Adored By The Network / PBS Kids

Examples related to member stations

• WNET, PBS' flagship station in New York City, adores their children's programming ever since the PBS Kids block's inception in 1993. On an average day, they play children's shows almost all day from 6AM to 6PM, with a two-hour break for Charlie Rose and educational programming for adults like Learn To Read in between. When this practice was abandoned in 2017, they filled in the gap with more children's programming. They also made their own idents for their children's block rather than the standard ones PBS had and a unique promo video about it in the late 90's. In 2003, Thirteen launched a subchannel for their children's programming called Kids Thirteen which still runs to this day, being one of the first PBS stations to have a children's subchannel that wasn't related to the former PBS Kids network.
  • In June/July of 2015, WNET went through a period where they couldn't go one week without screening the Sesame Street episode "Veggies Revolt". In 2017, they developed a similar fondness for the episode "When Dinosaurs Roamed Sesame", as well as the special "The Cookie Thief", they loved playing "Baby Bear Learns About Bees" and "Bert And Ernie Make A Movie" in 2018, and in 2019, the most shown-episodes were "Astronaut Elmo" (which is shown every week and sometimes even twice a week, like when it was shown twice in a single day on October 1, 2019) and "The Happy To Be Me Club". However, this "repeated episodes" problem also happens with other kids' shows on WNET and their 24/7 kids subchannel, Kids Thirteen:
    • In the summer of 2017, the Kids Thirteen subchannel aired the Thomas & Friends episode "There's Always A Good Explanation"^note which consists of "Flatbeds of Fear" and "Disappearing Diesels" at least twice a week (occasionally airing an additional time or two on Thirteen itself), and the Caillou episode "Knowing I'm Growing"^note Which consists of "Caillou's New Shoes" and "Caillou's Teddy Shirt" from season 1 and "I Want to Grow Up" & "Caillou and the Tooth Fairy" from season 2 every other week on Kids Thirteen.
    • On the main channel, the Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood episodes "Neighborhood Thank You Day; Thank You, Grandpere Tiger!" and "Calm At The Clock Factory; Calm For Storytime" would each air twice a week. On the main channel, as well as the Odd Squad episode "And Then They Were Puppies; A Case of the Sillies".
    • The repeated episode problem isn't something that began in The New '10s, however, beginning all the way back in the spring of 1999, when the "Accentuate The Positive" episode of The Puzzle Place played once a week.
    • Ever since late June 2020, the Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood episode "Daniel Doesn't Want To Go Potty; Daniel Sits On the Potty" airs at least once a week on either Thirteen themselves or their Kids Thirteen channel.
    • When Donkey Hodie temporarily went into reruns after the first 13 episodes aired, "Spooky Shadow Swamp; Hidden Orchestra" tended to play more often than any other of the episodes from that batch, airing at least every 3 days. This problem occurred even after 5 more episodes were added to rotation in August 2021, but stopped when 4 more new episodes were added in November 2021.
• WETA, Washington DC's PBS station, also suffered from the "adored episodes" problem in March of 2000:
  • The Arthur episode "Meek for a Week; Arthur, World's Greatest Gleeper" aired twice a week during this period.
  • The Barney & Friends episodes "Going On A Bear Hunt" and "Waiting for Mr. MacRooney" aired every week that month.
  • When WETA would play Dragon Tales during this period, 2 times out of 7, the episode would either be "Tails You Lose; Calling Dr. Zak" or "Dragon Drop; Cassie Loves A Parade".
• When Halloween 2017 rolled around, guess what WTTW Chicago (Chicago's PBS station) did? They aired both Odd Squad episodes "Haunt Squad" and "Safe House in the Woods", repeatedly, up until Halloween. For a show with its first Halloween episode in three years, though, this is justified.
• Rootle, the name for PBS North Carolina's (previously known as UNC-TV) 24/7 PBS Kids channel, hosts a block on the weekends called “Read-a-roo's Block Party”, where a 3-hour marathon of a show airs. For example, in July of 2017 they held Ready Jet Go! marathons.
• KGTF, the PBS station in Guam, was quite fond of Noddy:
  • The Noddy Shop ran on the network longer than it did on any other affiliate and even longer than it did on TVOntario. It was one of two shows ^note  the other one being Between the Lions on KGTF to keep its time slots throughout its entire run, with the show airing weekdays at 8:00AM and weekends at 8:30AM.
  • They were also one of the first stations to air Make Way For Noddy. Like the previous incarnation, it also kept its 10:00AM Saturday timeslot throughout its run, airing until 2011.
• Like WNET, KCPT in Kansas City also adores their kids shows, airing them non-stop from 7AM until 6PM. This has been going on since 1999.
• WGBH adores Curious George. They give it at least two airings every weekday, give it plenty of promotion, and even tweak the schedule shown on most affiliates just to air the show more.
• In the early 2000s, VPT went through a period of time where the only Arthur episodes they would show were either "Hide and Snake/Muffy's New Best Friend" or "The Contest/Prove It!"
• While on most PBS stations, Thomas & Friends only aired on weekend mornings, there were some stations that showed enough love for the show to air it on weekday afternoons, with some even keeping the weekend morning airing if this was the case, with that even being turned into a daily airing on some stations.

