a few minutes a day a few times a week to learn about and critique media. What’s fiction, what’s a good place for real information.

In my house, this is at dinner usually. We talk about what we’ve heard (or what I’ve heard but now my kids bring stuff - it took some years though) and I say “I saw this news story but I found it sus because it only reported other people’s opinions as fact rather than fact; what’s your opinion?” Or even just take chances to say what an opinion is vs a fact. I’m an ex-editor so my kids have heard “source?” and “next source?” and so on forever. Again, take a light hand here especially at 7 - developmentally kid is still fuzzy on what a lie is - but just become a household that cheerfully digs a little deeper.

3. Invite your child to show you a couple of things they love at their dad’s, about once a week. This is the hard part. But, a) you need to keep connection with your kid first and foremost. B) you don’t want your kid to feel bad or like there should be secrets or that part of their life wrecks you. C) it will make it less attractive to your ex and d) re-watching it may help it lose its power a bit.

During this time try for cheerful loving honesty. I am an older, uncool mom, and I have no problems saying to my kids that things weren’t quite to my taste, with — super important — a warm hug and “but I’m game for it” feeling. This is because I introduce them to things they don’t love and they also are fine to say it’s not to their taste - but come along for it some of the time.

There is one exception though and that is:

4. When something onscreen deeply violates your values — for us this isn’t violence that makes sense in the story or language, but meanness or disrespect for dignity or of groups of people or what does — mention it after, calmly. Like “I’m glad we watched that. I thought this part was funny. One thing that bothered me, though, was…” Don’t expect your kid to agree. Just assert your value. I do this in a very “How to Talk so Kids will listen…” (great book) way. Like “dirty dishes go in the sink” “coats go on hooks” “I don’t like the way every episode of this show makes fun of a girl.”

Connection and fun is the biggest thing though.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:16 AM on January 26 [24 favorites]


You say he's into making stuff. Thankfully there are a ton of channels on YouTube for crafts of all kinds. Usually the content is just projects and building tips, no bullshit or bad influences. This might be a good road to go down as it might inspire kiddo to learn new skills and make things for himself, plus there's just so much stuff out there it'll give him a good amount to watch.

I'd sit down with him and see if he likes the idea of getting into something like woodworking or restroration. If he likes watching cars getting destroyed, he might also like seeing them get rebuilt and restored. Search for things like "woodworking", "blacksmithing", "car restoration" and see if he's into it. Watch videos together and encourage him if he seems interested in a project. If nothing else, at least it will be more educational than watching influencers smash things up.
posted by fight or flight at 6:02 AM on January 26 [2 favorites]


If you have access to your kids devices, turn off autoplay and watch history. That should help stop him from getting further drawn in. After that, Minecraft, though there is some (cartoon/video game) violence, has some very wholesome YouTubers popular with kids. I recommend the Hermitcraft Server in general, and Grian or MumboJumbo in particular.
posted by yaj at 6:17 AM on January 26 [1 favorite]


I would caution you against taking on the burden of feeling you are exclusively responsible for counteracting his dad’s parenting. While there are some good suggestions here, your job is to affirmatively parent how you want. I’d avoid the urge to create mental scenarios where you and his dad are in a competition via screen time. It’s not actually your job or even really possible to undo how his dad parents. It’s going to be ok.

If anything, a more constructive approach might be to get him involved in non-screen activities and friendships that can carry over to his dad’s time. If dad is minimally cooperative maybe he will agree to take kid to swim lessons, play dates, etc.
posted by haptic_avenger at 6:29 AM on January 26 [12 favorites]


This is hard and I'm sad for both of you. My kid has a classmate who's been allowed similar access from around that age, and I will say that the broader social community does seem to have an influence, even with two parents tolerating the media consumption in that case. The behaviors and comments that were happening at seven have toned down significantly by ten, and although I'm sure that to an extent it's just that that kid is better at compartmentalizing his life and hiding things he knows aren't acceptable in many contexts, at least he does know it's not the whole world. You all will get there too. And eventually the appeal of being parked in front of a screen instead of actually parented will wear off, particularly if his mates' parents aren't keen on that for their kids and set boundaries around playdates.
posted by teremala at 6:33 AM on January 26


How about a very fun online small-group class, in something that builds empathy. My first thoughts are improv or theater - these are highly interactive, and build friendships and human connection to an extent -- especially when the kids are older. It's basically structured, very rewarding play, with an audience. It doesn't get better than that.
posted by amtho at 7:33 AM on January 26


There's a good, popular "How to Draw" channel that features a friendly male artist (since you asked for male role models) teaching a kid how to draw something. There are approximately 1,000 of these videos. My nephew could spend hours doing this when he was seven. Start him on How to Draw Bluey.
posted by hovey at 7:42 AM on January 26 [3 favorites]


Since he likes making stuff and cars, he might enjoy the show “Junkyard Wars.” Each episode the two teams build something mechanical, like a hover boat, out of junk. It’s a lot of fun.

