Too Much Screen Time Harms Development

Fred Rogers with the real Daniel!

I was shocked to find The Fred Rogers Company trademark on PBS kid shows like Daniel Tiger and Super Why! I wonder what Fred himself would have thought of  very young children watching these 3D animated shows, or playing the game versions on computer or iPad!  Is it a coincidence that 'his' company started featuring these shows, after his death? 

The company that was started by Fred Rogers in 1971, began making 'educational' programs like Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, "a new animated program for preschoolers ages 2 to 4" in 2012.

"In 2006, three years after Fred's passing, and after the end of production of Blues Clues, The Fred Rogers Company contacted Angela Santomero [creator of Blues Clues  and Super Why] to ask what type of show she would create to promote Fred’s legacy. That conversation was about the birth of "Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood."

PBS initially ordered 40 episodes, which were broadcast between September 2012 and February 2014. ...Santomero confirmed that PBS Kids has renewed the show for a second season of 25 episodes to premiere September 2014." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Tiger's_Neighborhood)

"Two of the women behind Nickolodeon's biggest shows [Blues Clues] are now rolling out their own line of educational programming, toys and books for kids." Says Angela Santomera in this interview on Fox: "It's an interactive show where kids are able to practice the key literacy skills as identified by the National Reading Panel, so it's the first 3-D animated series for PBS kids.."

The Digital Daniel

In an interview in Forbes magazine, A Different Kind of Tiger Mom, she says:

"This “interactive” model has proven effective by numerous educational studies done on Blue’s Clues and Super Why, proving that kids who watch scored statistically significantly better on standardized tests than kids who did not watch."

So, it appears that entertainment for kids is no longer educational in the broadest sense, but focused on the components of the standardized tests! What would Fred Rogers have thought of that? The people who now run his company clearly don't care about that.

I'm sure Mr. Rogers would have wholeheartedly agreed that "what’s most important for children is lots of time for hands-on creative and active play, time in nature, and face-to-face interactions with caring adults."

And as  stated in the report Impact of Screen Time on Development and Learning,

"Regardless of content, excessive screen time harms healthy growth and development.”

And, lastly ponder the following about how students best retain information!

‎”[Those], who held a paper copy in their hands, averaged a retention level of 85%. Those who saw it on the movie screen had a retention level of between 25 to 30%, and those who studied it on the TV monitor had a retention and comprehension level between 3 and 5%.

One professor from MIT made the passionate plea that we must encourage children to develop the ability to think first, and then give them the computer…if you introduce the computer before the child’s thought processes are worked out, then you have disaster in the making.

This is because, as Piaget pointed out, the first twelve years of life are spent putting into place the structures of knowledge that enable young people to grasp abstract, metaphoric, symbolic types of information. The capacity for abstract thinking developed as a result of the natural concrete processes that have been going on for millions of years. The danger here is that the computer, which operates by the same artificial, cathode-ray-tube technology as the television, will interrupt that development.”  ~ Interview with Joseph Chilton Pearce