One day, while Mary Rothschild, our founder, was making bread with a group of pre-school aged children at Ariadne’s Thread, the children’s center she founded and directed, there was a period of about 45 seconds of total silence as the children paid attention to their work. Mary looked around, feeling fulfilled. 

Then Stacy (not her real name, of course), who had just turned three, looked up and said:


“The Lion King video is too loud.”


There was no TV in the children’s center.  Perhaps it was coming from a car in the street outside?

Mary listened and finally said “I don’t hear it, Stacy.”

Stacy’s large, dark eyes turned up to meet Mary’s as she said:


“It’s in my head.  It’s in my head.”


This, and many other similar occurrences led Mary to reading, researching and talking to parents and teachers about how media was influencing children’s attention and health. This was the beginning of Healthy Media Choices was now a 501c3 nonprofit organization.  Over the last ten years, Mary has spoken to and helped hundreds of grateful parents and teachers find intentional ways of making decisions about media in the lives of young children.  She enjoys every minute of this work.

Our Origins:  Stacy’s Story