What my son wants to watch

When I was a little girl, I loved Sesame Street. I would watch it from our home in Michigan in two language - English and French. I am not sure how much of the French I retained, but I loved the Muppets and the familiar adults and children, and the stories. To this day, I have a favorite Muppet. (It's Bert, because he loves the beautiful ordinary things in life like oatmeal and paperclips, and he just wants some quiet time to read his book.)

My son, unfortunately, never really got into Sesame Street.

I tried. I really did. But it never caught his complete attention. He watched some of it, but wasn't impressed, and we moved on. He explored other shows, and when he watches shows now they are all on Netflix. I am trying to keep him off YouTube.

Because that is where children go for content now: YouTube.

YouTube is great for some things: I learn new skills and the history of Nintendo and in-depth knowledge of subjects that interest me. I am grateful for it. But, as a parent, I worry about the content my son might see on it. I have heard all those horror stories of inappropriate videos making it into children-oriented channels. And I have read about all the crack-downs that YouTube has put in place to keep their content for children safer than ever.

It's the rabbit-hole aspect of the channel that I find disturbing. If I - as an adult - can accidentally waste an hour clicking through to the next "related" video, what chance does my son have? And, keep in mind, that is just regular YouTube. I don't have the strength of resolve to find out what the children's version is like.

So, for now, we limit our interaction with YouTube. I am sure that I will have to face the battle one day soon, so I need some help. How do you monitor your child's use of YouTube? Tell me in the comments.