Theories on Blue’s Clues

This paper will cover the episode of Blue’s Clues, “Color’s everywhere”. The host for Blue’s Clues is Joe; he presents the audience with puzzles. They also included Blue, the animated dog; he help’s the audience to solve the puzzle. Blue leaves behind a series of clues, which are objects marked with one of her blue paw prints. The camera moves left-to-right like reading a story book. In between the discovery of the clues, Joe plays a series of mini-puzzles games with the audiences that are related to the overall puzzle. As the program unfolds, Joe and Blue move from one animated set to another, jumping through magical doorways, leading viewers on a journey of discovery. At the end of the story, Joe returns to the living room, where he sits down in a comfortable chair to think, in Blue’s Clues, this known as the “Thinking Chair”. Joe thinks over Blue’s three clues and attempts to come up with his answer having the audience participate to help him figure it out. In this program the audience needs to help figure out what other pal Blue wants to put in her portrait that she has been painting. In Blue’s Clue children’s stories are being told through pictures and they present the information from multiple perspectives in real world contexts.

They use places and objects that children are familiar with during the program, by keeping it simple and age-appropriate. Blue’s Clues also uses active participation instead of passive viewing, this keeps the children intellectually and behaviorally active during the show. The creators of Blues clues use their knowledge of cognitive thinking and development to create a program that would entertain and teach children. This show is catered toward children ages 3 to 7. Blue’s Clue enables children to use critical thinking for problem solving, but at the same time keeping it fun and enjoyable. Blues Clues also uses the narrative format to effectively help children’s minds develop. The program Blue’s Clues teach cognitive thinking through, numbers and letters. The things Children learn from “Blue’s Clue’s” are an excellent example of the many aspects that will help them in their school years and other events in life to come. Blue’s Clue’s uses games, songs, dancing and multiple other learning techniques to teach and entertain the children.

Some of the items the children will be introduced to are rhyming, repetitive speech and identification of words and objects. These aspects of teaching will encourage children to learn new and exciting ways to express their inner selves, and also challenge children to think and move beyond simple “yes” and “no” questions. The episode of Blues Clues “colors everywhere” is a program created for children in Piaget’s preoperational stage. Children during this stage begin to connect the world with words, images and symbols. In this show the host uses drawings to remember clues and at the end the drawings are combined in order to use mental reasoning and problem solving. The mini games try to use the same idea of mental reasoning and problem solving. In the beginning the host keeps changing his shirt to a different colored one and pretending it was a magic trick.

This uses “pretend play” to teach young children about colors. The show also uses the idea of cognitive changes in development and also uses audience interaction, this show also allows children to play along and use their minds. As the host on the show faces new challenges, so does the audience. A child’s contribution to interaction with the host is rewarded with enthusiasm and positive feedback from the show’s characters. Blue’s Clues also uses the information processing theory. They try to motivate children by activities and their interest in books, which they do throughout the program. Children also observe aspects such as bright colors and movement, which are present throughout the program. When Joe asks the audience questions and the observation for the clues, children can organize what they are observing in the program such as what colors go together to make the color orange. Using this process the children are able to contain more and more information that they have observed and use it to figure out the clues. Kids using this process are able to connect the objects in there own environment to go with the colors they are learning in the program.

As the program comes to a close, the host Joe goes over to the thinking chair to figure out what the clues were from the handy dandy note book and to see who Blue wanted to add to the portrait of her pals. Then Joe shows them the audience the three clues the colors Blue and yellow and a white puppy, from the handy dandy note book. And if they mix the two colors together it will make the color green. With these clues combined together it will make a green puppy. So Blue wanted to paint her green puppy pal to her portrait. Then Blue and Joe move through the magical doors to where “Blue “had her portrait started and painted the portrait of the green puppy to complete it. Then Joe asks the audience what colors do they see as he pauses, which he does throughout the program to let them answer the question. There were all the colors of the characters and objects that were in the program.

Joe, the host of Blues Clues, was the main character that related to children. His thought processes consisted of private talk, which allowed him to sort his thoughts out loud. By doing this, the audience is able to sort out their own thoughts in problem solving. He used critical thinking to put small clues together to figure out the big puzzle. By writing down clues and analyzing them, the host was able to reason and solve the problem.

The theories that I chose were the preoperational stage and the information processing stage. Both theories are effective in teaching and in order to reach there educational goals. Blue’s Clues is an excellent program for children, making it clear what they are asking from children and the program focuses on one topic clearly for the children to learn. By Blue’s Clue taking this approach they make it fun and easy for their audience to follow along and this important to do with the age group that they are appealing to. I would recommend Blue’s Clues as a learning program for children to watch.