Research project:"Cartoons in children’s life"

Research project

Cartoons in children’s life.

                                                     

Novak Irina, form 9 ”b”

Science research supervisor: Popova O.L

Orekhovo-Zuevo

2015

 Contents

Introduction……………………………………………………………………3

I  THE MAIN PART

1. First a bit of history…………………………………………………………5

2.  Comparison of cartoons of home and foreign production………………….7

II   RESEARCH……………………………………………………………...11

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………..16

Bibliography………………………. ………………………………………….17

Introduction

 Childhood is the most wonderful period of human’s life. If you ask what are the most fascinating memories connected with it, the answer is cartoons of course!  Generations grow up watching them.

Once we asked our parents, if they enjoyed watching cartoons in their early age.  No wonder the answer was positive. It wasn’t an ordinary event for them, the children of the1970’s. “Mummy! A cartoon, please!” cried children.

 The grownups had to put aside their work and sit down to watch a wonderful fairy tale in the company of their children. Our parents act the same way.

 They sailed together the sparkling waves of those marry and sad, educating and miraculous, mysterious and funny stories.

 Now we their children watch them. These cartoons are of both soviet and foreign production. But somehow greater and greater number of parents feel doubt if it is safe for their children or whether they benefit from foreign cartoon production. Where does this oppressive feeling of annoyance come from? Why do they suspect that something wrong and irretrievable is going on? In our work we will make an attempt to find out how cartoons affect children’s psychology.

The aim of the work: on the basic of reading some literature and making practical work investigate how modern cartoons of home and foreign production effect the children’s mind and what kind of cartoons little ones can benefit from.

The tasks of investigation:

1) to find in special literature how the genre of animation appeared;

2)  to find out what dangers are hidden in the make-believe world of animation;

3) to make a survey of preferable cartoons and their characters among the pupils of 1-5 forms.

4) to investigate how western cartoons effect the level of agitation and aggression of younger pupils;

5)  to analyze the results of investigations and make conclusions;

6) to make instructions “The most beneficial way of watching cartoons”.

The subject of investigation – cartoons of home and foreign production.

Hypothesis of the work: cartoons of Russian and foreign production based on ideas of love and kindness will be of benefit to harmonious development of a child, while those based on violence develop agitation, terror, lack of confidence, make it difficult to contact with other children and grownups.

While working, we used the following methods:

1.     studying literature;

2.     watching and discussing cartoons;

3.     making questionnaires for  pupils of 3-5 forms and their parents;

4.     analysis of results;

5.     making instructions.

We think the topic to be actual because nowadays there is a great variety of cartoons.  We constantly watch them. Many children prefer watching TV or video to playing games.

First a bit of history.

Animation films are older than natural film production.

Time origin should be started from the moment of

invention of apparatus that could “animate” drawings. On 20^th July 1877, a talented inventor, a self-educated engineer Emile Raynaud delivered a report on the results of his work in the academy in France and demonstrated an apparatus called praxinoscope, that he had constructed.  It looked like a mechanic toy with a tape covered with drawings and a rotating mirror cylinder.  Later on Emile Raynaud improved his apparatus. Nowadays there are other animation techniques, such as puppet animation, silhouette and collage animation, computer animation. First animation film studios were organized by Barr and Bray. Cartoon characters were borrowed from newspaper comic strips or made up at the studios. The most popular animation film character was the cat called Felix, made up by P. Salliwan in 1917 and improved by O. Mesmer in 1920s. To report dialogues they used “bubbles”, as in comic strips, or subtitles as in films. A young animator from Los Angeles Walt Disney filmed his first cartoon “Steamer Willy” with synchronized sound in 1928. It was the first cartoon about Mickey Mouse.

Vladislav Starevich, the founder of three-dimensional animation in Russia, started his work at Hanzhonkov’s firm on 3-D cartoon “Development of Tadpole” making frame-by-frame filming of living tadpoles in the water. So 1911 can be admitted as the year of foundation of Russian animation.

 Animation is a derivative from the Latin word ‘anima’- the soul, that is why animation means ‘making alive’. In our film industry animation is mostly called multiplication, which means ‘making multiple (pictures)’.

Developing multiplication is a time-taking and laborious process. Producer defines the theme in general, script-writers work out the plot and screen script, which is divided into episodes and scenes illustrated with a string of sketches. But notwithstanding the fact that cartoons are created in many countries of the world it turns out that not all of them are recommended to watch. What can we watch on our TV screens? Why do some cartoons arouse a storm of happiness, a desire to imitate the favourite characters and form positive emotions but other cartoons do real harm and make children angry? There are two groups among cartoon creators. On the first hand, there are those who imitate grown up life in the cartoons, on the other hand, there are producers who create children’s world with its own mode of life Modern children tend to imitate adult life with its evil and aggression that is why they prefer the first kind of cartoons.

