Boy, oh Boy! Did I Ever Screw Up When I Ordered National Geographic Kids!

Buying magazines for your kids is different than buying magazines for yourself. You want quality content that will educate and foster curiosity and creativity in their growing minds, but you also want something with wholesome values: you want the kids to grow up with decent role models, and you want to avoid things that over-emphasize marketing hype, or that encourage TV watching and video game playing over outdoor activities that promote good mental and physical health and a concept of teamwork.

Choosing "good" kids magazines isn't always easy. There's too many of them on the market, and most parents lead busy lives in which we don't always have time to screen everything the kids see quite as well as we'd like.

We have to use a little judgment and a healthy dose of trust.

Most Americans trust the National Geographic name. It's been respected for scholarship and worldliness for well over a century. Nobody ever grew up in America without reading more than a few issues of National Geographic magazine. It fosters curiosity and exposes us to a wider world.

Is it unreasonable to assume that a kid-oriented National Geographic magazine --- National Geographic Kids --- will be up to similarly high standards??

It evidently is.

I should know better than to read too many Epinions reviews. I'd ordered a school-year subscription of this magazine without reading reviews and without actually having ever sat down with an issue to examine it. My mistake. I trusted the National Geographic name. Only later did I read some of the negative reviews here. It gave me food for thought. I finally sat down and actually looked at what I'd been feeding my kid's mind. I was appalled!


Telling Kids to Buy, Buy, Buy!
Initially, I thought the complaints here about this magazine's commercial focus were misplaced.

Leafing casually through a couple issues, I didn't see that many ads jump out at me. It wasn't until I looked closer that it became apparent that there were:
* ads masquerading as content (find the Kelloggs Twistables hidden in this town square cartoon! --- March 06 issue)
* articles that were nothing more than ads themselves (2-page spread about characters in Ice Age 2 --- April 06 issue)
* ads for things you don't want your kids addicted to (M&M candies, etc.)
* insidious product placements (in the middle of articles, pictures of Mario Bros., Shrek characters, recognizable logos, trademarks, packages, etc.)
* articles that encourage consumerism (story about where to buy video games -- March 06)

None of this is the kind of thing I really want to be handing to my kids. All these things are unhealthy influences on a young mind that doesn't yet know how to doubt ad jingles and who doesn't realize that there are some things that we really don't want dominating our lives. We need a balance, and we don't need ads and articles encouraging kids to play video games instead of playing in the park, or suggesting that eating M&Ms is lots more fun than having 3 healthy meals a day. Don't even get me started on Kelloggs Twistables, which are portrayed as "fun" things to find and buy and eat --- even though the dentist just told them that fruit snacks like Twistables stick to the teeth causing more and worse cavities than most sugar-laden candies. The magazine under-cuts the messages from teachers, parents, or health professionals.

Kids don't question ads. They don't get offended by subtle suggestions, regardless of how unhealthy they may be.

Shame on National Geographic Kids for their stilted commercial emphasis!!


Worthless Content...
I bought National Geographic Kids thinking that I'd get a solid world view with a lot of stories of fascinating natural wonders, unusual perspectives on world cultures, and maybe even some insights as to who we are in a changing America.

Unfortunately, you get very little of this kind of quality content. Instead, each issue is full of nonsense, gibberish, and valueless silliness.

The March 2006 issue is 44 pages in length. There's about 3 pages of outright advertisements, and only 4 pages of genuinely GOOD content!

The good is:
* one page article about an interesting and little-known kind of dolphin
* one page article in which the Pet Vet answers some interesting questions about animal health
* two-page article about how animals camouflage themselves in the wild

The vast bulk of the magazine is worthless drivel like:
* two pages about stupid things you can buy for your pet (tiaras for kitty...)
* one page proving that sports bloopers just aren't funny in still photos
* one page about "naughty" pets doing ordinary things pets do (cat sleeps in sink, dog sleeps on sofa)
* two pages about how to tell if your dog is happy (he wags tail and licks you) or mad (he barks and bares teeth) followed up by two pages of same drivel for cats.
* whole page for four corny kid jokes (Knock, knock. Who there? Dozen. Dozen who? Dozen anybody want to play with me?)

Now don't get me wrong, I'm all for having a few zany animal pics and a few corny jokes, but I don't want what I perceived as an educational magazine to have random silliness as it's primary focus.


Bottom Line
I'm hugely disappointed. You'd think National Geographic would be a name you could trust. It's not when it comes to National Geographic Kids.

The magazine is poorly focused with very, very little quality content, an overwhelming emphasis on non-educational playfulness, and an unsettlingly excessive number of inappropriate ads and stealth product endorsements.

I'm hugely disappointed. I won't be renewing...