Toddler Modeling
If the phrase toddler modeling piques your interest, you’re not alone. Each of us know we have the cutest, most adorable toddler in the world—and isn’t it selfish to keep such a child to ourselves? His face should be blazoned out to everyone.
Before you get your child into modeling, though, there’s a lot you need to think about. Here we’ll look at some of the pros and cons of modeling, and give you information that can help you to make the best decision for your child and your family.
Why Toddler Modeling is a Good Idea: The Pros
There are two big reasons why parents decide to have their children do baby and child modeling: the money and the fame. It’s special to see your toddler smiling out from the pages of a big magazine, and it’ll be fun to have a stack of magazine clippers to give her when she’s grown up “You were a toddler model, and the world loved you!” Looked at that way, it could be good for your child’s self esteem.
The money isn’t something to turn your nose up at either. You can use the money your child makes to improve her quality of life now, or you can put it in a separate account where it can accumulate interest for her college days. Some far-thinking parents even set up a retirement account for their toddler models!
Why You’d Better Not Let Your Toddler Model: The Cons
It’s his big chance for money and fame; two fun and useful things. Should you go sign your toddler up right away? Well, wait a minute. Maybe, but there are some cons you should know about too.
First, modeling is disruptive. You don’t get much advance notice before a photo shoot, and when a client gives a date and time, you have to drop everything and do it. You have to keep your toddler happy, enthusiastic, and photogenic through the whole affair; even if it’s a day she’s feeling grumpy.
Sometimes you’ll have to travel long distances. In fact, it’s not really worth getting into child modeling unless you live in a big city, just because there will be way to much travel time. No one comes to you to take pictures; you’re expected to come to them.
And if modeling can be good for your child’s self esteem, it can be really bad for your child’s self esteem as well. There will always be ‘go-sees’ in which your child is auditioned and not selected—and being not selected, the equivalent of being rejected, always hurts.
Even if your toddler is never rejected – highly unlikely—she still might get her head turned by all the attention. She could easily end up thinking that her chief value is her looks, and that’s something you never want for your toddler.
All this is not to say you shouldn’t go into modeling; but these are things you need to think about before you make the decision to go ahead.
The Profile of a Successful Toddler Model
There’s something else you need to think about before you decide to go into modeling—does your child have what it takes? And here I’m not talking about whether your child is beautiful, whether she is clever, whether she is thoughtful and wonderfully intelligent. A very specific kind of toddler succeeds at modeling, and if your child doesn’t fit the bill, it’s best not to even try out once.
A toddler model has to be outgoing, enthusiastic, and cheerful in a wide variety of circumstances. But that’s not all. He also has to be able to interact maturely and take directions from people other than you—in a quick, straightforward way. He also has to have fun in the environment that comes with modeling; if he is even the slightest bit miserable the whole thing will be a flop.
A toddler model also has to be flexible and not phased by change of plans—including the kind of ‘change of plans’ that mean they were rejected. They have to have the ability to handle getting close to a group of people—and then never seeing them again.
If that profile fits your child, and he has good looks to boot, he might, possibly, have the potential to be a successful toddler model.
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