My kids love watching Scooby Doo. They’ve watched all the seasons of the What’s New Scooby-Doo? series as well as dozens of episodes of the original Scooby-Doo series, too. My son watches mostly for the monsters, and my daughter for the mystery.
I’m sure that anyone just casually watching my kids viewing a Scooby Doo episode wouldn’t think any learning was going on. It’s more difficult to see the value in watching shows like Animal Atlas or Magic Schoolbus than Scooby Doo because it doesn’t seem very “educational.” But as I’ve watched episodes with my kids and seen them play Scooby-Doo on their own, I’m amazed at the things they have learned from a show that’s often thought of as fluff.
If the majority of their time was just spent watching Scooby Doo instead of getting out in nature, cuddling together and reading, pretend playing, drawing, and other activities, then I believe they would be missing out on a lot of important and wonderful experiences, but I don’t ever want to devalue what things they do learn from their favorite TV shows or DVDs.
Out of curiosity, I wanted to see if I could come up with a list of 25 things the kids have learned while watching Scooby-Doo that were “educational.”
Here are some of the things they have learned…
1. How New Years Day is celebrated in Hong Kong.
2. The importance of dragons in Chinese culture.
3. That some race cars can exceed speeds of 220 miles per hour.
4. What a crash test dummy is and how it’s used to improve car safety.
5. Most of America’s gold is stored at Fort Knox.
6. Military terms like: mess hall, drill sergeant, barracks, & stockades
7. There are prehistoric creatures living on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia
8. There are international sand sculpting competitions.
9. Ancient Indian writing is called Sanskrit.
10. Coral can grow as big as an island.
11. There are endangered animals in Africa.
12. Hatari means danger is Swahili.
13. Herbivores eat plants.
14. An infrared light on a camera allows you to see animals at night.
15. People think its good luck to throw coins into the Trevi Fountain in Rome.
16. Pompeii was destroyed in the 1st century A.D.
17. The difference between dormant vs. active volcanoes.
18. Trained stuntmen perform most of the stunts in movies.
19. A chupacabra is a legendary monster that looks like a small bear with spines on its back and has allegedly been spotted in Mexico.
20. There weren’t electric lights out west (in the United States) until 1902.
21. Astronauts eat food that has been dehydrated.
22. Chimpanzees have flown into outer space.
23. Many people are buried above ground in New Orleans because the ground is swampy.
24. Mardi Gras is an annual festival in New Orleans where people dress up in costumes.
25. A mirage is when the suns’ rays make it look as if something is there that really isn’t.
Watching Scooby-Doo has lead us to explore Greece, Pompeii, Sumo Wrestling & Japanese culture, among many other things. The more you’re open to looking for the learning that takes place in everything you do, the more connections you’ll make. And the more connections you make between things, the wider your perspective will be on life, learning and what it means to be truly educated.
*We’ve had some illness in the family this past week, so I was unable to get the next travel post up today. I”ll return to my travel series next Wednesday.
What things have you or your family learned while watching a favorite TV show?
Photo Credit: Rob Gallop
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