Wednesday, May 7, 2014

A Wave of Fans vs Critics Drinking an Ocean of Haterade


Fluffy waffles on a cozy couch, the morning sunrise just poking over the hills, and the birds singing a sweet serenade. The family is brought together by the simplicity and humor of Saturday morning cartoons. Our most favorite was Spongebob Squarepants. These are the times I look back and treasure as the days get hectic and we all move in different directions. It never crossed my mind until most recently that this show I loved could in fact be harming me. Alarming allegations against whom lives in a pineapple under the sea sent my mind spiraling on what has become of us. Accusations stating watching the sea sponge and his gleeful antics cause an inability to learn, think, and concentrate are shocking but overall disappointing that instead of pointing the finger at ourselves we point it at a fictional cartoon that we ourselves created. Spongebob is just a cartoon and it can not be blamed for educational issues.
    It is no new craze, people have been blaming entertainment for causing other issues for years. Steven Pinker gives examples in his article Mind Over Mass Media
written in the New York Times of when comic books first came out in the 1950’s people thought they were the cause of violence and crime. We can now see this is absurd but yet we still do it just with a different form of entertainment.  Video games since their creation to the present day have been seen as a cause of violence as well. MTV’s Teen Mom has been seen to glorify and send teen pregnancy into a skyrocket.  Even though the amount of teen parents has not risen at all in fact, it is at its lowest rate in 30 years. This proves that the people have been fed the wrong information by the media. We are thinking things without solid proof. A person’s violent tendencies or other risky behavior doesn’t have to do with the video games, comic books, or the T.V. shows  they experienced. I strongly believe that it is accurate to say a majority of the population would agree that the form of upbringing is the most crucial puzzle piece to shaping a person’s future personality and actions. So why would we point the finger at the cartoon when it comes to a students academic troubles? Shouldn’t that once again fall into the hands of the guardian or educator? Correlation is not causation although some see it differently.
    Carmen Chai exhibits interesting reasoning for her opinion against the porous square.
In her article written in The Calgary Herald entitled Frantic SpongeBob found to lower kids' ability to learn; Study reveals fewer effects in calm cartoons, she opens with, “Sitting through an episode of the fast paced cartoon Spongebob Squarepants may give parents a headache,” telling us how she really feels right away. I didn’t know spending quality time with your children watching cartoons that they enjoy caused physical pain to the area around your brain and skull, that is quite interesting news to me. Does reading a book to your child based on the same cartoon or similar cause pain to your corneas? I’m just curious because corneal damage is nothing to take lightly. Are we going to have to burn all the literature Carmen Chai?  
She goes into a study done on a group of 4 year olds where their problem solving abilities are tested after watching nine minutes of Spongebob. Another group is given the same test after watching nine minutes of Cailou, a calmer cartoon born in the land of Canada. The results she shows claim the Spongebob group’s scores were significantly lower than the Cailou group. While showing this she explains her hypothesis that Spongebob being a fast paced cartoon, breaks down a child’s attention span and ability to concentrate. Cailou is what she interprets to be the superior cartoon choice because it is much slower paced. Yes, if one was seeking to replace comedic wit with slug paced predictable plots more like a lullaby than entertainment then yes, Cailou is superior by far.  One mediocre experiment was not enough though.
    A second study was conducted. In this particular study the four year olds were sat down and a plate of marshmallows was set down in front of them. Scientists told them to wait about five minutes before they ate a marshmallow. Results expressed that the Spongebob group waited only two and a half minutes while the Cailou group was able to wait four.  We all know the tempting powers of a marshmallow. I’m no pastor but I am fairly certain it was a marshmallow that tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden so I find this experiment flawed.  How good is a four year olds sense of time? Scholastic explains that four years olds are very much in the now. They tell how time passes by events throughout the day and year such as birthdays, lunch time, and other important events like that. Actual time telling isn’t as prominent until later on so this experiment should not be considered. The studies are flawed for not only this but for a few different reasons.
        The studies would be considered more valid if the group being tested upon was even the best group to get the most accurate results.  Spongebobs producer spoke to CNN regarding the controversy against the popular Nickelodeon show. For starters although the four year old age group may watch the show as well, the shows target audience is six to eleven year olds. He elaborates, “Having 60 non-diverse kids who are not part of the shows target demo, watch nine minutes of programming is questionable methodology. It could not possibly provide the basis for valid findings that parents could trust.” Cailou would be the more appropriate show for the group they are testing because Cailou’s target audience is two to five year olds, and in the show Cailou was written in to be a four year old. The trials and tribulations the small chico goes through are meant to be based around things that normal preschoolers would come across, eh. (Get it. Because he is from Canada) Things that they can relate to and better understand. Is a four year old completely understanding everything that goes on in an episode of Spongebob? That is kind of up in the air, no one can really say or be positive. So why then would the target group of the experiments not be the target group of the show that may not understand it anyway? Below is a clip from Cailou and you can clearly see what age group it is directed towards.
  Furthermore, as attention span is the main topic of discussion I would like to bring to the table that the average four year olds maximum attention span is only around fifteen minutes anyway, while a child who is six to eleven years old can usually remain focused between half to a full hour.
    Chai sites Oren Amitay and Mark Sabbagh, psychologists and so called parenting experts. They pose a solution or an aid to solving to the main issue, being children’s difficulty concentrating by saying parents shouldn’t let their kids watch TV before school or watch TV in between on studying breaks to increase their attention span on the tasks at hand. This is a good idea but in all the psychology books I’ve ever read including Basic Psychology by Richard Straub  they actually recommend these breaks. You don’t necessarily have to watch T.V. but it won’t hurt. Breaks such as these, not being overly challenging to the brain have been proven beneficial, your brain needs to absorb and store what you just took in into its long term memory so you will be able to later retrieve it more easily. Scientists at the University of Sienna discovered and explained that although it may not seem like it to the older generation, kids get stressed out too. Things we find simple are quite new to them. Watching a normal amount of cartoons was discovered to have an almost pain killing effect, like a stress reliever. Kids who are stressed out or in pain are not going to be able to concentrate in school and this will obviously affect their ability to learn.


