Abstract:

The rapid development of technological tools such as television, computer, mobile phone and internet significantly affects all aspects of society.Television and cartoons are nowadays common to a child’s education process in the family. Cartoons’ carefully prepared contents contribute significantly to the development of the child’s social life, behavior and cognition. While kids are watching cartoons, they start learning much of the behavior and information unaware. The child who can’t fully grasp the world of cartoons’ heroes, whether it is real or fictive, may exhibit different behavior because the events influenced him in the course of time. Therefore, for the selection of children’s programs especially cartoons, the families must be very careful and they even need to watch them occasionally with children. Nowadays, Caillou and Pepee that children match with great love appear as educational comic productions on which families can spend time with their children in front of the telescreen. In the Caillou, a Canadian production, Caillou has been treated as a 4 year old child, and his relationship with people in daily life has been used. Pepee, a Turkish cartoon, has been prepared to adress children at the age of 4 and 5, and aims at both teaching Turkish culture to children and entertaining them. When choosing cartoons for children, their age as well as the content of cartoons should be considered. Spending a lot of time in front of telescreen, by leaving the child inactive, can negatively influence his psychology and physical development. Therefore, there must be a time for pre-school children to watch a cartoon; in this way, children will be able to acquire habits. Otherwise, the children’s habits of watching cartoons will cause major problems in their future educational life.

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