#chld712

[noodlescopicproportions-blog]

Problem Solved!

(Now Everything is Awesome) “Play and inquiry are learning approaches that capitalise on children’s natural curiosity and exuberance.” The Ontario Kindergarten Program (2016) aims to foster the natural desire to learn and have that learning be effective in the years to come by advocating a play based curriculum. Of the four frames (i.e. broad areas of learning used to structure thinking about learning and assessment) in the program, one is Demonstrating Literacy and Mathematics Behaviours which covers learning and development in regard to:“. . .communicating thoughts and feelings – through gestures, physical movements . . .” and “. . . mathematics behaviours, evident in the various ways they use concepts of number and pattern during play and inquiry; access, manage, create and evaluate information; and experience an emergent understanding of mathematical relationships, concepts, skills and processes. . .” (Section 1.1, Pg. 15) This frame overlaps closely with the frame Problem Solving and Innovating, its main idea being to foster these skills in all areas of learning, not just math. One children’s television show is catering wonderfully to this idea - Peg + Cat is a pre-school animated TV series, airing on PBS Kids and available on YouTube that is as apt for kindergarteners, as it is for its intended audience. It is an educational show about math that teaches so much more. Essentially, the Kindergarten program intends to build on a child’s prior knowledge and conceptual understanding of math from their everyday experiences such as manipulating objects, making comparisons, making observations, asking questions and solving problems. (Section 2.3, Pg. 76) Peg + Cat takes the approach of Peg identifying a problem in her daily life and then with the help of her friends and the available resources deduces a solution. Shows the gradual process of self-directed inquiry, observation and then deducing the solution by the child. The episodes start out with Peg and her cat playing and then encountering a problem. This acts as a gate to introducing the actual math problem to be solved but there is nothing instructional about it that would take away the child’s attention from the story. The only thing that is overt is Peg announcing that they have a ‘big problem!’ before they jump into the solution part. Which isn’t so ‘mathematical’ as it is an everyday aspect of life, which reinforces the idea of integrated mathematics behaviours. The show also shows kids how math is connected to arts. (pg. 82) The visual treatment subtly hints at mathematical elements, such as the graph paper background and the infinity symbols representing clouds. 

https://www.google.ae/search?q=peg%2Bcat&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjRtfTdm8HTAhXG7xQKHZw6ApYQ_AUICSgC&biw=1366&bih=613#imgrc=Mt7ntjSHt99XMM:

Innovative thinking is being fostered when children “. . . create music, visual art work, or dances and make improvements to them.” (Section 2.4, Pg. 88-89) Music uses math as a structure to compose and that is something children will pick up on subconsciously. It is also explored as a theme in various episodes. One of them being The Beethoven Problem where musical notes from one of Beethoven’s famous compositions are sung as ‘short’ or ‘long’.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAby_01hxSY

The elements of story, dialogue and song are some of the main things that keeps this show engaging, both for children and adults who might be watching with them. The more aspects of the mind engaged in the learning process, the more seamlessly applicable the math will be in the child’s life because it is closely tied into everyday experiences. In conclusion, while Peg + Cat may not appeal to educators across the board because of some concerns with it’s style of entertainment, it is definitely worth considering as a tool to bridge the learning transition from school to home and vice versa because it integrates math into everyday life situations in a way that very few children’s TV shows have managed to do so far.

[parasiticresilience]

Levelling Up: How Prodigy Makes Learning the Loot

Many kid’s games on both mobile and desktop incorporate curriculum elements to advocate learning concepts. There’s a bit of a paralysis of choice right now - games that teach early literacy, mathematics, or science populate pretty much every app marketplace or game website. The question of their appropriateness or suitability to the curriculum is a big question. As it stands now, there’s a lot of discussion and debate surrounding how kid’s games should incorporate curriculum into their content.

One game that’s been at the forefront of curriculum-based content for teachers, parents, and kids especially, has been Prodigy Math Game. Let’s look at how:

Prodigy Math Game is an educational desktop game built around math curriculum between Grades 1 to 8. Self-described as “curriculum-aligned”, Prodigy incorporates solving math problems and learning math concepts delivered in a gamified world where players can create their own character and adventure through a game filled with objectives and challenges.