Above is chart that displays the incredible increase in the diagnoses of ADHD in previous years. Now the recommended amount of studying time for adults to best absorb and retain the information being taken in is actually only twenty minutes anyway. Experts say twenty minutes on, twenty minutes off is the the best game plan to get the best results. Are we perhaps setting our children up to fail with unrealistic expectations?  If we think about how much focus we put on testing and MLA format essays it’s no wonder the diagnosis of ADHD has increased. The classroom can turn into a robot convention quickly with the boring meter off the charts for students and teachers alike. The discussion of concentration in kids has turned into a frenzy among teachers and child psychologists. I seeked out the view point from a teacher of this upcoming generation.
 A second grade teacher voices her opinion anonymously on a child development learning site. In her eyes people are too quick to diagnose kids with attention problems such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. They diagnose quickly when they see a child who is fidgety in the classroom sh. While occasionally these diagnoses can be accurate sometimes there is a different issue and instead boils down to the teaching style. “If educators don’t switch up the routine every now and then kids aren’t going to remain as actively engaged,” she explains.  We are in an era where the technology is so advanced we can’t keep teaching kids in the same way that we used to.
    Lets take a moment to look at the positive Spongebob offers. He exhibits kindness to everyone, even the “villains” per say of the show, Squidward and Plankton. He works day in and day out at the Krusty Krab displaying fabulous customer service that I think many adults could benefit from seeing. Then goes home and takes care of his snail, Gary. Kids can gain from his excellent display of friendship with Patrick the Star. I personally learned to never give up on something you desperately wish for when after time and time again Spongebob fails his boating test, but he continues admirably never giving up. Right this moment I am using skills acquired from numerous episodes. For instance the episode where he has to write a paper about what not to do at a stoplight. During this episode he is distracted by everything around him, and does everything besides write his paper until about fifteen minutes before it is due. By seeing this I learned not to procrastinate. I learned about perseverance once again when Spongebob wants to get buff but doesn’t want to work for it and purchases inflatable muscle arms. Nothing good comes out of inflatable muscle arms, working hard for real muscle arms always pays off, I know this now. I learned that parenting is a big responsibility from watching the episode where Spongebob and Patrick take in a stray clam who can not find it’s mother and treat it as though it were it’s own. That’s diversity if I ever have seen it, and it’s a beautiful thing. From the episode where he takes a jellyfish home who only wants to party every night I acquired the knowledge that partying is fine but to always in moderation. The list goes on for days but I’m not the only one who has learned something from this cartoon that is under the laser beam eyeballs of destruction and hate from critics.
A story of true friendship is displayed written in an article in the Carleton Place. A girls best friend begins choking on a piece of Trident chewing gum. Sources have said the flavor was none other than original. The girl gets flashbacks from an episode where Squidward chokes on his clarinet and then Spongebob saves him with the heimlich maneuver. Having this knowledge fresh in her head she acts and saves her friends life. I rest my case folks. If I had a microphone I would drop it and walk of the stage that I also don’t have. Has anyones young life ever been saved inches from certain doom by Cailou? No it has not.
    So are we going to remain insane blaming innocent entertainment that we created and have the choice to consume as the issue? Or are we going to grow up and take ownership for the issues we see and actively search for solutions? Searching for new ways to teach today’s youth is the key to this large heavy door called life. Everyone needs to sit back, relax, and enjoy some good cartoons now and then. It is good for your soul. As with everything moderation is another key component, too much of anything can be a bad thing. But none of the studies produced solid enough evidence to prove that watching a normal amount of this cartoon could be harmful to a child’s learning and focusing ability.

No comments:

Post a Comment