Ask the Scholar

{
    "localId": "158698564",
    "label": "Early Childhood Development #1: Early Childhood Development [3]",
    "core": "doc",
    "dtoType": "document",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/158698564"
}

{
    "id": "158698564",
    "sourceUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/158698564",
    "contentType": "document",
    "title": "Early Childhood Development #1: Early Childhood Development [3]",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/158698564",
    "collections": [
        "Records of the First Lady's Office (Clinton Administration)",
        "Melanne Verveer's Subject Files"
    ],
    "iiifBase": "https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/clinton/2068127/42-t-2068127-20060198F-Seg4-017-001-2014-001.jpg",
    "thumbnailUrl": "https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/clinton/2068127/42-t-2068127-20060198F-Seg4-017-001-2014-001.jpg",
    "largeImageUrl": "https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/clinton/2068127/42-t-2068127-20060198F-Seg4-017-001-2014-001.jpg",
    "imageCount": 159,
    "hasImages": true,
    "source": "import",
    "hasTranscription": false
}

{
    "url": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/158698564",
    "naId": 158698564,
    "levelOfDescription": "fileUnit",
    "otherTitles": [
        "42-t-2068127-20060198F-Seg4-017-001-2014"
    ],
    "recordType": "description",
    "ocrSource": "nara-archive"
}

{
    "seq": 85,
    "pageIndex": 0,
    "type": "photo",
    "url": "https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/clinton/2068127/42-t-2068127-20060198F-Seg4-017-001-2014-085.jpg",
    "mediaId": "03457ec181b592ce",
    "ocrText": "Page 19\nFederal News Service, MARCH 1, 1996\nMR. : I think that's a really key point because more and more of the studies\nare showing in that middle school period of time, where we go into the\nprepubescent period and early adolescence, that is probably the most critical\ntime in a child's life, and it is also, I think all of us as parents know, is\nprobably the most difficult time that we have raising our children. We not\nonly dumber than dirt\n(laughter), but they seem to have gone into a meltdown\nand just kind of tuned us out for a while. And that's where the influence of\nthe television, and it really does seem to be -- that's there the mindset is,\nthat they sort of vegetate there for a couple of years. And it's at that\ncritical point where we're shaping those values that they're going to carry with\nthem. And this goes back into what we were talking about earlier in the crime\nstatistics.\nDR. PHILLIP: You know, it's really interesting, because well, I think\nit's\ntrue with parents we always think about the most critical time as being what\nwe're trying to deal with at the moment, and if you've got adolescents in the\nhouse, that's pretty preoccupying. But I vacillate back and forth with my sons\nand daughters because of the gap. And really, if you look critically at the\nresearch, you begin to recognize that it's all important.\nWhile the value constructs that you talk about, I think, are extraordinarily\ncritical because that's the time when normally, in fact, long before there was\ntelevision, we were struggling at that age to try and figure out what's right,\nwhat's wrong, how we should behave, but, you know, between the ages of one and\nsix, there's a lot that's going on that we tend to forget about. If you put\nchildren in a room with a monitor and you feed violent and aggressive images\ninto that room through the monitor, and leave some toys on the floor and then\nshut the monitor off, guess what happens? Within minutes, those behaviors will\nbe reenacted.\nSo that we've got to recognize that it's all important. And I think the most\npositive thing, as has been said by many of the young folks in this room and\ntheir parents, is that the technology is marzelous. When I was a kid growing up\nin New York there were three television stations, and programming was so\nsophisticated that the Million Dollar Movie ran the same movie four times a day,\nseven days a week. (Laughter.) Things have changed, and they've changed in such\na way that you simply don't know what's on and you don't have a handle of what\nthe information is that's available -- good and bad.\nThis small piece of technology really helps us create a reasonable environment\nfor the broad range of children that may be in your home and in your community\nand in our nation. I predict -- and I hope I'm right with this prediction --\nthat this is the first in a series of technologies that will be helpful. This\none happens to be viewed negatively because it's been cast as an instrument that\nwill block-out signals. But I suspect that there's going to be technology\nthat's going to help us facilitate identifying things that are of value. I\nthink we're going to see (frame ?) shifts in the industry.\nBut most importantly, we have to make sure that this technology does not force\nparents to reach over to that television set and turn it off. Because if we\nturn off the television set, we are really denying our children probably one of\nthe greatest inventions of this century that has really, I think, served an\nenormously useful purpose in providing strong and important influences.\nPRESIDENT CLINTON: I'm so glad to hear you say that as well. But that -- I don't\nknow how much time we have left. But I think we ought to hear from the young\npeople especially on the flip side of this. Because we believe it's important\n-- we applaud the industry for developing the rating system and making it\ncompatible with the V- chip."
}