The Curriculum

Let’s start out by analysing just how closely Prodigy maps itself to Ontario curriculum. As a parent or teacher, it becomes rather self-evident. Prodigy provides things like parent dashboards so they can see the progress of their children as they progress through the game. This is a great way to build two-way engagement on both sides; parent and child.

The game is closely tied to the curriculum levels for each respective grade depending on what the player chooses. Through the parent portals, there are even guides mapping out the tiers of learning per grade level: 

Figure 1: Grade 1 In-Game Math Skills as described on the website.

Reflected in the Ontario curriculum for mathematics, we can see that these are outlined mostly 1-to-1 in the “Math Skills” page of the Prodigy website. The first-grade curriculum expectations listed in the Department of Education guidelines are:

Number Sense & Numeration

By the end of Grade 1, students will:

Read, represent, compare, and order whole numbers to 50, and use concrete materials to investigate fractions and money amounts;

Demonstrate an understanding of magnitude by counting to 100 and backwards from 20;

Solve problems involving the addition and subtraction of single-digit whole numbers, using a variety of strategies

Geometry and Spatial Sense

By the end of Grade 1, students will:

Identify common two-dimensional (2D) shapes and three-dimensional (3D) figures and sort and classify them by their attributes

Compose and decompose common two-dimensional shapes and three-dimensional figures;

Describe the relative locations of objects using positional language

Take a moment to compare Prodigy’s Math Skills page to these overall curriculum expectations for first graders. The web page is designed for both parents and teachers, but at the same time takes the effort to categorise and link to (via the icon beside each skill in Figure 1) 

Prodigy uses this model to infuse curriculum-driven content directly into the user experience by distilling the action of solving math problems into the core of the game. By doing so, it can cover up to Grade 8 since it allows for grade appropriate problem sets to slot into the gameplay mechanics to drive progression (give the student/player motivation to keep going).

While hints and tips support the scaffolded learning within the game, giving each problem a context is what I think the most successful aspect of this model is.

The Gameplay

Let’s talk about that context. Take a look at the screenshot below:

Just from looking at the image, you wouldn’t be able to tell “classroom math exercise” from “cute looking adventure game.”  The design choice to deeply gamified learning shifts the attention away from what students are usually used to. If you were to ask a first grader, what do they think about the above image, you might find responses varying around “this looks fun!” from kids.

The game is structured as a retro, 16-bit RPG (role-playing game) inspired by many games of past, and many games that exist today (Castlevania, Super Metroid, Pokémon, Zelda, and many others come to mind). At first glance, it looks like your regular ol’ RPG. This is where Prodigy gets clever. Rather than an “attack” button, Prodigy shifts the onus onto the players’ ability to solve math problems, demonstrated in the below screenshot.

Figure 3. Example of a problem overlay players must solve to “cast spell.”

This example is just one way Prodigy executes the learning objectives in tandem with the game. As shown in the curriculum screenshot, Prodigy is composed of math problems from across many subjects involving quantity relationships, spatial sense, and operational sense as dictated by the Ontario curriculum for first graders.

Beyond The Game

Prodigy has grown into something bigger than the sum of its parts. Its ability to scale to the needs of individual users gives it the power to be a catered interactive experience that most games strive for. In this case, having math curriculum as the bedrock to reach users from Grades 1 to 8 is the smartest choice Prodigy could have done to find its niche in this enormously growing marketplace. And now, it’s an entire community platform of learners.

Figure 4. A screenshot of Prodigy’s sign-up page for new users

Learning & Gaming

Learning can be fun. Anyone who plays video games knows this. Every time you do the wrong move and get defeated by the big boss, or turn the corner on the race track a bit wide, or miss that button press - games, often, provide you with the “try again” option.

If my experience in the classroom, and as an adult learner has shown me anything, it’s that trying, again and again, and gaining more knowledge in the process, is the key to understanding any concept. Prodigy has figured out a methodology to building this into gameplay and advocating it across all the places that impact a child - at home, on their screens, and in the classroom.

It’s a great model to learn from - and something I hope emerging game producers and developers look at when building their own interactive educational experiences.

