‘Once Upon A Pandemic’: Assessing Children’s Stories Endorsed By The Indonesian Government To Communicate COVID-19 Crisis

Abstract

The objective of this study is to evaluate children's stories that are used to communicate and to educate children about the COVID-19 pandemic. It evaluates the appropriateness of the story selection by assessing the intrinsic elements and the visual images of the stories. The research focuses on three stories that have been endorsed by three Indonesian government bodies, and evaluates both the narrative and the visual images of the stories. These children's stories have become extremely popular and have been widely acknowledged as a wonderful method of educating, entertaining, and assisting youngsters in dealing with the crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite its important role in communicating crises to and educating children about the pandemic, little study has been conducted to assess the appropriateness of these children's stories. This study investigates how well these children's stories are in addressing the COVID-19 crisis to children. It is found that not all of the children's stories endorsed by the Indonesian government are suitable for accurately communicating the COVID-19 crisis to children.