{"id":18591,"date":"2020-05-22T09:00:04","date_gmt":"2020-05-22T13:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev2.worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/worldscreen.com\/"},"modified":"2020-05-26T09:33:26","modified_gmt":"2020-05-26T13:33:26","slug":"green-screen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/green-screen\/","title":{"rendered":"Green Screen"},"content":{"rendered":"

Climate change is at the forefront of global policy and politics, and the issue has seeped its way onto kids\u2019 TV shows. <\/em><\/p>\n

It\u2019s quite a tall order to teach young kids about the scary realities of global warming and the environmental changes that they\u2019ll be seeing and hearing about\u2014and may have even already noticed\u2014as they grow up. Though nature and caring for the environment have been addressed in popular kids\u2019 programming in the past (think of Bert and Ernie singing about saving water, Ms. Frizzle taking us to the rainforest on her magic school bus and even Captain Planet chanting \u201cEarth! Wind! Fire! Water!\u201d as he and his Planeteers scurry off to save the world), there has never been a higher demand for eco-themed kids\u2019 series, and it\u2019s with good reason.<\/p>\n

Talk of the causes and consequences of climate change has reached fever pitch. Plus, a new generation of parents\u2014millennials, who hold eco-friendly values nearer and dearer than any previous crop of consumers\u2014are looking to explain these issues to their children in ways that little ones can understand.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe kids\u2019 industry has a heritage of stepping into this space, and this is certainly one of the areas that kids\u2019 television has always mined for entertainment,\u201d says Kimberly Dennison, Gaumont\u2019s VP of creative development for animation and family. \u201cBut I do think that right now, broadcasters and platforms want to speak to kids in this space more than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn particular, public broadcasters are hungry for shows that tackle environmental issues, but the demand also applies to the streaming services that are anxious to make shows with important messages for kids,\u201d says Liliana Reyes, the senior VP of content at Portfolio Entertainment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe passion that today\u2019s youth have for the environment stems from the real danger facing them and future generations if we don\u2019t act in defense of our planet,\u201d Reyes continues. \u201cThis has become a very real issue and kids today are certainly engaged with this topic more so than ever before.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all see what\u2019s happening around the planet, we see the kids standing up, and we think we have to do something from the entertainment side to help and send out a message,\u201d says Ulli Stoef, the CEO of Toon2Tango.<\/p>\n

Bob Higgins, executive VP of content for kids and family at Boat Rocker Studios, echoes Stoef\u2019s statement, saying that he has never seen even the slightest pushback from broadcasters when it comes to environmental fare. \u201cI think broadcasters across the board understand that it is something that kids have demonstrated an affinity for and always will,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

ONLINE <\/strong>
\nAs far as Higgins is concerned, \u201cthere\u2019s never a \u2018too soon\u2019 with kids and the environment. There\u2019s no point in not teaching them from the very earliest ages their global civic responsibility of taking care of the world in which we all live together. The same as you teach them to clean their room, we\u2019re teaching them to clean and care for the bigger room.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most of the shows that end up teaching kids about the environment, especially those aimed at the preschool set, aren\u2019t set up to be solely environmental shows. \u201cWe try not to take them to school again,\u201d says Stoef. \u201cThe issues are [set] in a bigger, fun, eccentric story, and it\u2019s more about self-exploration.\u201d<\/p>\n

GREEN LIGHT<\/strong>
\nIndeed, it has become necessary for many producers to pad a series\u2019 ecological messages with storylines and characters that almost make young viewers forget that they\u2019re absorbing positive environmental messaging while watching TV. Some programmers fear that pigeonholing a show into being a \u201cgreen\u201d series will isolate viewers, and they certainly don\u2019t want to fill their slates with shows that have managed to politicize the once-benign sphere of kids\u2019 TV. \u201cWhenever you introduce that<\/em> show to the broadcasters they say, We already have a \u2018green\u2019 story, that\u2019s enough,\u201d Stoef says.<\/p>\n

Toon2Tango\u2019s new series Rebel Nature<\/em>, for example, follows a young girl who is raised on an oil rig by a robot that her parents built 50 years ago\u2014before the entire planet was underwater. She believes that she is the only human on Earth and has no idea that world was indeed once full of her kind. When she meets some \u201cleftover\u201d humans, she begins a wild adventure of self-discovery, seeing firsthand the changes taking place in the natural world. \u201cIt\u2019s been produced for the purpose of bringing across to kids the message of what can happen to our planet\u2014what is happening currently and what the consequences are to the environment,\u201d Stoef says.<\/p>\n

