ABSTRACT
Technological change has brought ever more use of television, video-film, DVDs, computers and the internet in the home, school and work place. One result of all this is that young children enjoy and use texts that are less linear and more visual than print. This chapter (on children’s experience of television and video-film) and the next chapter (on children’s use of computers and websites) look at how children can be involved actively and creatively with these new texts and new ways of making meaning. The analysis in this chapter begins with a look at the issues around watching television at home and school and moves on to a short case study in which young children are helped to understand how television commercials work. The account then considers the uses of video film and there is another short case study, this time with a teacher and children looking at a video-film on seaside holidays in Victorian times as part of a larger topic on travel. A main argument threading through the analysis is that sensitive adult mediation greatly extends children’s response.
