I like to think of myself as a pretty laid back parent, but there is something that aggravates me to no end... When educational children's programming (or reading materials) lie to our children.
First case in point:
Curious George.
I really like Curious George. When he makes mistakes, even though everything seems to magically work out for him, he's pretty contrite about the mistakes he makes. But this is my ongoing problem with the show, the books, and the entire concept: GEORGE IS NOT A MONKEY. Come on, people, he doesn't have a tail! Monkeys have tails. In fact, George appears to be a chimpanzee. So stop referring to him as a "monkey" over and over again. The "Man in the Yellow Hat" who is George's best friend (owner?) is in fact some sort of wildlife biologist so he should know better. It's not as if he's some random hardware store owner who happens to own a lovable, furry pet who gets into hilarious antics.
Second case in point:
SuperWhy -- specifically The Boy Who Cried Wolf
This entire show premise is that the superheroes travel into a book, learn how to read, and then change the story. Why are they changing the story? When you change the story, you change the moral of the story. In the Boy Who Cried Wolf, the boy in the show keeps seeing a wolf while setting up for his party but whenever he tries to tell his friends, the wolf disappears. The "new" lesson is that the boy is sad that his friends don't believe him. Come on, the original story is about how it's wrong to lie (another very important lesson, and less touchy feely) because otherwise WOLVES WILL EAT YOU.
Third case in point:
Colors book - Seal v. Sea Lion
Owen has a whole series of books that are basically fancy flash cards in baby board book form. One of them goes through "colors." At the very end of the book to demonstrate the color "gray," it shows a picture of a dolphin and then one of a "seal." Except, the "seal" is actually a sea lion. It's easy to tell since the sea lion is in typical sea lion pose where his front flippers are holding his head up (like he's posed to balance a ball on his nose). I hate to break the news to you people, but seals can't hold themselves up like that. They're essentially furry land slugs. So why not just put "sea lion" under the picture?
It's not as if these things are mindless, non-educational children's books or programming exclusively there for entertainment. You're supposed to make me feel better about letting my child watch tv or encourage me to read to my child more to teach him things... And despite small public programming budgets, you can take 5 minutes and Google to correct your mistakes. All I want is just the facts. So the next time you hear me growl while reading to my child, it's probably not me reading Where the Wild Things Are, it's probably me discovering another lie in an educational material.
