Dr. Donna's Review

About the Film

This month’s Kidtoon feature is comprised of all new stories and interstitials featuring some favorite Kidtoon characters from “Little Robots,” “Care Bears” and “My Little Pony.” Four stories from the world of the Little Robots, include “Scary, Scary,” “Noisy’s New Song,” “A Bit of Give and Take,” and “Reach for the Sky.” In each of the four stories, the featured Little Robot characters, Tiny, Scary, Spotty, Noisy, Sporty, Stretchy, and Sparky One and Two, learn and teach each other lessons about living, learning and helping one another. In the “My Little Pony” presentation, the ponies of Ponyville receive a postcard from Rainbow Dash who reports on her exciting visit to Unicornia. The visit is brought to life as Pinky Pie reads the news to the assembled ponies. The world of the Care Bears is brought to us through a music video presentation entitled “We are the Care Bears of Care-a-lot.”

Interspersed with the presentations about favorite characters are animated, educational shorts that use the idea of the world as a “small village” to explain concepts of economics and food and wealth distribution.

About the Kids
This film’s primary appeal is to younger children, 3 to 6. Because of the variety of presentations, both boys and girls will find something to enjoy in Kidtoon Comics. The featured stories are unique from one another and developed with an intrinsic appeal to younger children. The themes are age appropriate and there are many lessons, both cognitive and social-emotional, embedded in the story content.

Film content and features
“Kidtoon Comics” features well-produced segments about a delightful group of well-known characters. While Kidtoon kids know the characters from other Kidtoon presentations, these selections are all fresh and new. The animation styles are different from one another but work well together in this variety format. The songs that convey the educational messages are clever and memorable.

Things to talk about
There are many opportunities for follow-up conversations with young children. Here are some suggestions:

• Use the presentation as an opportunity to help children develop recall skills. Ask them to recall the variety and order of the different segments of “Kidtoon Comics.” Ask them to review their favorite story from the line-up and explain why it is a favorite.
• Each of the “Little Robot” stories conveys a simple, important lesson. Help children recall and articulate the lessons. For example: In “Scary, Scary” Scary thinks he wants to scare his friends but when he does become scary because he looks strange, his friends run away from him and he doesn’t like that after all. In “Noisy’s New Song,” Noisy learns that his friends like his music better when he plays and sings a softer, more soothing song. In “A Bit of Give and Take,” the robots learn to appreciate Tiny and all the things that he does for others. In “Reach for the Sky,” Stretchy tries to fly but his experiments fail until Tiny and Stretchy apply what they’ve learned about magnetism to help him accomplish his goal.
• Talk with children about how excited the ponies were to receive a postcard from Rainbow Dash. Help them to write and mail a postcard or letter to someone.
• Ask children to recall the meaning of the “small village” shorts. Help them to understand the ideas about how money, food and other resources are distributed among people of different means.