Abstract
As an educational psychologist working within a school and therapeutic context, I became
aware of the need to utilise children’s existing frame of reference and lived experiences to
support barriers to learning and development. In my interaction with children I realised that
television programmes and characters constitute a major part of their development and
social context. The aim of this research was to explore the grade one learner’s experience
of television programmes and characters and to provide guidelines to educators and
educational psychologists on the utilization of these programmes and characters to address
children’s diverse learning and developmental needs and provide relevant classroom and
therapeutic practice.
In this study I worked from an interpretive and constructivist research paradigm with a
qualitative methodological paradigm, which aimed to provide a comprehensive description
of the grade one learner’s experience of television programmes and characters. A basic
interpretivistic qualitative research design was selected. The theoretical base underpinning
this study was Bronfenbrenner’s bio-ecological theory of human development and in
addition to this, a whole school approach, developmental psychology, learning theory and
impact therapy was used.
The participants in this study included twenty grade one learners from an Afrikaans Private
School in the West Rand. Multiple methods of data collection were used and included
observations, lesson presentations, focus group interviews and making and discussing a
scrapbook. Three themes were established after data collection and analysis and were
discussed as the findings of the study. A constant comparative method guided data
analysis.
The findings of the study were strongly guided by the children’s identification with television
characters that represented strength, authority and control, as well as beauty and humour.
These findings provided guidelines to educators and educational psychologists on how they
can utilise television programmes and characters as a medium to improve their classroom
practice and therapeutic interventions.
Fritz, Elzette, Dr.