Reading Rainbow was an American TV show that encouraged children to read. It started running on PBS Kids on June 6, 1983 and continued running until November 10, 2006, which made it the fourth-longest running children’s TV show on the station. However, even once Reading Rainbow was cancelled, reruns continued to run until August 28, 2009, while an iPad app was released on June 20, 2012 before being made available on the Internet, other mobile devices, and other Internet-capable devices through a successful Kickstarter campaign in May of 2014. Summed up, Reading Rainbow can be said to have had enormous influence over TV viewers, so much so that it merits recognition.
Here are some of the reasons that Reading Rainbow was so essential to TV:
Showed That TV Could Be Used to Educate
In the 1980s, children were spending more and more of their time in front of the TV screen, which caused some people to ask whether TV was ruining an entire generation of children before their eyes. LeVar Burton, the executive producer of Reading Rainbow recognized the effect that TV could have on its viewers, which convinced him that a TV show could be used to convince children to start reading again instead of spending all of their time in front of the TV screen. As a result, while Reading Rainbow was not the sole TV show to do so, it can nonetheless claim a sizable share of the credit for showing that the TV can be used to educate as well as to entertain.
Convinced People to Become Readers
Reading is one of the most critical skills that people can have. In part, this is because our society is founded on the basis that people are literate, meaning that people who either cannot read or struggle with reading are at a huge disadvantage compared to their fully literate counterparts. For proof, look no further than the text on signs, meaning that people who have problems reading will not be able to draw all of the information that they are expected to be able to do so from them. However, it is also important to note that reading can expose readers to a wider range of possibilities out there than otherwise possible, thus enabling them to realize that much more of their potential.
Taught Good Habits in Viewers
Unsurprisingly, parents can have a great deal of influence over their children. For example, parents who read more tend to have children who read more. Many of the children who developed a fondness of reading by watching Reading Rainbow are now adults in their own right, as shown by how millennials contributed the lion’s share of funding to the Reading Rainbow Kickstarter campaign. As a result, it is no exaggeration to say that Reading Rainbow has had a positive impact on more than one generation of Americans by teaching good habits to its viewers, who are much likelier to pass them onto their own children than those without said fondness for reading.
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