Children's television series (or children's television shows) are television programs designed specifically for children. They are typically characterised by easy-going content devoid of sensitive or adult-facing themes and are normally scheduled for broadcast during the morning and afternoon when children are awake, immediately before and after school schedules generally start country-by-country. Educational themes are also prevalent, as well as the transmission of cautionary tales and narratives which teach problem-solving methods in some fashion or another, such as social disputes.
The purpose of these shows, outside of profit, is mainly to entertain or educate. Complicating matters somewhat is that not all children's programs are equal: some are aimed at infants and toddlers, some are aimed at those aged 6 to 11 years old, and then there is broadcast content for adolescents and those aimed at all children.
The dominance of YouTube in the 21st century has also seen the platform become a crucial platform for children's content, with some channels aimed at preteen viewers being among the most followed channels globally. The quality of some children's programs on YouTube, particularly those aimed at younger children, has before led to widespread controversy, culminating in the late 2010s as what became known as Elsagate.
History
Children's television is nearly as old as television itself. In the UK, the BBC's Children's Hour was first broadcast in 1946, and is in anglocentric circles generally credited with being the first TV programme specifically for children.
Some authors posit television for children tended to originate from similar programs on radio. Running with the UK example, the BBC's Children's Hour was launched as a radio broadcast in 1922, with BBC School Radio commencing live broadcasts in 1924.
In the early 1930s US media landscape, radio adventure serials such as Little Orphan Annie began to emerge and became a staple of children's afternoon radio listening.
Evolution of style in the US and beyond
Early children's shows included Kukla, Fran and Ollie (1947), Howdy Doody, and Captain Kangaroo. Another show, Ding Dong School, aired from 1952 to 1965. Its creator and host, Frances Horwich, would sit in front of the camera and simulate small talk with the viewing audience at home, demonstrating basic skills for the camera.
This practice lives on in contemporary children's broadcasting as a genre in of itself, with Australia's ongoing program Play School one example.
At one time, a program called Winky Dink and You took a more interactive approach, prompting its viewers to affix a clear vinyl sheet to their television and draw pictures to match what was going on on-screen. This format did not persist, nor was it replicated, due to a number of factors unrelated to its popularity: children whose parents did not buy them the vinyl sheet would draw with crayons directly on the television screen itself, potentially causing expensive damage; there were also concerns that having children within arm's length of a television screen of the era could expose them to harmful radiation.
Later and more recognisably modern shows for young children include Sesame Street, The Electric Company and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. In the 1990s, more children's television series such as Barney & Friends, Blue's Clues, SpongeBob SquarePants, Bear in the Big Blue House, and The Big Comfy Couch were created.
A voluminous range of children's television programming now exists in the 2020s.
Notable successes outside the US include shows like Play School, Noggin the Nog, Thunderbirds, Mr. Men and Thomas & Friends originating from the UK, Le Manege Enchantè from France, The Singing Ringing Tree from Germany, and Marine Boy from Japan.
Canadian studio Nelvana is a particularly prolific producer of children's programming. Much of Nelvana's product is broadcast worldwide, especially in the US, where the similarities in dialect do not require any dubbing or localization.
Role of advertising
In the United States, early children's television was often co-opted as a platform to market products and it rarely contained any educational elements (for instance, The Magic Clown, a popular early children's program, was primarily an advertisement for Bonomo's Turkish taffy.) In the early years of television, advertising to children posed a dilemma as most children have no disposable income of their own. As such, children's television was not a particularly high priority for the networks.