I tucked Genevieve and Reesa into bed, and sat down in a corner of the room to do some laptop reading. Staying in the room for a short time can help them settle down more quickly. After a couple of minutes of silence, Genevieve started talking softly. Before I could ask her to quiet herself, I heard the content of what she was saying and decided to not interrupt.
"A cleaner world gives us a healthy environment.
"A healthy environment makes a world for healthy people.
"A cleaner healthier world for children to grow up in."
Wow. Such heartwarming, eco-sentiments from my five-year old. My green heart swelled with pride. Our household examples were being absorbed by our child! The world would indeed be a better place! My daughter is so perceptive, so articulate -- she's ready to be president someday!
And then, she added the kicker:
"Clorox--bringing you a cleaner world."
@!#!!!!...sizzle%$%..fry?@#*!%..pop! Thump! (last sound was my jaw striking the floor)
"What did you say?" I whispered.
She recapped for me. "When the world is a cleaner place, and the outside is clean, then we can all be healthy."
"Yeah, yeah, not that. Um, where did you hear that?"
She paused. In retrospect, her recitation sounded like a data dump, and it felt like she was trying to find the file and retrieve the information.
"It was on PBS Kids, at the end of the program."
More evidence that public broadcasting has both sponsorships and commercials. When a kid absorbs it like a commercial, it's a commercial. Kinda funny that PBS has some webpages on being media smart--they should have a page on being smart about their own commercials. These are skills that we will have to concentrate on teaching our children, and it looks like we'll need to get it in high gear starting now.
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