[notawizard]

Why Peg + Cat is Perfect Kids Under 7

           This adorable programme airs on Treehouse for children aged 3 to 5 and follows the adventures of a little girl named Peg and her pet cat. Peg+ Cat succeeds in making math fun and relevant by showing kids how math is present in their lives and can be used to solve a variety of problems, from giving her mom the proper number of birthday presents to saving baby chicks. Peg + Cat follows the Ontario grade one curriculum, making it a great tool to prepare kids who are going into grade one, or to reinforce their current learning.

Ontario’s grade one math curriculum is designed to help children develop necessary skills such as: problem solving, reasoning, reflective thinking, connecting concepts to the world around them, representing mathematical ideas visually, and communicating their thinking clearly (Pg.32 of 135). Peg + Cat helps to develop these types of thinking and behaviour very well. The content in each episode is repetitive as the creators take the time to teach it’s viewers in multiple ways. Whenever there is a problem to be solved, Peg verbally explains the problem while writing it down for viewers to see and then explains each step of the solution in the same manner. While Peg, Cat, and friends carry out her plans their, they all sing about what they are doing and why or what they learned. These problems are anchored in the real world to further emphasize that math is everywhere. As we see in The Slop Problem, Peg, Cat, and the teenagers need to catch and place the chickens back into their coup. Each person can carry up to five chickens, thanks to a smart phone app, and they learn about counting in fives.

Peg + Cat teaches more than critical thinking and communication, however, as the types of math taught can be linked directly to more specific goals in Ontario’s grade 1 math curriculum.

Number Sense and Numeration

Two of the three overall expectations in Ontario’s curriculum for students are to “demonstrate an understanding of magnitude by counting forward to 100 and backwards from 20;” and “solve problems involving the addition and subtraction of single-digit whole numbers, using a variety of strategies.” (Pg. 33).

In the episode The Arch Villain Problem and The Birthday Present Problem Peg and Cat practice counting forwards and backwards. In The Arch Villain Problem, Cat can only do nine clumsy things before he scrapes his knee. Peg keeps track of his blunders by counting backwards from nine in order to help keep him safe. Meanwhile in The Birthday Present Problem, Peg and Cat must collect five rocks of from six different places in order to give her mom 30 rocks for her 30th birthday.

Measurement

This section’s goals are to “estimate, measure, and describe length, area, mass, capacity, time, and temperature, using non-standard units of the same size;” and “compare, describe, and order objects, using attributes measured in non-standard units.” (pg35).

In The Slop Problem, Peg, Cat, and the teenagers have to clean up the farm animals before the farmer comes to check on them, but they have trouble figuring out which animal should go in which tub and how much water to use. Peg must help them understand how to estimate and relate size with mass and capacity.

Geometry and Spatial Sense

Peg + Cat fits into two of the this area’s learning expectations of “identify common two-dimensional shapes and three-dimensional figures and sort and classify them by their attributes;* compose and decompose common two-dimensional shapes and three-dimensional figures.” (pg. 37).

The Straight and Narrow Problem

deals with a mysterious villain who starts turning other shapes in town into triangles, and it is up to Peg and Cat to save the day! Together, they teach viewers how to identify various shapes and how to combine them to make new ones in order to restore the city.

Data Management and Probability

“collect and organize categorical primary data and display the data using concrete graphs and pictographs, without regard to the order of labels on the horizontal axis; read and describe primary data presented in concrete graphs and pictographs; describe the likelihood that everyday events will happen.” (Pg, 40).  

In The Mega Mall Problem Peg and Cat must search the mall for the teenagers who wondered away right before their dance competition started. By learning how to read the mall’s map and creating a graph to represent what each teenager wanted before disappearing, Peg and Cat were able to find all of the teenagers and get back to the dance competition right on time.  

This is Just the Tip of the Iceberg

After watching five eleven minute episodes, I was able to find all of this information. Just think of what the whole season can teach kids. I may not be a teacher but I’m giving Peg + Cat an A+

Works Cited

The Ontario Math Curriculum can be found here

Links to the episodes below:

Peg + Cat Episode 11, The Slop Problem, The Birthday Present Problem.

