Have you noticed that while watching cartoons with your little one, there are frequent pop-culture nods, celebrity appearances, or jokes that you seem to get but not your toddler? This isn’t by chance; it’s a clever tactic aimed at fostering Joint Media Engagement.
Joint Media Engagement refers to when family members and other important adults in a child's life view media with the child, and discuss it together. Studies show this can further enhance a child's understanding of the show's lesson (Dore & Zimmerman, 2020)
Parents and guardians can enhance their child's learning while enjoying TV time together in these three ways:
Direct children’s attention to the content that matters (the "lessons").
Support the lesson by correlating how the educational content relates to the real world.
When children are encouraged to make connections from a screen to their own environment, concepts are further cemented (Willis 2014)
Pausing and asking questions of your toddler about things that are being taught is a great way to bridge comprehension.
Discussions can have a magnifying effect on the cognitive process used by children when they are viewing educational programming. (Willis 2014)
"Fairy's House" offers parents opportunity to strengthen their own joint media engagement. The show implements sound mindfully and purposefully, indicating when and where to focus attention, which intuitively influences adult interaction, as well.
"Fairy's House" depicts familiar everyday scenarios that parents can replicate with their children, such as playing peekaboo. Grownups can bolster a child's comprehension of the ideas presented on screen by integrating them into real-world contexts.
In addition to this, "Fairy's House" features an interview with a Child Development Specialist during the end credit sequences, discussing the day's theme and providing adults with further insights into why the specific episode topic is significant for a toddler's development.
Photo credit: Ketut Subiyanto
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