Higgins notes that Boat Rocker\u2019s series that explore environmental themes are, on the surface, not about the environment at all. \u201cFor example, Kingdom Force<\/em>, which on its face may look to have the most opportunities to teach kids about environmental issues, is really a show about diversity,\u201d he says. The series, which is currently being produced for the CBC, is about five animals from five very different ecosystems\u2014among them are a polar bear from the Great White North, a gorilla who lives in the jungle and a savannah-dwelling cheetah\u2014who come together to protect the universe. \u201cIt\u2019s a way that we can talk about the political, if you will, with topics of global warming, but put it out there in a way that is being told on a level that kids understand,\u201d says Higgins.<\/p>\n

Boat Rocker also has Dino Ranch<\/em>\u2014which has been picked up by Disney Junior for a 2021 U.S. premiere\u2014a series that centers on a crew of junior ranchers who work in a \u201cpre-Westoric\u201d setting where dinosaurs still roam. Kids see a happy group of friends playing with dinosaurs, and underneath that surface are the messages of conservation. \u201cYes, we\u2019re dealing with [environmental issues], but we\u2019re doing it in a fantasy way with dinosaurs, so that we can give kids the fun fantasy adventure while leaving in the current topical lessons,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The WildBrain-distributed dirtgirlworld<\/em>, meanwhile, from mememe productions for ABC in Australia, is about a green-thumbed girl who grows vegetables in her backyard full of friends. It\u2019s a \u201cnarrative-driven kind of story world that\u2019s about friendship and love, fun and nature, and has this sort of embedded sustainable living theme, without it hitting anyone over the head with a hammer,\u201d says Cate McQuillen, the series\u2019 creative producer.<\/p>\n

STRAIGHT TALK<\/strong>
\nHowever, some producers and distributors, like Canada\u2019s Portfolio Entertainment, have been able to find an audience for shows that do address environmentalism more directly. Hero Elementary<\/em>, for example, is a co-pro with Twin Cities PBS that follows a group of kids in a school for budding superheroes. Though the show also teaches young kids the power of STEM skills, \u201cWe explore topics such as how littering destroys the natural habitats of wildlife, how the conservation of resources like paper serves to protect our forests and how wildlife and nature are so interconnected that one cannot exist without the other,\u201d says Reyes.<\/p>\n

Italy\u2019s Mondo TV is also co-producing a series that focuses on the environment in a fairly straightforward way. Called MeteoHeroes<\/em>, the series is jointly produced with MOPI (Meteo Operations Italia), a weather forecasting and meteorological research group. MeteoHeroes<\/em> has also gained the patronage of three prestigious Italian public institutions: the ministries of the environment and education, and Legambiente, a leading Italian environmentalist association. \u201cThrough our programs, we want to entertain youngsters everywhere, <\/strong>but also to transfer knowledge and to help them enjoy a better life in a more peaceful, friendly and safe planet\u2014<\/strong>in an ecologically aware environment,\u201d says Luana Perrero, the company\u2019s head of content sales.<\/p>\n

NATURAL ADVENTURES<\/strong>
\nTo accompany MeteoHeroes<\/em>, Mondo also has on its slate less direct \u201cedutainment\u201d shows about the environment, with a duo of series billed as \u201ceco-adventures.\u201d The shows \u201cengage kids with great storytelling and delightful stars that kids will identify with or would like to have as best friends,\u201d says Perrero. YooHoo to the Rescue<\/em>, for one, follows the titular fluffy character and his gang of friends as they travel from the magical forest of YooTopia to Earth to confront threats to nature and wildlife, meeting endangered animal species from around the world along the way. The second season of Robot Trains<\/em>, meanwhile, sees the group of characters known as Rail Watch transform from trains to robots to protect their home\u2014which is made up of Water Land, Sunny Land, Wind Land and Mountain Land\u2014and its vital energy supplies. \u201cOur series don\u2019t present issues as daunting; we believe for every problem there is a solution, and teamwork leads to a successful mission!\u201d Perrero says.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe find the best approach is to help kids fall in love with the environment, as opposed to scaring them with doomsday scenarios,\u201d says Portfolio\u2019s Reyes. Shows like The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That<\/em>, which teaches kids about topics like animal migration and how flowers feed entire ecosystems, and Doki<\/em>, which takes viewers around the world to learn about its natural wonders, do just that. Fostering a love for the environment first is also the goal of dirtgirlworld<\/em>\u2019s creators. \u201cWe wanted to make this world that had an absolute beauty about it to remind people that the world is beautiful,\u201d says McQuillen. \u201cYou protect what you love, and the notion of making this project was to engender that love of nature.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kids\u2019 comprehension skills tend to limit the ways in which environmental issues can be presented, as the early stages of brain development don\u2019t allow them to comprehend and retain complex information about scientific studies, weather patterns or the more traditional ways you might present analytics to an adult. \u201cObviously, you can\u2019t go into very high-concept things,\u201d comments Gaumont\u2019s Dennison. \u201cIt\u2019s about providing some really concrete, simple, kid-friendly adventures that kids can then relate to the world that they live in back home.\u201d<\/p>\n

