BETWEEN THE LIONS is an attempt to combat what has been described as a nation-wide literary crisis in American schools. It is the only show out of 300 such children's television shows that is designed to help children read; it strives to show children ages four to seven the power and pleasure of literacy through stories, skits, songs and animation. Each thirty minute episode incorportates a whole-part-whole approach to literacy blended with rich media elements. Animation plays a key role in the presentation of literacy concepts in Between the Lions.

Each episode includes the five areas of reading instruction: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and text comprehension. In the first segment of every episode a short story or poem is read aloud, then it is discussed. A key word is pulled from the text using animation and then that word is used throughout the rest of the episodes' skill building segments. 

Photo by John E. Barrett. © 2000, WGBH & Sirius Thinking,™ WGBH

Animation is used in Between the Lions to introduce and highlight key sounds, new vocabulary, high frequency sight words (words repeated through many skits) and target vowels or consonants. When the story is read aloud in the first segment, the words are highlighted on the screen for children to read along. The highlighting serves a two-fold purpose; it distinguishes the words as they’re read and it shows children that English is read from top to bottom, left to right, a key principle of book and print awareness.

Animated skill building segments teach phonemic awareness, the awareness that words are made up of sounds. When animation is used to compare similarly spelled words, it serves to demonstrate the theories of alphabetic principle and word construction. It also supports the child's ability to recall the definitions of the words.

The success of animation’s use in Between the Lions may be attributed to the organic nature of their use. If animation is intrinsic to the text being simultaneously heard and seen, it helps the child identify the words with the concepts or items being shown. Non-organic graphics like traditional cartoons serve to entertain, however if they are not strategically placed they may be more distracting than helpful. 

While research supports the argument that computer graphics contribute to students' content area learning, there has not been any significant research that supports the usefulness of computer graphics for early literacy learning. Likewise, there has not been any significant research on the effects of animation on early literacy learning. It may be postulated however that animation helps significantly, due to the success of Between the Lions.

According to a study conducted by the University of Kansas, beginning readers benefited significantly by watching just 8.5 hours, 17 episodes, of Between the Lions. The children were tested on five literacy goals: letter-sound correspondences, word recognition of high frequency sight words, simple consonant-vowel-consonant words and decodable long words, exploration of the meaning of new words, understanding word families and concepts about print. Kindergarten children who watched Between the Lions outperformed kindergarten children who did not watch Between the Lions by nearly 4 to 1 on measures of specific program content. They also demonstrated accelerated growth rates in key emergent literacy skills in comparison to a control group. This research proves that Between the Lions can help to reinforce, motivate and extend early literacy instruction, both in the classroom and in the home. 

Photo by John E. Barrett. © 2000, WGBH & Sirius Thinking,™ WGBH

Between the Lions

"When do computer graphics contribute to early literacy learning?"

"Summative Evaluation of Between the Lions: A Final Report to WGBH Educational Foundation"

Wepner, S.B., & Cotter, M. (2002, February). When do computer graphics contribute to early literacy learning? Reading Online, 5(6).

Linebarger, D. (2000, July). Summative Evaluation of “Between the Lions:” A Final Report to WGBH Educational Foundation.


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Halimat Alabi

Alabi, H. (2005). Animation in literacy development. In B. Hoffman (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Educational Technology. Retrieved July 15, 2010, from file:///D:/实验室/eet/articles/animliteracy/start.htm