Peg + Cat Episode 12, The Mega Mall Problem.

Peg + Cat Episode 17, The Arch Villain Problem, The Straight and Narrow Problem.

All screen shots were taken from the episode links above and edited by me.

© The Fred Rogers Company and 9 Story Entertainment

[yesthisisagoodidea-blog]

“I Don’t Want My Kids Seeing That!”: When To Throw Letters From Concerned Parents In The Trash

We want to keep explicit, harmful, and inappropriate content out of children’s media. Nobody would disagree with that. Nobody actively wants to expose children to content that could hurt them…

Excellent article on LGBT+ representation in children’s TV from a classmate of mine.

[yesthisisagoodidea-blog]

Bait and Bury: Queerbaiting in Teen Media

Image via twitter.com/MaryneeLahaye Spoilers for The 100.

The internet erupted last Thursday with outrage over the death of Lexa, a lesbian character on The CW series The 100. Emotions have ranged from fury to misery, but perhaps the most upsetting aspect is the feeling of fatigue. The LGBT community is sadly accustomed to being pulled into a series with the promise of representation, only to have it sent away or worse- killed off. For teens struggling with their sexual identity, this practice of “queerbaiting” could have potentially devastating consequences.

The 2015 GLAAD report of “Where We Are on TV” shows 4% of TV characters are LGBT+, compared to an estimated 10-20% of the actual population. With so few characters to represent the community, the weight of responsibility is heavier on the writers to give meaningful depictions of queerness. However, due to many factors including network restrictions, lack of queer writers, and a tendency to rely on tropes, queerness is often handled poorly or merely used as a tool to gain a queer following.

Queerbaiting is not a new phenomenon. One of the earlier examples in the teen sphere is the band t.A.T.u.’s 2002 music video for “All the Things She Said,” in which the 17 year old female singers share a kiss, going on to affirm their heterosexuality in interviews. This is echoed years later by Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl” (2008) and Little Big Town’s “Girl Crush” (2014), both of which use homosexuality (in the titles, no less) to draw the listener in, but within the same song reassure them of their hetereosexuality. This turns queerness into a gimmick to be exploited to attract attention, yet all are songs are massively popular both in and out of the LGBT+ community. With so few sources of representation to choose from, it’s unsurprising that queer communities rally around even the slimmest examples of queerness, and those marketing to teen audiences are definitely aware of this.

Consider the marketing of shows such as The OC, Gilmore Girls, and Gossip Girl. All are guilty of running ads featuring a main character engaging in a same sex kiss (Marissa, Paige, and Chuck and Nate, respectively) that never transpired in a serious queer relationship.

The most significant queer relationships occur in shows built around the premise of a queer main character, such as Sugar Rush, South of Nowhere, or more recently, Faking It. All of these shows use their characters’ sexualities in their advertising, though considering the heft of the story being about their sexuality, it’s understandable why. However, it still presents a sensationalism of queerness that is viewed by marketers as a “good hook” more than an intrinsic and personal part of life.

The worst offenders of this trope, however, are those who combine queerbaiting with the more heinous cliche dubbed “Bury Your Gays.” This is named for the disproportionate amount of deaths queer characters suffer in media. Buffy the Vampire Slayer saw the death of two of its four queer characters (Larry, Tara), Degrassi killed its only trans character (Adam), Supernatural brutally murdered a lesbian in an act even the cast has reproached (Charlie), two of the nine major deaths on Pretty Little Liars have been queer women (Maya, Shana), and now The 100 joins these ranks with Lexa’s death. It’s bad enough to be manipulated through queerbaiting, to see identifiable characters killed off, but to do so to a teen audience is downright irresponsible. LGBT+ teens are at four times the risk of attempting suicide, and following Lexa’s death on March 3, at least one teenager in New Zealand was hospitalized due to a suicide attempt in response to it. A week after Lexa’s death, the topic “LGBT fans deserve better” trended on Twitter with over 200 000 tweets in an effort to bring awareness to the issue, raising over $30 000 for the LGBT+ suicide prevention foundation, The Trevor Fund. These fans are passionate about the characters that make them feel less alone, and they deserve to see those characters get happy endings. Enough queer characters have been sent away on a bus, have been “just experimenting,” have died or been murdered or committed suicide. As content creators, we have to do better.

