Granny Ranny's Coming Attractions

Wow! Wow! Wubbzy! Wubbzy, the animated preschool show on Nick Jr. stars a bright yellow square of a guy who loves to play and makes you laugh. He gets stuck in awkward predicaments that he gets out of thanks to the help of his pals, Widget and Walden.

Bob Boyle is the creator and executive producer of Wow! Wow! Wubbzy! for which he received the Individual Achievement in Animation award at the 2008 Emmys. Previously, he was a producer and art director for Nickelodeon’s hit show, The Fairly OddParents. Bob is also a fun loving Libra .

Wubbzy started when his niece said, “Hey Bobby! Will you draw a story for me?” She had come up with a crazy story about a little guy whose tail had been bitten off by a big long thing and was seeking help from his friends. You can see the original book online at the Wubbzy blog site: http://wubby.typepad.com/

What is cool is that she is 17 now and came to Los Angeles this last summer to intern for the show. What a great thing for both her and the show. As Bob says, “She has a lot of energy. Since I don’t have kids myself, it was great to have her around. Plus, she was working on a new show of her own while she was here.”
Bob went to college wanting to be an animator. The college he attended didn’t have an animation program so he studied illustration instead. After graduation, he moved to The Big Apple – NYC, where he worked with some major publications supplemented by working as a bellhop at the Marriot Marquee in Times Square. He often doodled on the guests’ claim checks – something that captured his colleagues attention who encouraged him to do more. Later, he moved to Hollywood, got a job at the Marriot there, then got a job at Film Roman where he worked on Bobby’s World and the Howie Mandel show. It was a great experience in that he learned everything there was to learn about animation production. Eventually that led to developing his own stuff. One weird thing happened after he got Wubbzy landed. He was in NYC meeting with the Nickelodeon folks. While standing in their offices, he looked out the window where he could see on the street below, the Marriot Marquee where he used to work. Later, he returned to give a motivational speech to the Nickelodeon employees.

I love this show! One of the things that is most refreshing about Wubbzy is its sense of humor which most other pre-school shows don’t even come close to. Bob talked about what it was like when he started designing a preschool show. It was something he had never done one before. He looked at other successful shows such as Dora and Blue and observed their educational content. “That idea terrified me. I didn’t know how to do that.” He had come from working on Fairly OddParents which is all about being funny all the time and thought it would be fun to translate that to a preschool show. It was an offbeat idea, and obviously it worked.

I asked Bob what would happen If Wubbzy ever appeared on David Letterman. “Hopefully he wouldn’t be there to do stupid pet tricks. Although, he could do that since he’s got the tail. He’d probably wonder what was in the cup on Dave’s desk or he’d stare at the gap in Dave’s teeth. He’d probably enjoy it because Dave is silly. He’d much rather be on Letterman than Leno. Letterman is kooky.”

I think that if Letterman had a Top 10 List of “Why It’s Fun to Be Wubbzy” it would look like this:

10. You don’t have to drive in LA traffic.

9. You can eat as much marshmallow lasagna as you want and not gain pounds.

8- Not having to wear pants

7- Being able to make funny cartoon sounds every time I fall on my head

6- Three words- Kickity Kickball! Ooops, I guess that’s just 2 words.

5- I get to pal around with Dora the Explorer on the weekends!

4- I get to work out my social awkwardness in front of millions of viewers. Hey wait! That’s not very fun!

3- Sure beats my last job in the fireworks factory.

2. I can terrorize my writers any time I feel like it.

1- Did I mention not having to wear pants?

All silliness aside, Wubbzy does have some deeper messages. They are different in every episode. Some of the bigger things are being yourself, knowing it’s okay to be different and that everything doesn’t have to be perfect. Wubbzy makes a lot of mistakes and he learns from them. It’s stealth learning at its best. There are songs at the end that wrap up the episode. So, you end up singing the lesson of something such as “don’t lie.”

Bob offered some advice to novice animators. “The key is – like the people at Nike say, ‘just do it.'” By that, he means – draw. Draw draw draw all the time. Create your own stories. You don’t necessarily go to animation school to get into this business. It helps to take drawing classes. Many people in this business that come from many walks of life who just stumbled into animation. There’s definitely not a straight path or set of rules. Once you’ve done your work, show it to other people. Don’t be afraid to show to others and get criticism. Listen to their feedback and take it to heart. Thanks Bob, can’t wait to see what you do next!

According to a new study published in the latest issue of Pediatrics, if your child care situation involves grandparents, you can rest easy knowing they are in good hands. In fact, they might be safer with their grandparents than they are with you!

Contrary to common wisdom that suggests grandparents are too far removed from the realities of child rearing to understand and protect children from injury and harm, the study find that quite the opposite is true. Analyzing data from the National Evaluation of the Healthy Steps for Young Children Program, researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health determined that children are less likely to be injured when in the care of grandma than in other situations. That’s right, grandma takes better care of the little ones than organized day care centers, other relatives and even stay at home moms.

The reasons for this aren’t clear, but we could speculate for days. Grandma might be less distracted than professional caregivers and even moms. Maybe grandma keeps the kids on a shorter leash and therefore out of harm’s way. Whatever the reason, this should be comforting news for the increasing number of families who depend on grandparents to provide regular child care.
For more info, go to http://www.parentdish.com/2008/11/05/grandparents-take-better-care-of-the-kids/ or
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/04/kids-safest-under-grandparents-care/

The First-Ever Christmas Movie Starring Barbie™, is Available Exclusively on DVD Celebrate this holiday season with music, laughter and fun as Barbie™ stars in, the all-new “Barbie™ in A Christmas Carol,” coming exclusively to DVD on November 4, 2008.

