We do not watch a lot of television in our house. We pretty much have it off all day, every day. The girls are allowed, at most, one thirty minute television show in the morning and one in the evening; however, most of the time, we don’t reach ten shows in an entire week.
And then I got sick. I’ve actually been quite ill for the last month but particularly in the last two weeks unfortunately landing in the emergency room three times. All of this means that, unfortunately, we have had television on more (way more) than I would ever like.
Our cable box crashed a few weeks ago, so we have just been watching Netflix and Hulu which means the girls (and myself) have the opportunity to watch some of the old great eighties cartoons I watched as a kid, and to be honest, the difference between shows from back in the day and today is shocking.
I think most people with kids are aware that old time cartoons are much scarier. I’d say we have to turn off about 50% of what I turn on because it is too scary for my kids who have been raised on Word World and Little Einsteins. I think the lack of violence is a turn in the right direction.
However, I think we have also taken a sharp turn in the wrong direction for one key reason — the shows of today simply do not spark the imagination that older cartoons did.
A few minutes in front of the Disney Channel or PBS will show you that most modern cartoons have brilliant colors and a solid lesson plan, but they stop at that. The pictures are brighter but less complex. The characters are rounder and less detailed And the story lines are nearly eliminated. Sure there will be a basic plot, but the show revolves around a certain curriculum and the plot and characters are there to deliver that curriculum.
And I’m not bashing that per se. With the number of children in this country who spend their entire days watching television and the number of parents who don’t read to or sing to their children, educational based programming can be a blessing. After all, this is why PBS has the grants from the Department of Education.
But while they are busy teaching the basics, kids are lacking a plot and a story, and I think these are crucial. Children don’t have to work to watch simple stories. They don’t have to follow characters. They don’t have to remember past events. They surely don’t need to predict future ones. Kids don’t have to learn the nuances of a character’s personality because they really don’t have personalities.
And what about make believe? That glorious promised land of youth? It’s hard to see how searching for letters or practicing shapes will entice children to take the story beyond the screen and into their own imaginations.
I think back to watching Jem, The Flintstones, and The Smurfs and how we would pretend to be them after the show was over. How we would build scenes in our minds and act them out. How we would dress like them and try to talk like them. In essence, how we took what was created on the screen and created from it.
And I just don’t see that in children’s programming these days.
I guess it’s just another area where we seem to be taking a wrong turn – away from independent, free thinking towards more structured, testable thinking. Sadly we will pay the price when we have a generation of children who know all the facts but can’t come up with a single creative way to put them together.