by Emily Shimp

Created on: April 24, 2009

Over the past ten years or so, PBS children's programming has focused more on the younger audience and less on older children in elementary or middle school. From the 70s through the 90s, however, PBS had some amazing shows designed not only to educate, but also entertain, children as well as adults. A lot of those shows have sadly been canceled, and are mostly either seldom, or never, seen on TV again. Here is a list of what could be considered PBS' best children's shows in its history:

10. The Puzzle Place: In this puppet series, a bunch of multiracial children learn about life's lessons, ranging from sharing, to the "magic words" (i.e. please), and getting along with other people. Even as PBS was turning more towards programming for younger children, this was one of the better shows for that target audience for being informative as well as being fun. It seemed somewhat like Sesame Street, but it was entertaining in its own right.

9. The Magic School Bus: This animated series, based on the popular book series, took Ms. Frizzle's class on a variety of wacky field trips to the inside of a human body, the center of the earth, and even through our solar system. It made learning about science fun and wacky, and Lily Tomlin was great as Ms. Frizzle. This may have started a trend on PBS, as a lot of its shows today are animated, but this was not a bad beginning at all, and this was back when PBS still cared about older children.

8. Reading Rainbow: This long-running series had Levar Burton encourage kids about the excitement of reading by sharing stories, recommending similar books, and teaching kids about such things as farming, the library, and even Star Trek. The books themselves were often engaging, the kids reviews of other books were cute, and the lessons in between were fascinating. The show may have only recently been retired, but it remains a fine example of PBS children's programming at its finest.

7. Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego: A sequel series to another PBS kid's show (more on that later), this game show had kids learning about history as they pursue the notorious thief Carmen Sandiego and her cohorts through time in order to retrieve stolen artifacts from the past. While not quite as entertaining as the previous series, it still benefited from the return of Lynne Thigpen as the Chief, some funny informants, and a challenging final round where kids had to try and correctly answer 6 questions to capture Carmen. Sad to say, this show was one of (if not

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