Yakka Dee
Season 1, Episode 9: "Peas" (5 minutes)
UK: Beakus
CBeebies, Thursday 23 November, 14:20
Here's one that I've never heard of before.
Yakka Dee seems to be targeted at children with delayed speech, and possibly also towards toddlers who are starting to learn to speak. I can't find any written material about the series, but I noted that the credits mentioned a "speech and language adviser," so I assume that it has a basis in speech therapy practice.
The series presents a combination of simple 2D animation with live-action footage. The main character is a girl named Dee, who explains that she is known as "Yakka Dee" because she likes to talk a lot.
Format
The episode has no story at all, and I imagine that this is done on purpose, to avoid confusing children who do not have much language or have cognitive disabilities.
We see Dee interacting with a disabled child, trying to encourage her to say the word "peas". At first she does not respond at all, so Dee tries to encourage her by showing a series of very short clips putting the word "peas" into different contexts. For example, live action footage of peas on a plant, with the words "growing peas"; or a boy blowing on a spoonful of hot peas, with the words "blowing peas". The word "peas" is spoken many times by a variety of different children, so that the viewer can hear the word in a variety of voices, and Dee directly addresses the viewer several times, saying "you say 'peas'!"
We then return to the disabled child. Dee asks her again to say the word "peas," with the encouraging words "I know you can!" This time the girl responds in sign langugage (I think maybe it's Makaton which we have seen before in Tiny Tumble). The series of short clips plays once again, and finally the girl says the word "peas". "Yay, you did it!" Dee congratulates her.
There's not a huge amount to say about this programme, because it's so very simple. But I think it's clear that it is very carefully constructed, using a strong theoretical background to produce a very specific result. As I noted in my review of Tiny Tumble, it's very important that there is programming aimed at children with special educational needs, so that they are not left behind.
I do wonder why animation is used, as it doesn't seem to serve any particular purpose. The only thing I can think of, is so that the educational content can appear to come from the mouth of a child rather than an adult...maybe this makes the content more palatable to the viewers?
It was notable that the episode presented a lot of diversity. Not only is the main animated character black, but we see a variety of different children: 11 girls and 7 boys; 8 white, 5 black, and 4 Asian; 1 with special educational needs and 1 physically disabled.
All in all, although the episode had little entertainment value, and to an adult viewer mildly infuriating due to all of the repetition, it is highly educational and serves an important purpose.
Available to watch online until 23 December 2017
Comments
Post a Comment