Parent Approval Mode on YouTube Kids: What It Is And Practical Tips For Everyday Parents
Last Tuesday, I was folding my 7-year-old Lila’s soccer uniform at the kitchen counter, listening to the low hum of the dishwasher, when she called from the couch that she wanted the new slime mixing video from her favorite creator. I yelled back “sure” without looking up, same as I do most nights after school. Ten minutes later, when I went to grab a glass of water, I glanced over and saw she was watching a 25-year-old guy yell over an unboxing of tiny, marble-sized fidgets that would be gone in five minutes if he got them in our house. The whole video had jump cuts every two seconds and loud, jarring sound effects. It wasn’t even supposed to be on YouTube Kids, but the algorithm had served it up after her slime video, same as it had served up a handful of other weird stuff I’d stumbled on over the previous month.
I’d always just used the default YouTube Kids settings, figured a company that big would get the filtering right. But after that fidget video, I texted my sister, who teaches 3rd grade, and asked if she had any hacks. She told me to turn on parent approval mode – I’d heard the name before, but always thought it was just for super strict parents who don’t let their kids watch anything fun, or that it would take hours to set up. I was wrong on both counts.
I pulled it up that night after Lila went to bed. Officially it’s called “Approved Content Only” in the parent settings, but most people know it as parent approval mode, and the gist is simple: instead of letting the algorithm recommend whatever it thinks is kid-friendly, your kid can only watch videos or channels you’ve personally approved. I thought I’d have to sit there for three hours adding every video Lila ever liked, but it turns out you can just approve entire channels, not individual videos. That’s the first trick I wish I’d known sooner. I just made a mental list of all the channels she already watched on a regular basis: Art for Kids Hub, National Geographic Kids, that nice British lady who does clay tutorials for kids, the old My Little Pony compilation channel she’s obsessed with. That took 18 minutes, by my clock – I was waiting for my face mask to dry, so I wasn’t even rushing.
I noticed a difference the first week. Before, Lila would spend 15 or 20 minutes just scrolling through the infinite feed of recommendations, switching from one video to the next before the first one even got started, saying she “couldn’t find anything good.” By the end of that, she’d be grumpy and overstimulated, and it would be a fight to turn the iPad off when dinner was ready. Now, her home screen only has the 14 channels I approved. She knows what’s there, she picks one in 30 seconds, watches the whole thing, and more often than not, she’ll close the iPad and go dig out her crayons or clay to try whatever she just watched. It’s not that I mind screen time, but mindless scrolling that leaves her cranky? That’s what I hated. This cuts that out almost entirely.
People always say “that sounds like so much work, every time they want something new.” But it’s not. YouTube has a separate parent app that lets you approve content from your own phone, anytime, anywhere. If Lila mentions a video her friend talked about at recess, I just pull out my phone while I’m waiting for her mac and cheese to boil, search the channel, check one or two videos to make sure there’s no yelling, no weird sponsored content, nothing that’s not for kids. If it’s fine, I hit approve, and it’s instantly on her iPad. That takes less time than it takes to stir the pasta. Last week, she asked for a unicorn cookie baking video her friend told her about. I checked the channel, it was just a stay-at-home mom baking with her 6-year-old, no loud stuff, no weird ads. Approved in 10 seconds. Once, she asked for a Lego unboxing video from a big creator, I checked it, and the guy was dropping f-bombs like it was a grown-up gaming channel. I just told Lila “That one’s not made for kids, sorry. Want to open the new Star Wars set you got for your birthday together instead?” She usually agrees, no big fight.
It’s not perfect. Sometimes I’m in a work meeting and can’t check a new channel right away, and Lila gets pouty. I just tell her we’ll do it after I’m done, and she goes plays with her dollhouse until then. Once I approved a craft channel that started posting sponsored content for sugar-loaded cereal bars that I don’t let her eat, so I just removed the channel from her list when I noticed. No big deal, it takes two taps. I also don’t only approve “educational” content. She has one channel that’s just an 11-year-old girl reviewing fidgets and slime, it’s totally silly, no learning involved, but it’s harmless, and she loves it. That’s the best part – you get to pick what’s okay for your kid, not a random algorithm that’s just trying to keep them scrolling to sell ads.
I still have days where I feel guilty about screen time, like I should be doing more crafts or taking her to the park more, or just being more present. But the truth is, I work part time from home, some nights I need 20 minutes to finish an email or get dinner on the table, and YouTube Kids is the thing that lets her have a little calm time while I do that. Parent approval mode didn’t fix all the messy parts of parenting and screen time. I still have to remind her to turn it off when we’re done, she still asks for weird videos sometimes that I have to say no to. But it took the constant stress of checking what she’s watching off my list, and it made her screen time more fun for her. Last night, after she watched a video on how to draw a fox, she closed the iPad, got out her sketchbook, drew a lopsided fox with a pink tail, and wrote “for Grandma” on the bottom. It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s a small setting change that made our everyday life a little easier, and that’s more than I can say for most parenting hacks I’ve tried.
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