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The long-held belief that television is detrimental to child development, emotional health and overall literacy has been a stubborn one in North America. The opinion, largely fuelled by anecdotal evidence, and poorly constructed studies has, however, proven not only unfounded, but the bulk of research has actually demonstrated the opposite.

"Moderate amounts of television viewing were found to be beneficial for reading," states Annie Moses in the Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, further stating that "programs that aim to promote literacy in young children have been found to positively impact specific early literacy skills".

One interpretation of Plants vs. Zombies, for instance, reveals an ironic representation of an ideological battle between the good natural spirit of flora and Zombie-like brainwashing that supposedly comes from entertainment and digital media. Pay close attention to the character design of the zombie villains–football zombies, disco zombies, suit & tie zombies, etc. Suddenly, it becomes clear that, intentional or not, there’s an implicit anti-consumer, non-conformist cultural critique underlying the game. Plants are the good guys. Brainwashed mainstream zombies are the bad guys.

Individualized gameplay might be better than television because they’re more interactive.

These days, in fact, most storytelling is interactive. We consume most of our media through internet connected devices. And technology is so adept at providing ‘adaptive feedback’ that it proves to be an exceptionally effective teaching tool. In fact, a recent SRI study shows that game based learning can boost cognitive learning for students sitting on the median by 12%.