Megan Fox, apps spying on our kids, and more: Our parenting news roundup

Megan Fox talks about her grooming routine before giving birth, a new report released by the Federal Trade Commission detailing how popular apps for kids are mining data on their whereabouts and finally, a new study linking childhood obesity to television in the bedroom.

By Stephanie Hanes,?Correspondent / December 14, 2012

Megan Fox announces nominations for the 70th Annual Golden Globe Awards, Dec. 13, 2012, in Beverly Hills, Calif.

Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP

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It?s Friday, and time for our parenting news roundup.

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Correspondent

Stephanie Hanes is the lead writer for Modern Parenthood and a longtime Monitor correspondent. She lives in Andover, Mass. with her husband, Christopher, her daughter, Madeline Thuli, a South Africa Labrador retriever, Karoo, and an imperialist cat named Kipling.

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First up this week: the television and you. (Or the television and your kid.)

Yup, still a bad idea...
We know, we know, you?ve heard all the dire warnings about ?screen time.? It stunts your child?s intellectual development, makes her hyper, makes her tired, and generally is a bad idea. Despite the fact that kids are interacting with screens more than ever before.

Well, here?s yet another news item to keep in mind next time you?re tempted to shut the toddler in his room with the television babysitter. (And it?s not that we don?t understand the temptation, we assure you.) A study this week published in the ?American Journal of Preventive Medicine??finds that not only do children with televisions in their rooms watch more TV, which in turn tends to make them fatter, the screen time logged in a child?s bedroom seems to actually make kids heavier than television watched in, say, the family room.?

In other words, if there are two children with about the same diet and level of physical activity, the one with a television in his room will have more health risks than the one who watches television in other areas of the house.?

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/7sVRzyBrJwg/Megan-Fox-apps-spying-on-our-kids-and-more-Our-parenting-news-roundup

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