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Pop Culture Happy Hour: Making Toddlers Into Nerds

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It's been more than two and a half years since we last did a show packed with recommendations of pop culture (and other culture) for kids. We figured it was about time to do it again, for reasons we'll get into in the episode, so here we are.

We don't usually spoil episodes for you, but there is a complete list of recommendations on our Facebook page.

After we get through a deluge of recommendations for you, we run through some of the tropes in children's entertainment and culture that we think it's important to avoid. We talk about how kids tend to outgrow their fixations, the right way to think about bullies, and Glen's general sense that not every song should be telling you that you are the most important thing ever. Stephen talks about an article that draws out some of these same questions, and it's well worth checking out.

As always, we close this week's show with what's making us happy this week. Glen is happy about a podcast that not only has great content, but brings some new voices to the podcast world. Trey is happy about fried pie, but also about a theater piece he's looking forward to. Stephen is happy about revisiting a song he loves following the death of Lou Reed, and he's also happy about an enchanting cover he found on YouTube. I'm happy on a couple of personal notes, but also happy about a terrific song I heard on television.

Find us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter: me, Stephen, Glen, Trey, producer Nick Fountain, and our esteemed producer emeritus and music director, Mike Katzif.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Linda Holmes is a pop culture correspondent for NPR and the host of Pop Culture Happy Hour. She began her professional life as an attorney. In time, however, her affection for writing, popular culture, and the online universe eclipsed her legal ambitions. She shoved her law degree in the back of the closet, gave its living room space to DVD sets of The Wire, and never looked back.