Preschool Show - TV Tropes

Clockwise from top-left: Justin Time (2011), Under the Umbrella Tree, Wonder Pets!, Dinosaur Train

"How the heck do you do a show for two year olds?"

— Baloney, The Mr. Potato Head Show, "Royal Pain"

With the rise of televised cartoons, so came the rise of cartoons aimed specifically at the youngest audience: toddlers and infants.

The genre of preschool-aimed cartoons really kicked off in The '90s. Notable titles from that decade, both animated and live-action, include Barney & Friends (1992), Bananas in Pyjamas (1992), Madeline (1993), Jay Jay the Jet Plane (1994), Blue's Clues (1996), Caillou (1997), Teletubbies (1997) and The Wiggles (1998). As a result many networks have blocks dedicated to preschool cartoons, such as PBS Kids, Nickelodeon's Nick Jr., Disney Channel's Disney Junior (formerly Playhouse Disney), and Cartoon Network's short-lived Tickle-U block or the current Cartoonito block. Several of these blocks have even spun off into their own channels dedicated exclusively to preschoolers and their parents.

Preschool aimed live-action shows date back several decades, but the codifier was Sesame Street in 1969. Many feature either puppets or people in costumes.

Most cartoons of this sort (starting in the Mid-2000s) are either Flash animated or All CGI Cartoons. They are usually Edutainment Shows, either teaching things like letters and numbers, or being of the general type of edutainment that teaches kids about life skills, though some more slapstick cartoons exist as well.

There's an overlap between this genre and the "young child/elementary" show (like Fraggle Rock, Between the Lions, Reading Rainbow, Arthur, Pee-wee's Playhouse, The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss (before its Retool), Cyberchase, WordGirl, Martha Speaks, Odd Squad, or the My Little Pony franchise), but preschool shows tend to feature slightly younger characters and more preschool-oriented themes. Most preschool shows have a target demographic of age 2-6 while "elementary" shows have a target demographic of ages 6-8. A work can be in both demographics by being a general "early childhood" cartoon.

The genre has been critiqued for being bad for children's psychological and physical health, but it's also received praise for its educational and moral merits. These kinds of shows also tend to attract the Periphery Hatedom the most for many of the tropes commonly associated with them. For this reason, these series are often nicknamed "baby shows".

Not surprisingly, most, if not all of these shows fall into the category of Sweet Dreams Fuel.

Compare to Kodomomuke for Japanese anime which are oftentimes preschool-aimed and Picture Books for the literature equivalent. See also Children's Show Tropes.