We asked in the video shop what kind of cartoons parents tend to buy for their children. We were answered that the majority of purchases are new foreign products. It is not so interesting for many children to watch Russian cartoons after foreign colourful action cartoons. All children chose cartoons according to the principle of brilliance and interest, to the trend in the class or kindergarten. Many Russian cartoons were based on the plot of Russian fairy-tales. Soviet cartoons were interesting and made viewers think. How are things getting on with foreign cartoons? Almost 50% of foreign cartoons are produced on the well-known old principle: the start – culmination – the upshot, the crime – the investigation – the punishment.  So the main plots of American cartoons are conflicts and crimes.

      The majority of modern cartoons have the following features:

1. Bright, actions occur very quickly.

2. An easy clear plot, repeated in all cartoons.

3. Significance of speech for understanding the cartoon is minimized.

4. The cartoon is voiced by interpreters with similar voices.

5. There is much aggression.

6. Music is monotonous.

The comparison of cartoons of home and foreign production

           Now let’s try to make an experiment. Watch one episode of a serial “Woody and his friends”, which lasts for 10 minutes and retell it. What result are you going to have?  Well, I think   1-2 sentences about hitting one another and knocking down somebody else and then Woody cried out his famous “Hi-hi-hi-hi-hi. Now, watch, for example, a cartoon “Oh and ah”, which also lasts for 10-15 minutes. Answer one question, please, “What does the story teach you?” Children sponge everything they can watch on TV. They can’t distinguish fabrication from reality. For them all characters are alive and real. Little ones will imitate them in their behavior, intonation and games. Abroad “Tom and Jerry” DVDs are marked 6+.You bet a child takes it as something natural  that one can skin a cat but it will stay alive and have fun or, a mouse can be hit on the head, blown up, poisoned but it will remain safe and sound and will continue plotting against miserable Tom.

Now let’s make a detailed comparison of cartoon characters and what cartoons of foreign and home production teach.

Let us survey some cartoons of home and foreign production.

 “T he Tiniest Gnome” is a cartoon about the tiniest gnome called Vasia, who as learning how to do good. In each episode he rescues the characters of some fairy-tales, for example, Little Red Riding Hood, seven little goats, three little piglets and so on. It forms wonderful image of a saver.

 “Magic Sack” The plot is quite recognizable. A well-brought-up bear Spiridon has got grandson Ivashka, who he is taking care of. Ivashka is very naughty and does only the sings that he likes doing. Animals complain about it, the grandfather feels worried an, at last, he decides to make a pedagogic experiment. “If you want to be naughty, then let it be as you like it, but first fill in this sake with stones.” Hurray! Long live tricks!

   "The biggest friend" It transfers us from native widths to mysterious Africa where an angry crocodile lives with an African girl and her friends - a puppy, a chicken, a hand bell and a hippopotamus. The hippopotamus applies to be the biggest friend. The animated film (which comes to a good end, of course), is very intelligible even for the smallest ones. At the end of the cartoon the girl explains to the hippopotamus: "Look! They are very small, but all of them are my great friends”. Well, there is nothing to do for the hippopotamus but only to shed flood of tears.  In this cartoon we find out who is the best friend. And, of course, it is clear for everyone we must help our friends.

          Look at the baby who is watching a kind cartoon film. You can see a squall of emotions on his face. Here he laughs with the main character, here frowns his brows, empathizing and being sorry, here - repeats words of a familiar song … Kind animated films have a huge educational value. They can teach the kid to make friends and sympathize, to help and stand up for the weak, to be generous, to love parents and grandparents, they will show how to overcome difficulties.

Watching this cartoon film a small viewer will be convinced that the evil will be punished while the good will always triumph.

Let's consider a typical American animated cartoon "Goofy and his friends".

Having watched several series of this infinite animated film we can isolate one often repeated plot: there is a certain person who is occupied with any very important business. As a rule, he is busy with something quite useful if not socially (the employee of any company which services population), but for himself personally (builds something, grows up, etc.). Also there is an idler who is extremely busy entertaining himself. Considering the plot we can see the conflict between the main character - Goofy and subjects. Being a hero Goofy naturally must win.

      As a result, it turns out that the slogger who disturbs a woodpecker in his entertainments is defeated while Goofy is shown as brave, extremely inventive hero, exposing his enemies as fools and losers.

          Let's take for an example another animated film "Ninja ". Schröder and all these cyborgs are a modern embodiment of the evil. It isn't typical for Russian children, there is a constant opposition to bad, the main characters constantly kill and it makes you doubt if they are good?  

