Infant simulation dolls giving reason to pause

FARMINGTON – Monday morning, after three nights of next-to no sleep, all Dustin Gammon wanted to do was get rid of the baby he’d been assigned that Friday.

Lucky for him, he could.

He’d been given a Baby Think It Over infant simulation doll, along with other members of Kathy Kerr’s Mt. Blue Middle School eighth grade health class.

Using the dolls is a good way to get young teens to realize having kids – especially at their age – isn’t glamorous or easy, Kerr said Tuesday.

The Baby Think It Over dolls look harmless enough. Cute, plastic, and infant-sized, they come in a variety of races and look surprisingly lifelike. They also cry, and can be set to be easy, medium, or cranky, depending on the teacher. Holding and rocking them quiets them down after lags of between 5 and 35 minutes, according a Web site that sells the dolls.

A computer chip embedded in the doll’s body keeps track of how long it’s left to cry unattended, and whether or not it’s been hit, dropped, or otherwise abused.

Kerr gives the dolls out on Fridays and checks their chips Monday to see how well they’ve been cared for, she said. Usually, they’ve been cared for well.

How their “parents” are faring is another matter entirely.

Kerr’s students are very excited when they get the babies on Friday afternoons, she said.

Eighth-grader Josh Miller rocked his doll and then carefully put it into a front-pack last Friday. He was excited, he said. He didn’t think it would be that bad.

But by weekend’s end, all her students were clamoring to get rid of the crying dolls, Kerr said.

“I expected it to be like a normal baby,” 14-year-old Gammon said, “and not cry too much if I took good care of it.”

“It didn’t annoy me until it woke me up at night,” he said on Tuesday. “I only got six hours of sleep over three nights.”

“It was annoying – it cried too much,” Jessica Williams said.

“I’m definitely not going to have a kid until I settle down,” Gammon said. “I want to go to college.”

No one in Kerr’s class wants to be a parent any time soon now, she said. Giving the students the dolls over the weekend is a perfect way to bring the point home for them. Teens are very social at this age, and if dolls cut into their social lives, that’s nothing compared to what a real baby would do.

Learning from experience – with a doll – is the point of the exercise. And while some might wonder if eighth-graders are too young to get started with sex education, Kerr would beg to differ.

Mt. Blue Middle School students have gotten pregnant before, she said. “It’s happening. Kids are telling me – they’re asking me for pregnancy tests and birth control,” she said. “It’s younger and younger. It used to be just (in) high school.”

Some parents have called her since she started sending dolls home, angry that their child’s – or their own – sleep was being disrupted, Kerr said. But on Monday mornings, she feels vindicated.

Kerr always asks her students if they’re ready to have a real one, when they come drop off their Baby Think It Over dolls.

“Before I can even finish the sentence, they say, ‘No. I’m all set.'”