[tinyscientist]

The Ethics of Homonormativity and Gay Assimilation in Mainstream TV

When I was fifteen, I didn’t know any gay people. The only access I had to queerness was watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer in my parents’ basement and secretly downloading t.A.T.u music videos. Let me tell you, nobody should ever have to validate their identity by watching a t.A.T.u. music video. 

But as problematic as EVERYTHING about t.A.T.u is, they were transgressive and exactly what I needed to see. They kissed girls, they knew how to operate explosives, and they drove trucks. #Lifegoals.

(Great role models)

Queerness in the media has undergone some significant changes since I was a teenager. This is undeniable.

Now mainstream TV shows have gay characters, but they’re usually white, cis, monogamous, affluent, and male. How revolutionary! So diverse!

This is called Homonormativity. It refers to when LGBTQ folks don’t challenge the systemic oppression of marginalized groups within the queer community, such as racism, sexism, transphobia, classism, and ableism. 

(A homonormative family in their natural habitat)

Homonormativity is harmful to the LGBTQ community because it allows a small percentage of privileged gay people to be accepted in heteronormative society, while reinforcing heteronormative social values and exclusion of people with intersectional identities. It is especially damaging for queer youth to see only a certain type of queer relationships.

The show can advertise to left-leaning audiences and say “look, we have gay characters, we’re open-minded and progressive” and earn themselves a gay fan base at the same time. This is garbage because it exploits queer viewers and doesn’t represent the majority of what LGBTQ families and relationships really look like.

(Homonormativity poster)

When gay couples are assimilated and depoliticized, it contributes to the idea that the battle is won, and queer people no longer face discrimination.  

This is also assumed when homophobia is shown as laughable caricatures, like an ultra-religious character ranting about homosexuals. This does not accurately portray the microaggressions and systemic violence that is part of daily life for LGBT people. As well, homonormative gay couples may depict internalized homophobia in an uncritical way, for example, with characters who avoid femininity or interactions with other queer characters.

Some examples of shows that fall into this are Modern family, The Fosters, and Glee.

Modern family has a white cis gay couple, Cam and Mitch. Cam is coded as the more effeminate partner, and many jokes are centred around him filling the “mother” role in their family, while Mitch is the “dad.” Both characters are clearly affluent, and actively police each other’s stereotypical mannerisms, so as not to appear too gay.

(Mitch and Cam from Modern Family)

The Fosters has a little more diversity, as Lena is black, but they still fall into roles set by heteronormativity. Stef is a cop, which plays into her role as the more masculine, authoritarian partner, while Lena’s character is more in touch with her feelings and is more maternal. They are also affluent enough to support multiple foster children, and their values are traditional American values.  

(Stef and Lena from The Fosters)

Glee had characters with a wide range of sexual orientations and gender identities, but the writers seemed to prioritize the storylines of the white male gay characters over those of the other queer (and more marginalized) characters. One of the main differences was the coming out storylines. The white male character, Karofsky, had a sobering, shocking coming out event that reminded viewers of how seriously we should treat outing a gay person. On the other hand, Santana was forced to apologize and thank Finn when he outed her to the whole school (and all of Ohio). This alienated many queer women in the Glee fandom, myself included.

Glee also ended the series with all four of the main queer cast getting married at a very young age. This emphasized the need for queer characters to validate their relationships through heteronormative systems.

(I am a cog in the wheel of systemic oppression) 

Despite the disappointing number of shows that only show homonormative couples, there are ways that writers, showrunners, and production companies can avoid falling into this trope.

We can have more queer/trans writers of colour, and make writer’s spaces more welcoming and inclusive to writers/producers who aren’t white, straight, cis, or male. We need queer storylines to come from a place of experience and understanding to have authentic, relatable stories. 

The benefits of implementing these changes is that LGBTQ youth will see themselves in a more honest way on screen. We ALL need to see ourselves and our struggles shown as meaningful and important. 