             We can see the girl’s image is also cruel in American plots. Traditional qualities for female like shyness, unselfishness, modesty, and the most important motherhood are derided. Everyone saw an episode from “Shrek” (When the bird bursts out from troll’s singing). Children always laugh at this moment. In this way consciousness shift is reached. So we can see that our kid’s mentality is being changed. It isn’t only a scene of a “beautiful” murder; it is a good example of death. The main positive female character of our fairy tale can’t be like that, she can’t be cruel, can’t kill people, animals, birds any living thing. There are monsters and mutating people in all the American cartoons. The main characters shoot, burst, kill, fly by unclear for our brains planes, spaceships. We can hardly call these cartoons kind. 

What it leads to:

 1 .Animated cartoon’s brightness allows to attract kind’s attention easily. As a result the child shouldn't make any efforts to learn how to concentrate attention. Inability to concentrate attention develops, and at school the child can't sit the whole lesson and remember all the material.

2. Clear, simple plot doesn’t give opportunity for imagination and fantasy to appear. And after all, you know that animated cartoons are one of the ways to develop thinking, attention and memory.

3. Child’s speech develops intensively in the school period. Therefore it is very important to hear correct, beautiful native speech, to hear correct intonation and feelings given by speech. The lack of correct speech can lead to lag in its development.

4. Watching animated cartoons a child can observe behavior models, different actions, studies how to achieve his or her aims. Unfortunately, it is a way of aggression. According to numerous researches, children who mainly watch foreign animated cartoons have increase of cruelty and aggression.

Research

           Within our practical work we have questioned pupils of 3-5 forms in our

school No. 4.

The questionnaire for pupils:

Form ___________

1 . Do you watch animated films? (yes/no)

2 . When do you prefer watching animated cartoons? (In the morning, during the lunchtime, in the evening).

3 . What kind of animated films do you prefer?

(Russian or foreign)

4 . What is your favourite cartoon?

________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________

5 . Who is your favourite character?

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

The questionnaire results

1. Do you watch animated films? (yes/no)

2 . When do you prefer watching animated cartoons? (in the morning, during the lunchtime, in the evening).

3 . What kind of animated films do you prefer?

(Russian or foreign).

4. What is your favourite cartoon ?

5. Who is your favourite character?

        We have made our research in the form of a questionnaire. The research showed that all the children love animated films. The majority of parents don’t   want to limit their children’s choice of a cartoon to watch. The child has a right to choose. It is a very alarming sign. Children choose foreign animated films, preferring such animated films as «School of magicians", "Lillo and Stitch”, " The Simpsons", "Futuram" and etc. They watch cartoons more than 4 hours a week that is harmful for their eyes and health. Main characters that can kill or commit a murder make something cruel become their favourite characters. What if our children start imitating their behavior in everyday life? Unfortunately they can hardly name 10 Russian or Soviet cartoons. This is our history and culture. We consider parents should observe what their children watch.

       In this way, we offer the following recommendations for choosing cartoons:

Cartoons must:

1) Teach to love animals. Animals are often used as main characters in cartoons.

2) Teach how to make friends.

3) Help to study world around you.

4) Teach how to do our duties. Therefore characters must set a good example for children.

 5) Refuse watching animated series. Every cartoon must have a plot.

6) Watch cartoons no more than 2 hours a week.

7)  Retell the mother and the father the contents of an animated film.

8)  Read works stories on which animated films are based (for example, read “Dunne and his friends" by V. Nosov) then watch the animated film based on it.

Conclusion.

All children enjoy watching cartoons, but not everything we like is useful. If a child takes some damaging object and starts playing with it, parents take it away. But when children are watching cartoon not all parents pay attention to the fact, whether the plot is “damaging” or not. You can clearly see little respect, cynicism, cruelty that characters of some cartoons show to their relatives, parents, brothers and sisters. In many cartoons these qualities belong to the character that is meant to be positive. It is well known that positive characters should be imitated so these evil traces of character eat into children’s mentality

 So let us sum up. Recently psychologists have made investigations different cartoons’ impact on children’s mentality. It was found out that after The Soviet cartoons children relax, become friendlier their night sleep and appetite improve. After American computer animation children’s fears widen. They get naughty, start fighting and broking toys. However, nowadays you can hardly see Cheburashka and Winnie-the-Pooh on TV screens. On the contrary aggressive cartoons serials have filled the majority of programs. Of course, cartoons can’t be easily divided into bad or good. As our cultures are different Russian children should better watch home cartoon production.  In the experiment our hypothesis was proved. We have shown that not all cartoons influence children positively. That is why in our opinion it is preferable for our children to home made cartoons.

Bibliography.

1. «The planet of cartoons», the article «My child», Moscow, 2007

2. «About our Soviet cartoon», G.Borodin, 2005

3. Internet articles.

4. Psychologists’ articles:       1.T. Genina

                                            2.E.Yspenskiy.

5.TV Show  «Moscow week».