Hello, Adventure-Raisers and welcome to Session 22: Podcasts and Kids! I hope your weekends are all fun-filled and your dice are rolling well!

Ok, so as you all know my son, Little Green Dragon, is almost a year and half old. He’s starting to pick up words and phrases and repeat them, or at least trying to do so. Thank the Lord he hasn’t picked certain words yet… I AM trying to clean up my own mouth, and so are all his aunts and uncles in the party but it’s honestly a hard habit to break, especially if you work in a frustrating industry. Aaaaaaaaaaaat any rate, now feels like a good time to start expanding his vocabulary. Which alright, easy enough, that just means that I need to talk to him, right? So I started reading my books out loud, we play with Elmo to practice the alphabet, I narrate playtime, etcetera. These are all pretty standard practices, and there’s nothing wrong with them…. but you know, we can’t do everything strictly by the book, that’d be boring. I lighted on the idea of playing podcasts a week or two ago.

I was already listening to Burrow’s End by Dimesion20 (Trailer), because I’m actually new to podcasts in general and my husband Orin recommended this one because of the character Tula. When I started D&D, someone was giving me tips and pointers and they told me not to look up Matt Mercer / Critical Role because, and I quote “we won’t be as good as them.” Which…. while that’s turned out to be true (sarcasm), but the point is I’ve steered clear of the podcast horizon out of habit. Now that I’m expanding my career as a blogger and memer in this space, I figured it was time to start listening in.

A while ago I was spending my whole day singing the alphabet and I was frustrated that I couldn’t get some dishes washed. During Little Dragon’s naps I was already playing Burrow’s End and I noticed the SAT words that Abria Iyengar and Brennon lee Mulligan both like to sprinkle in. I also caught phrases like “word picture” and “thunder on a day without clouds”, and I got to thinking that Little Dragon could absolutely learn things like that. That this is the kind of descriptive language I want him to be capable of using. To be clear, I am also scanning for swear words and inappropriate references, but the subject matter of Borrow’s End in particular really doesn’t steer into the R rating frequently (no, Little Dragon did not watch the episode with the bear, don’t even start giving me gripe about that. I’m not dumb). And though there are depictions of violence, he’s still at an age where he won’t internalize everything Abria is describing. Besides, if I wasn’t comfortable with him hearing a fight scene being a TTRPG Parent would be a bit harder. I might pull back on Diension20 in particular as he gets older, probably favoring more podcasts featuring young children, but I think this is a wonderful way to help get him used to communication and let me tell you why.

Firstly, while there are amazing props available, podcasts are not a primarily visual medium. One thing that I don’t want to do is reinforce a screen addiction, so having a steady stream of words in the room that doesn’t also immediately pull his gaze is a win. Secondly, it’s a real conversation being presented. No one is reading from a script, subtle ques may be missed or picked up, and intonation is critical. This is also I like about early Sesame Street. Thirdly, and I already mentioned this: the descriptions presented are not entirely relying on slang or abbreviations. There is some of that but for the most part these theater kids are on point with their word paintings. Fourthly, and frankly, these folks get paid to do this because they are entertaining as heck. While Little Dragon may not be looking at the screen when Ava (Erika Ishii) is talking, I’m certainly chuckling. Which more than I can say for Cocomelon. Besides, it’s been MONTHS since my group has been able to get back together, I need some game time!!!!!! Fifthly, and I’m not sure if other podcasts do this to be totally fair, but the streaming service Dropout does put content warnings up on every episode of Borrow’s End and that helps me sift through it for him, obviously. There is still more swearing than I’d like, because it’s not meant for children explicitly, so again after this podcast we’re more than likely switching to something suggested by Podcast Reviews, 7 Best Podcasts for Kids , and when we do I’ll be sure to let you guys know how that turns out! Lastly, and this is just a fun phase of development: Little Dragon has entered his dancing baby phase, haha! I’m getting a really cute video of him dancing to the Never Stop blowing Up opening credit later to post on the socials (and nooooooooooo he does not watch that one after the opening!).

There’s a Dude Dad (link to his page) episode on Youtube that I couldn’t find again, but that explains his experience with this stage in his daughter’s development. Now, Dude Dad is a professional actor, so he was tackling it by reading screen plays to her. One of the things that he brought up was a vocabulary tracking device, which his daughter would wear and it would count the number of different words that she hears. Now, in that episode he makes it a point of showing how the device didn’t pick up ANY of the words in a movie he watched with his daughter, haha. I think that is a really obvious downside to using the TV to expand your child’s vocabulary – at least if the TV is the only thing you are using. In all things balance, right? I try to read to my son once or twice a day, sing to him, and I still narrate our play time. I’m still making eye contact with him and over annunciating. But if once in a while I need to climb over the baby gate to do dishes and neither of us really want silence, but my throat is sore from all the baby talk… yeah, I think that’s a perfectly acceptable time for a podcast. Heck, it’s a good time for the radio, isn’t it? That is what has worked so far for us, and I don’t think it would hurt anyone to try it. Just, you know, if there is content you want to be much stricter about exposing your little dragon to then I suggest you vet it first. For example, Dimension20 is definitely not for children; I’m walking a tight rope here. But I also believe in vetting children’s shows and really everything else, if you can.

That’s about all I have this week for you to chew on. By all means, fi you disagree or agree and have more suggestions or just want to sing my praises, feel free to comment and share this post. If I may be shameless enough to plug next week’s material, I wanted to let you all know that I’ll be posting a transcription of a wonderful interview with RedWyrm, a fellow TTRPG Parent and Adventure-Raiser! Be sure to look up his blog here, and find him on X!

Till next week, happy adventuring, and always remember you are not on this journey alone. Buh-bye!