EARTH DAY <\/strong>
\nDennison points to Touch the Earth<\/em>, a show based on the series of preschool picture books co-written by Julian Lennon and Bart Davis that have come into the marketplace on Earth Day for the past three years. The books themselves deal with \u201cconcrete issues that are environmental and also social in nature,\u201d says Dennison, themes that are carried into the series. \u201cThe types of stories that we\u2019re looking to tell range from animal stewardship to sharing the Earth with other creatures to finding ways to recycle and upcycle and be conscious of the way that we use the planet\u2019s resources,\u201d she continues. \u201cAnd the other storylines are about lending a hand to other people that you meet on your adventures and your journeys, so it really is about being a global citizen.\u201d<\/p>\n

The music and design of these shows are just as important as their characters and storylines. \u201cMusic, especially in a preschool space, is well-received and it\u2019s both something kids remember and is also entertaining at the same time,\u201d says Dennison.<\/p>\n

dirtgirlworld <\/em>is also a music-centric show, and McQuillen and her mememe productions partner, Hewey Eustace, who wrote, arranged and produced the series\u2019 award-winning soundtrack, were musicians before they made their way into the kids\u2019 TV industry. Songs from the show include \u201cEvery Little Drop,\u201d about the importance of conserving water, and \u201cGettin\u2019 Grubby,\u201d which encourages kids to go outside and get dirty.<\/p>\n

In the absence of music, keeping kids\u2019 attention can come down to a show\u2019s design, especially for the youngest sets. Mondo TV\u2019s series \u201care distinctive in look and approach; the story and design stand out in their own right in each show,\u201d says Perrero. \u201cThat\u2019s important to us. While the messages may sometimes overlap, each show needs to be unique.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not only do kids shows seek to educate young viewers about the natural world, but they also implore them to take action themselves, gently bestowing upon them the message that they are indeed the next stewards of this planet. \u201cFor us, [a show\u2019s takeaway] is twofold: it\u2019s the concrete, simple messaging combined with allowing kids to see that they can enact change by their choices and that really creates a pathway to hope,\u201d says Gaumont\u2019s Dennison. \u201cI think that\u2019s the biggest thing for these shows: kids, especially in the preschool set, need to see that there\u2019s hope and they need to see a pathway to action.\u201d<\/p>\n

TAKING ACTION<\/strong>
\nPortfolio\u2019s Reyes agrees: \u201cIn Hero Elementary<\/em>, we tackle issues like forest conservation in a way that\u2019s approachable to kids by focusing on what they can do to help, such as not wasting paper. It\u2019s important to distill these large and complex issues into actionable small steps for our young viewers, so they feel empowered to make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

She continues, \u201cIt\u2019s important to empower kids with steps they can take by themselves to recycle, conserve and reuse. Our aim is to educate and inspire future generations of activists and informed citizens who will move the needle on policy issues surrounding climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOur kids don\u2019t want to be the generation who [are always told] what\u2019s wrong and how to live with it,\u201d says Toon2Tango\u2019s Stoef. Instead, TV shows should encourage young viewers to be the change they wish to see, making them feel powerful and inspired to do something to help. Mondo\u2019s Perrero echoes this sentiment, saying all of the company\u2019s eco-themed shows make kids \u201cfeel part of something worthwhile.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all live on this big blue marble, and it\u2019s our responsibility to make sure it remains big and blue,\u201d adds Boat Rocker\u2019s Higgins. \u201cI mean what\u2019s the worst that can happen, we live in a cleaner community?\u201d<\/p>\n

The interviews in this report were conducted prior to the COVID-19 global pandemic. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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