It’s up to three very unusual Christmas Spirits to take Eden on a fantastical holiday journey that will open her heart to the spirit of the season and the joy of giving. “Barbie™ in A Christmas Carol” is sure to become a family favorite to enjoy every holiday season!

Regular child and adolescent violent video game use early in the school year predicted later aggressive behavior in both the U.S. and Japan, according to a new study. In “Longitudinal Effects of Violent Video Games on Aggression in Japan and the United States,” researchers monitored the behavior of more than 1,200 students in Japan, ages 12 to 18, and 364 U.S. students, ages 9 to 12. The study results were similar: habitual violent video game play early in the school year predicted later aggression. The more the children played violent video games, the more physically aggressive they became. The study authors recommend reducing child and teen use of violent video games.

For additional information on the study, please go to http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/faculty/caa/recpub.html. Scroll down to the bottom of the page.

Adolescents who have high levels of exposure to television programs that contain sexual content are twice as likely to be involved in a pregnancy over the following three years as their peers who watch few such shows, according to a RAND Corporation study issued today.

The study, published in the November edition of the journal Pediatrics, is the first to establish a link between teenagers’ exposure to sexual content on TV and either pregnancies among girls or responsibility for pregnancies among boys.

“Adolescents receive a considerable amount of information about sex through television and that programming typically does not highlight the risks and responsibilities of sex,” said Anita Chandra, the study’s lead author and a behavioral scientist at RAND, a nonprofit research organization. “Our findings suggest that television may play a significant role in the high rates of teenage pregnancy in the United States.”

Researchers from RAND Health say that exposure to sex on television may influence teen pregnancy by creating the perception that there is little risk to engaging in sex without using contraceptives and accelerating the initiation of sexual intercourse.

“The amount of sexual content on television has doubled in recent years, and there is little representation of safer sex practices in those portrayals,” Chandra said. “While some progress has been made, teenagers who watch television are still going to find little information about the consequences of unprotected sexual practices among the many portrayals promoting sex.”

She said that the findings hold implications for broadcasters, parents and health care providers.

Broadcasters should be encouraged to include more realistic depictions of sex in scripts and to portray consequences such as pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Parents should consider limiting their children’s access to programming with sexual content and spending more time watching programs with their children so they can explain the consequences of sex. Pediatricians should ask adolescents about their media use and discuss with them both contraception and the consequences that may accompany sexual activity.

The new findings are from a RAND research project that previously linked viewing of TV programs with sexual content with earlier initiation of sexual intercourse and other sexual activities.

The RAND study is based on a national survey of about 2,000 adolescents aged 12 to 17 who were recruited in 2001 and asked about their television viewing habits and sexual behavior. The participants were surveyed again in 2001 and in 2004. The latest analysis is based upon results from about 700 participants who had engaged in sexual intercourse by the third survey and reported their pregnancy history.

Information about television viewing habits was combined with the results of a separate analysis of television programs to determine the frequency and type of sexual content the adolescents were exposed to during their TV viewing.

Researchers focused on 23 programs popular among teenagers that were widely available on broadcast and cable television, and contained high levels of sexual content (both depictions of sex as well as dialogue or discussion about sex). The shows included dramas, comedies, reality programs and animated shows.

RAND researchers found several other factors, in addition to TV viewing, that influenced whether adolescents were likely to experience a pregnancy. Adolescents living in a two-parent household had a lower probability of pregnancy, while girls, African-Americans and those with more problem behaviors such as discipline problems were more likely to experience a pregnancy. Youths who intended to have children early also were more likely to experience a pregnancy.

Chandra said future research topics should include whether inconsistent contraceptive use may help to explain the relationship between exposure to sex on television and pregnancy.

“Television is just one part of a teenager’s media diet that helps to influence their behavior,” Chandra said. “We should also look at the roles that magazines, the Internet, and music play in teens’ reproductive health.”

Although the teenage pregnancy rate in the United States has declined sharply since 1991, the nation still has one of the highest teen pregnancy rates among industrialized nations. Nearly 1 million young women become pregnant each year, with the majority of these pregnancies unplanned. Research has shown that young mothers are more likely than others to quit school, require public assistance and to live in poverty.

Support for the RAND study was provided by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Other authors of the study are Steven Martino, Rebecca Collins, Marc Elliott, Sandra Berry, David Kanouse and Angela Miu.

RAND Health, a division of the RAND Corporation, is the nation’s largest independent health policy research program, with a broad research portfolio that focuses on quality, costs and health services delivery, among other topics.For more information, go to http://www.rand.org/publications/email.html

PBS Kids Go! characters explore democracy on Election Day, November 4, with three different programming specials. ZOOMout of the Vote invites elementary school kids to vote for their favorite candidate, get a crash course on elections and draft a letter to the President. The Democracy Project illustrates how government affects kids’ daily lives and explains the impact a single vote can make. American Experience WayBack shares Presidential secrets such as why Abraham Lincoln used to spy on his neighbors and Ronald Reagan’s Secret Service codename.