Here's how it starts: You say to yourself, "Why don't I just quickly check my e-mail while I feed the baby?" In the midst of things, your baby's little feet strike the keyboard. Suddenly the screen changes and your little guy abandons the breast or bottle in favor of the tiny pictures floating in a blue sky, or the brightly colored lines that move in on themselves in an endless pattern.

Your baby is interested in the same things you are. Like you, he wants to tap the keyboard and see what happens. Of course, it didn't take long for software manufacturers to tap into this market. Knowledge Adventure created JumpStart Baby, which is aimed at infants from 6 months to 2 years. The company calls it "lapware," since it's designed for babies who are sitting on a parent's lap at the computer.

"Educational" software for babies, toddlers, and preschoolers introduces concepts such as shapes, colors, counting, and the alphabet. The problem, says Michael Rich, M.D., a pediatrician at Children's Hospital in Boston, is that since a baby isn't interacting with the computer, neurologically the brain is in a passive state. The same goes for a child watching television. Since neural connections are made during the first two years of life through live interactions with caregivers, the American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended that children under age 2 should not watch any TV. Dr. Rich sees no difference between a parent clicking a mouse and a Hollywood producer creating a TV program: Both result in images on a screen that are passively received.

If you're going to let your kids play on the computer, Dr. Rich suggests that you play along with them, and judge for yourself the nature and quality of "interactivity". Set a time limit. Toddlers should spend no more than 20 minutes at the computer. Time can be increased as the child gets older, but balance sedentary activity with larger doses of exercise and live interaction. Especially during the first two years of life, nothing's more important than relating to interactive humans.