Something for the Boys & Girls

Radio, which often stoops to conquer, last week was accused of playing down to the kids, too. The accuser was the industry's own National Association of Broadcasters, which is to radio (or would like to be) what the Hays Office is to the movies.

The average U.S. child listens to the radio about 14 hours a week, reported N.A.B. Yet, judging from a survey made in schools in the Kansas City area, even second-graders prefer adult programs to the tepid gruel of hackneyed high adventure served up specially for them by breakfast-food programs. (Network children's shows are down from 40 in 1940 to 27 this year.)

In tough talk to its members, N.A.B. recommended a new set of ABCs. Radio stations were advised to:

P: Dream up new kinds of children's programs, "rather than adding similar types already available."

P: "Devote at least one half-hour every day between five and six to children . . . [and] develop a preschool-age or kindergarten program to be broadcast during the morning."

P: Get away from the outlandish escapades of the Orphan Annies with a show which would "dramatize the everyday life of ordinary children."

P: Find more programs "to appeal to the child's sense of humor."

P: Ask the kids themselves once in a while what they want to hear.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.