Julia makes a connection

Knowing that my two granddaughters are huge Barney fans, I brought a gift home for them the other day. It was a colorful poster of the purple dinosaur that had been sent out as a promotion by PBS, his television home.

Okay, so the poster was free and made for a very cheap gift, but they didn't know that.

When Meaghan, who is 4, and Julia, 1, visit my house, they often drag from the toy closet a large play kitchen, which comes complete with sink, stove and phone. To make it even more realistic, they have festooned it with photos, just like Mom and Grandma do with their refrigerators. Except that Mom and Grandma don't have pictures of the Teletubbies on their Amanas.

I thought the Barney poster would make a great addition to their kitchen. Sure enough, right after I un-tubed it, Meaghan insisted that I get the Scotch tape and hang it up.

Light bulb

As Barney pranced and danced on television, Julia's brain made a connection. She stood up, walked to the TV and pointed at the dino. She grunted in Julianese and stepped over to the kitchen, where she pointed again. Indicating the poster, she grunted. Then she went back to the TV and repeated the process.

Her grunt could be roughly translated as: "Pardon me, but the children's character now being broadcast on television is the same antic figure posed on this poster you gave us."

A link

I nodded at her. "That's right," I said. "That's Barney."

She stepped back and forth, from TV to kitchen, gesticulating that she understood the connection between the video image and the still photograph.

In other words, at the age of 15 months, Julia was having her first experience with the world of multi-media cross-endorsement. Next up, I assume, is the connection between those two images and stuffed Barneys and other Barney merchandise.

Media savvy

Maybe I shouldn't. Maybe it's all part of the wonderful world of growing up today. This early familiarity with the media might help children deal more intelligently with television and computers when they grow older. They will be wiser than their parents and grandparents about communications because it will not be something new. It will have been as common a part of their lives as play kitchens and Scotch tape.

Still, I can't help but wish that Julia's first connection of this sort had involved a real person rather than a TV dinosaur and a poster. For example, she could have pointed to a picture of me, grunted and then pointed at me.

After all, Barney and I are roughly the same size. I am not purple, however, something which I hope Julia notices.

(06-24-99) [[In-content Ad]]