[henhands]

“STEM for Girls” doesn’t mean “Make STEM Pink”

Considering some ethics in marketing Children’s Media...

The past few years have seen a drastic increase in the amount of STEM  (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) programs, products, and especially toys targeted towards girls. As a girl who studied life sciences in university I couldn’t have been happier. This was perfect! What a time to be alive! …at least, that’s what I thought at first.

Now before you shoot me I AM ALL FOR GIRLS IN STEM. Like I said before I was ecstatic at first with all the emerging efforts to bring more inclusion into the field I always had great interest in myself. But as I tend to do, I thought about the issue more and more, and as I tend to do, I began to have some doubts. My doubts aren’t from the idea of making STEM accessible for girls through toys, but rather how we seem to be doing it.

There is a significant underrepresentation of women in STEM fields. This is not new. It has been repeatedly reported that there are far less women working in STEM fields or even holding STEM-related degrees. The distribution of women actually in STEM is also heavily dependent on the field, with women being more prevalent in biology and heavily lacking in engineering and computer sciences. This pattern has become of great concern in recent years and both the Canadian and American governments have conducted research studies that confirm this disparity.

As a response to this imbalance there has been an increased amount of attention on STEM-focused toys, particularly ones that are aimed towards girls. I have also heard of retailers creating more “gender-neutral [...] environments” but I’m not certain whether this means increasing the number of gender neutral toys being sold, or giving girls more toys that are normally considered “for boys” (e.g. construction sets, science sets etc.), though I am inclined to think it’s the latter. 

Of course, there is absolutely no problem with having STEM-focused toys for girls. I applaud the effort. Women ARE underrepresented in STEM, and we should make an active effort to help every child realize their full potential, regardless of their field of interest and equalize opportunity. My doubt started manifesting, however, when I realized how these toys were designed and marketed, and how much “for girls” they actually were. Let me explain...

When I search “STEM toys for girls” I find results like this:

*Screenshots of Google search results taken from my computer*

Pretty cool! 

But when I start looking for the best STEM toys overall I get toys where I can dig up and assemble a T-Rex Skeleton, control a robot arm, grow crystals, and actually build a robot from LEGO?! WHOA! What can I build with “LEGO sets for girls”?

Oh...

Other STEM toys “for girls” seem to follow similar themes, with Jewelbots teaching girls how to program a digital friendship bracelet, and GoldieBlox teaching girls about simple machines and physics in construction with books and play sets that are unapologetically pink and purple. These toys all teach valuable lessons and help spark interest in the currently male-dominated STEM fields. As Pia Sen aptly puts in her article for cognito.org, these toys that closely resemble the jewelry play sets and princess books that young girls may have previously received can help them feel “as though it’s a natural progression to go from Cinderella to C++.”

A problem arises when there isn’t any break from these themes, when all STEM toys “for girls” are like this. Many of these toys are meant to “introduce” STEM to girls, and they do a fine job. But what happens when a girl wants to continue into STEM? What toys are available to a young girl that wants to continue exploring these fields? How far can you go when the toys “designed for you” have you building easily constructed coffee shops and parks while the boy beside you is making solar powered robots and remote control cars?

It seems (to me) that many STEM toys specifically for girls don’t have the same progression of required skill as STEM toys that are gender neutral. LEGO’s history started off very gender neutral, with boys and girls playing with sets that required the same level of skill to build. However, once LEGO started making sets aimed towards girls, their products split into two types: the sets clearly marketed for girls that were easier and dealt with home life or jewelry, and another line of toy sets that could’ve been easily gender neutral but were marketed toward boys. As Pia Sen asks in her article: “Did they not think we were capable of doing things beyond a middle school level?”

This isn’t to say that I want a pink T-Rex skeleton to dig up, or a bejeweled robot to build. Rather, I’m wondering why there hasn’t been as much, if not more, effort to market and emphasize STEM toys as gender neutral, instead of focusing all our efforts to make STEM “for girls.” I guess my greatest and overall concern about this movement (and maybe it’s just me. Maybe I’m crazy) is that is seems like there are two streams of STEM emerging: one for boys, and one for girls. This isn’t going to fly in the future. It can’t (…can it? I really feel like it shouldn’t…).