General PBS examples

• As of The New '10s, PBS Kids has enough faith in their shows to order a hefty 40-episode first season and tie-in specials for most of them. They also tend to upload episodes of their shows on their video app prior to their premieres. They have done this with Ready Jet Go!, Pinkalicious & Peterrific, and Let's Go Luna!.
• As a general rule, anything created by GBH or Fred Rogers Productions, like Arthur, Martha Speaks (until 2014), Pinkalicious, Daniel Tiger, Peg + Cat, Alma's Way, Molly of Denali, FETCH! with Ruff Ruffman, and Donkey Hodie will get the most attention from PBS. ^note Odd Squad and Between the Lions all got screwed, but they are exceptions rather than the rule
• Whenever a PBS Kids show gets a special or movie, expect PBS to frequently air said special throughout the month of its premiere. If it's at least an hour long, expect PBS to use said special to pre-empt the slots of their adored programs such as Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood and Donkey Hodie. This also happens to a lesser extent with new episodes of their programs, minus the pre-emption part.
• The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That! got this treatment. It was made part of the PBS Kids Preschool Block that featured Curious George, Dinosaur Train, and Super Why!. Sid the Science Kid's spot on the block was removed to make room for this show. It also ran for three seasons over the course of eight years and was given a couple of tie-in specials; they were Christmas and summer-themed ones, respectively.
• In the mid-to-late 2010's, Curious George 2: Follow That Monkey! was very common to see on the schedule of the PBS Kids block. The movie would air at least once a month, usually towards the end of the month. It was so beloved that they'll even preempt Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood to make time for this movie.
• Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood gets this treatment a lot. It has tons of posts made about it daily on PBS Kids’ social media, ranging from links to resources based on the show to promotions for blogs gushing over the show, lots of advertisement, and constant DVD releases. It helps that it has ties to the universally-adored Mister Rogers' Neighborhood and is the channel's second most popular program after Sesame Street. In addition, from the premiere of Ready Jet Go! in 2016 until the premiere of Donkey Hodie in 2021, the show aired a back-to-back hour long block on the PBS national feed, something that has never happened for any other series.
• PBS loves promoting Donkey Hodie. Before it aired, they aired many sneak peaks of the musical numbers and aired promos about the characters themselves. They also had several parenting blogs preview the show and make flying flapjacks to celebrate. After it premiered, they constantly put ads for the show on Twitter ad spaces, the official YouTube channel uploaded many episodes and compilation videos of the show onto their channel, and they even had four Family Night marathons of the show, with one of them lasting four hours. The show also got a second season renewal 11 months after its premiere, as well as several merchandising deals including a toy line and an album.
• In the summer of 2014, PBS held a “Double Your Fun” event where Arthur, Dinosaur Train, Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, Wild Kratts, and Curious George played back-to-back episodes.
• PBS loved Dragon Tales. They promoted it a lot and also gave it both a morning and afternoon timeslot ^note  with some stations adding a third timeslot, specifically those which didn't broadcast syndicated programming like The Big Comfy Couch when it first aired. Even after it was cancelled in 2005, it always held a prominent spot in their morning preschool lineup, only getting dropped in 2010 after broadcasting rights to the series expired.
• When PBS aired Elliot Moose as part of the "Bookworm Bunch", they made it the most promoted show of the block at the beginning of its run, showing some clips from the animated segments after the website bumpers for every show on the block. This ultimately did not help it, as the show and Corduroy would be removed from the block the following season. The clips played after the shows would only last about 5-10 weeks before being replaced with the more familiar song segments.
• FETCH! with Ruff Ruffman is very much adored. Long after the original show's cancellation in 2010 due to declining ratings, WGBH Boston continues to create spin-offs utilizing the character and his extended cast. Back when the first season was in production, PBS liked what they saw so much that they greenlit a second season for the show before it even aired.
• Martha Speaks usually had promos after Arthur episodes, PBS loved promoting Martha Speaks and most stations gave it two morning and afternoon slots before or after the Preschool Block and PBS Kids Go! from 2008 to 2014 before it got cancelled.
• Molly of Denali was heavily promoted by the network, with the promo for the show airing during every program break on PBS Kids beginning two months prior. New episodes also always get advertised, unlike the Invisible Advertising that other shows get.
• In June and July of 2016, PBS reran the first 10 episodes of Odd Squad Season 2 over and over in order to familiarize the audience with the new characters. Eventually, they went back to rerunning the old episodes alongside the new ones.
• Pinkalicious & Peterrific is the second most adored show behind Daniel. It has constant advertisements, thousands of social media posts, and has been the subject of Family Night marathons a few times. It also got a DVD release three months after it premiered, while Nature Cat, Splash and Bubbles, and Ready Jet Go!, all of which premiered before it, had to wait until the fall of 2018 to get DVD releases. This show’s constant adoration along with that of Daniel led to several other shows, especially Ready Jet Go! to be ignored in favor of those two shows.
• Six months after Ready Jet Go! premiered, it was renewed for a second season due to high ratings and critical acclaim. It also received several tie-in games within that period, and before the television premiere, PBS released several episodes of the show on the app. However, this special treatment suddenly waned for no reason whatsoever and the show was cancelled after two seasons.
• On June 15, 2018, every PBS station held an all-day marathon of Wild Kratts just to premiere 4 new episodes.^note ”City Hoppers”, “Blue Heron”, “Choose Your Swordfish”, and “Komodo Dragon”
• Work It Out Wombats! got promoted heavily by PBS in the weeks leading up to its premiere, and afterwards too. They even had a Zeke mascot roam around Boston to promote the series. It says quite a lot about PBS Kids and their high hopes for this show to do well when it was slated to received a podcast before it even premiered.
• When Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum first premiered in 2019, PBS gave it a lot of good treatment. It got consistent advertising, had its first 13 episodes released on the app, and got 2 daily time slots on the main PBS network before the show got less attention after the Clifford the Big Red Dog reboot was officially announced.
• While PBS Kids's presence and attitude on social media has largely changed beginning in 2020 (being more creative with posts similar to those of other kids networks, like Nick Jr.), one tactic they often use in light of new episodes of a show is heavily promoting said show through either showing clips of it, promoting a game from it that is on the website, or by slipping it in with other shows through a creative post. They've even taken to doing this with older shows, such as Mister Rogers' Neighborhood or The Electric Company (2009).
• Of all the ended shows on PBS Kids that are currently airing in reruns, Peg + Cat is given the most love by the network. The specials still air on Family Night when there's nothing else to run, and the reruns air in a decent timeslot of 7:30AM on weekends, when most older shows are broadcast during the 6:00AM hour.