More broadly, it sounds like a lot of the stuff he is being exposed to is really inappropriate for a 7 year old. Is it worth revisiting this issue in the terms of your co-parenting agreement? This may or may not to worth going to court for you.
posted by mai at 7:53 AM on January 26 [1 favorite]


Be amazed, How to Cook that, Quintastic, JB Bricks. Age-appropriate, but pretty clickbaity (to get and keep attention), but based in facts. All on Youtube. None cross over to toxic BS. Periodically my kids learn something.
posted by Toddles at 8:27 AM on January 26


There are lots of channels with bushcraft content. He might like that.
posted by nestor_makhno at 9:08 AM on January 26 [1 favorite]


PBS kids is great but maybe you are not in US? Not sure if it's freely available elsewhere. But definitely worth pushing if you can. wild Kratz is a favorite of my kid: cool robot sci-fi powers mixed with some decent educational content about cool animals- win win!

You are right to be leery of Minecraft and among us. I don't want my 7yo looking up slender man bs or reveling in gory executions, and I cast serious side eye at parents who think it's just fine. Also avoid Roblox to the extent possible, tons of bad actors and inappropriate content there.

Something that's super awesome fun and much safer in terms of video games: get him a $15 copy of pico-8 for dads house! He will gain access to hundreds of fun games across all genres. They have chunky pixel graphics but kids I know don't mI d that, it's adults that have weird biases against it. Hours spent there may not be exactly educational (though he will learn a lot more about the variety and depth of video games than otherwise) but it won't be shitty influences like you describe.

I'm sorry you're struggling with this, it sounds awful :-/
posted by SaltySalticid at 9:36 AM on January 26


Just to throw in some alternatives to watching, there are some educational age-appropriate iPad games. Pixicade you make your own video games, Tiny Bop has A LOT of different game apps. None have add-ons and all are educational and fun.
posted by Toddles at 9:47 AM on January 26


Here are some channels that my 7yo loves that I would be comfortable just letting her watch unsupervised-

The Kid Should See This
Roller Coasters!
Iseebitarou
Technology Connections
The Secret Life of...
How Its Made
Primitive Technology
Lego Cooking
Hercules Candy

Some of these are actually educational! All of them are harmless.
posted by Admiral Viceroy at 11:05 AM on January 26 [5 favorites]


In my opinion, small steps will help. Trying to go from visual cotton candy directly to purely "healthy" content risks missing a chance to find a hook that will keep him interested enough to leave the garbage-y stuff behind on his own. So some options that might be good for this :

Seconding Mark Rober - he has the same dude-vibe as a lot of the addictive creators, but is a legit NASA engineer, with a strong "STEM is awesome" core message. If I was the one on this mission, I'd also buy one of Rober's maker crates (or a Kiwi Crate) and build it when he's with you to get him more into the topics.

Hevesh5 is a fabulous domino creator that all the kids know about

Joseph's Machines has extremely well produced comical Rube Goldberg machines - try the "Jiwi Machine's" sketches for a slapstick entry point.

Jet Lag : The Game might be too advanced for him, but it's hooked a lot of kids across a wide age range and also has some of the "older boys doing dumb challenges" and "occasional comic fails" vibe.

Sage the Bad Naturalist has the frenetic choppy cool-kid vibe with sciencey content, but you might want to watch some to see if it's too advanced (I suspect the same is true of Simone Giertz)

Half Asleep Chris also does massive lego builds, with engaging stories and bonus cat footage.

Maybe look for a farm or rescue that has goofy animals, since that also tends to be addictive. (With the theater mention, I thought of SMAC versus Animals)

If you're really worried about weaning him off Youtube, the nuclear option would be to get a Disney+ kids account and play up what an exclusive treat it is. It's not educational in any way but it's not going to have some of the worse "disrespect for authority" or "destroy all the things up" vibes that youtubers can veer into.
posted by BlueBlueElectricBlue at 11:46 AM on January 26 [2 favorites]


I think others have recommended some good videos for your son to watch, but I’d also like to add that if he’s still being exposed to inappropriate content from his dad, it’s important to engage with him after his visits. Ask him about what he watched or offer some comments, just so he understands that those things aren’t good to copy.
posted by liza97 at 8:02 PM on January 26


Shiloh and Bros is not educational, but mostly innocuous, Hermitcraft is also a good group.

My kid likes Half Asleep Chris also.

Do you have access to the tablet? You can subscribe to better content and unsubscribe periodically to the challenging kind. I'm logged in to my kids account via my phone so I can view the watch history.
posted by aetg at 5:15 AM on January 27


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