It seems a bit counterproductive to promote gender equality in STEM by making a clear distinction between what’s considered “STEM for girls” and what’s not. It’s great that girls are being considered when making these toys and programs, but you can’t just “introduce” a field as big and particular as STEM and then leave it at that, simply expecting people to continue challenging themselves to think a certain way and critically evaluate ideas. The levels of difficulty offered by both STEM products “made for girls” and “made for boys” need to be balanced, and the toys themselves just need to be GOOD and INTERESTING, as toys should be. I know this is easier said than done, but it’s important (to me) because when these kids grow up, they won’t be in labs or workshops separated by gender (at least, I really hope they won’t be…). They will be working together to make great changes in the world, and I for one hope they step into their workspaces on equal terms with each other.

So now my question is: if the toys and games that started and nurtured their interests provided the same level of engagement, difficulty, and quality, does it really matter if one was pink or not?

[tinyscientist]

Blaze and the Monster Machines: Getting Fired Up About Physics

Last week, my partner and I took a short vacation to Halifax to visit some relatives and their almost-four-year-old daughter, Fin. 

As someone who studies Children’s Media, but has very few chances to interact with kids, this was a unique opportunity to observe TV habits. When she came home from preschool, she was all about fort-building and pretending to be a fairy.. but closer to bedtime, she plopped herself in front of the TV. Blaze and the Monster Machines was consistently demanded.

Blaze and the Monster Machines, an engineering-y show about trucks, is on right before bedtime, but Fin stayed wide-awake, while her mom told me some of her own observations of Blaze’s influence. 

“She knows what a lever is now, she knows that you can use one to lift heavy things.” I was impressed, since I’m sure levers were beyond what I understood at 4 (or 5, or 6). I asked Fin if she could tell me about levers, but she just looked at me like, who are you and why are you on my couch. Which is fair.

Blaze is an anthropomorphic monster truck, who has a human friend, AJ. They have other truck and human friends, both male and female. Some of the trucks are very truck-truck, and some are dinosaur-trucks or animal-trucks. I found this a little confusing because I kind of thought if you’re going to have a truck-dinosaur theme, you should stick to it. But I’m biased when it comes to dinosaurs.

(AJ and Blaze. Photo: Business Wire)

The main conflicts, often caused by another truck, Crusher, are usually resolved by a clever physics-based mechanism or machine. The main characters involve the viewers by discussing the reasoning, questioning the audience, then pausing, as though hearing the answer. With parental coaxing, Fin was shouting the answers... and so were we!

Now, anecdotal evidence (Fin’s mom) says that this show is legit educational. By comparing the show against the Ontario Educational Expectations for kindergarten, we can see whether or not this is true.

 The curriculum expectations are mostly centred around getting kids to ask questions and learning to communicate and record the answers they find. At this age kids are learning how to explore, inquire, plan, observe, predict, and use tools to find answers (or maybe more questions?) 

Kids should “conduct simple investigations through free exploration, focused exploration, and guided activity, using inquiry skills (questioning, planning, predicting, observing, communicating, select and use tools, equipment, and materials to connect things using the design process).”

Generally, this means they’re figuring out what the questions are that they want to answer and how they can do that safely. This is pretty important since the first thing you ask yourself as a scientist is:

“what question am I trying to answer?”

 In Blaze and the Monster Machines, questions are asked and solutions are investigated. The show uses outlines to trace the trajectory of ramps, pendulums, and levers, which helps kids (and adults) visualize the movement, mass, and angle of objects. Viewers are instructed to observe specific things in the environment and the way they move to predict their behaviour. When an object or machine needs to be built, a 3D blueprint appears as Blaze and his friends design it.

(Blaze and Starla using a lever. Photo: Nick Jr.)

There is also an emphasis on teamwork, for example, when a group of characters is required to solve a problem, instead of just one character saving the day. 

The characters work together, communicate results, and build off each other’s experiences.

Overall, I think this show does a fantastic job of making physics and engineering accessible and palatable to preschoolers, as well as giving them a good basic understanding of words and concepts that will be addressed in elementary school.