Children love television. They are drawn to the sounds, colors and motion. They respond to its messages quickly. Quality programs, like those on Idaho Public TV, can have a positive impact on young children's behavior, thinking and language. If you use television selectively, and within the framework of your overall program, it can be one more useful tool in your educational toolbox.

To help young children get the most from television:

Select specific program segments. Look for program segments that fit in with and extend the concepts you are working on with your children.

Make use of the VCR. Tape programs in advance. You can select desired segments and create a video library.

Co-view with your children. Watch with the children so you can ask questions, monitor their level of understanding and relate the material to other activities you are doing.

Extend the learning. Read books and do activities that relate to the themes of program segments you are viewing with your group.

Encourage active viewing. Show your group (by example) that they can sing, play, dance along and express their reactions to the things they see and hear on TV.

Limit television time. Young children need lots of time to move, talk, play and interact with others. Although TV can be a useful part of your program, it cannot replace the hands-on activities and experiences or substitute for interaction and caring preschoolers need.

Selecting the Best TV
Here are some guidelines to help you decide what kinds of programs will be beneficial for your children. Talk to your children about these guidelines and share these ideas with them in simple terms. Ask them to help you decide what they should be watching on TV and how much TV they should be watching.

Television is fine when...

It encourages creativity and critical thinking.

It engages your children to sing along, dance along, and respond.

It entertains your children.

It reinforces the positive values.

It inspires your children to want to learn more.

It helps your children to appreciate other cultures.

It inspires your children to want to read.

It's TV you want to watch with your children.

Television is a problem when...

It exposes children to violence as a means of problem solving.

It introduces subject matter that's not appropriate for children.

It occupies too much of your children's time.

It encourages children to think that they need to buy products.

It presents gender, racial, age, or cultural stereotypes.

Using Television Within a Child Care Program
There are many good shows within the Idaho Public Television schedule. However, they are not meant to replace the important daily activities you do with the children in your care. Television will help you the most if you use it selectively and sparingly.

Tape programs that you think may be appropriate to use with your children. This way you can review the material, select the segments you think are most useful, and plan the activities you will want to do with the group.

If you cannot tape ahead of time, select programs that are specifically tailored to the age group you are caring for. Look for material that highlights themes you want to develop in your childcare program.

Encourage children to actively respond to what they see and hear on television. Let them know they are free to come and go as they please. Have other activities available so children never feel they are supposed to sit quietly at the TV.

Think of the TV segment or show you are viewing with the children as one point in a theme triangle you are building. Reading and related activities are the others. If you watch a segment that highlights cooperation, for instance, follow it up with a good story that also shows characters cooperating. Point out to your group ways that they are cooperating and refer back to what they have seen and heard.

Young children need lots of repetition in order to understand and digest the material presented to them. Use the activities, books and television material in sequence over time to reinforce the concepts being presented.

Extend the Value of What Children View

Watch for activities you can do with the children. If a show takes you on a tour of a pretzel factory, for instance, try making pretzels with your group. You can make pretzels with playdough or clay, and if you think the children are ready, try making real ones to eat on another day. Making a recipe chart with the children about the ingredients used and the measurements involved will help them to explore some math along with enjoying pretzels!

Link the children's experiences to what they see. Point out connections as you go through daily routines. "We are cooperating just the way Elmo and Maria did on Sesame Street." "Susie is making believe she's been to the moon, just the way they do in the Land of Make-Believe on Mister Rogers' Neighborhood."

Encourage children to recreate what they see in dramatic play. Set out props that the children can use to recreate places and situations they enjoyed from the television programs. Help them to design their own railroad stations, banks and stores. Participate in the game along with them.

Use art activities to extend the learning. Suggest that the children make drawings or paintings of places and characters they have seen on programs you've watched together. You may want to help them construct scenes from favorite programs using household items such as milk cartons, straws, paper towel rolls and lots of imagination.

Extend the learning with books. Find books that reinforce themes presented on television series that your children watch. Help the children to make connections between the material and characters they like on television and the stories you enjoy together.

Extend the Learning with Books!

Reading with children is lots of fun and helps them to:

Develop language and listening skills

Increase their vocabularies

Learn the relationship between sounds they hear and written words

Explore a variety of places and situations

Become good readers

Select books that highlight the themes in the shows you've been watching with the children. For example, if a show has dealt with cooperation, read a story in which the characters work together toward a common goal.

Discuss the similarities between the books and what happens in the program. Ask the children if anything in the book reminds them of something they saw on a TV program. Encourage them to relate their own experiences to what they are hearing and what they have seen.

Encourage the children to "read." Make the books you read available to the children to look at on their own. After you have read a book several times and it is familiar, let the children "read" it to you, relying on their memories and the pictures. Let them know that their variations on the text are fine.

Help the children to "write" their own books based on stories you've read and programs you've watched. Write down exactly what they say and encourage them to illustrate the pages. Read their stories aloud to the children at group time. Keep paper, crayons and markers available so children can draw and "write" whenever they wish.