PBS Kids 24/ 7 Channel examples

• Arthur has one of the biggest amounts of airtime of any show on the 24/7 channel. However, this isn’t as bad as other examples since it leaves a lot of room for variety.
• The first incarnation of the channel, which ran from 1999 to 2005, aired three episodes of The Noddy Shop ^note which, unlike most PBS Kids shows, always ran in production order rather than this trope happening to specific episodes most of the time in weekly rotation whenever the network was on the first season of the show: "The Tooth Fairy", "To The Rescue" and "The Trouble With Truman" (and "Telling Tails" to a lesser extent). If the second season was what they were up to, the two episodes featuring Disrupto ("Big Bullies" and "The Human Touch") would be played at least two more times. The latter two episodes were so beloved by the channel that they would randomly air as the channel progressed through the first season. For instance, in October of 2000, the Disrupto episodes played on two consecutive days in the middle of Season 1 in between "The Magic Show" and "The Big Mess".
• If there are no more movies to show, then PBS Kids will run a marathon of one of their shows for PBS Kids Family Night. It may also be done to celebrate bombs of new episodes. For example, from April 6-9, the 24/7 channel ran a Ready Jet Go! marathon consisting of all the episodes from the season 2 premiere bomb.
  • They even run the movies considered to be "Family Night" ones outside of that block as filler. The Rhythm and Roots of Arthur and The Daniel Tiger Movie: Won't You Be Our Neighbor? tend to be the most frequently shown movies that fulfill this purpose as of April 2020, especially the former.
• After its premiere, Sesame Street: Elmo's Playdate was aired at least twice a day every single day. The same thing also happened with the sequel special The Power of We. After it was taken off, however, the special was never made available on DVD.
• PBS Kids had enough faith in the August 2023 batch of episodes of Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood and the season 2 premiere of Donkey Hodie that they pre-empted the second slot of Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood and the first one for Donkey Hodie on the 24/7 channel to air the new episodes of Donkey Hodie and Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood in those slots. Keep in mind that this rarely happens for new episodes on the channel (in the case of Daniel Tiger and Donkey Hodie, when a new episode airs, it's usually paired with a repeat of the same show), and it's also rare for the channel to change its' schedule outside of special events and Family Night.