Six-year-olds who could not tell time. A baseline test confirming it. Then two sessions with performance visual artists teaching through play and joy. Every child could tell the time. Every child moved up an attainment bracket. Dr. Jacqueline Harding ran that experiment, and the result is not a curiosity. It is a blueprint.

When children laugh, cortisol drops. Defences lower. The brain enters the relaxed, curious state where information actually sticks. Harding calls it the happiness laboratory — and the neuroscience behind it explains why people remember stories told with warmth far longer than any list of facts delivered under pressure. It also explains why a fear-based approach to education is failing teachers and children at the same time.

Harding consults on some of the most-watched children’s television in the world, including Peter Rabbit and Teletubbies. Her test for whether a show is working is simple: watch the child after it ends. Frantic and cranky means the pace was wrong. Calm and still talking about it means something landed. For every parent and grandparent trying to figure out what to put in front of a child, that is where to start.

Topics: laughter and learning children, play-based learning outcomes, child brain development, children’s TV consultant, fear-based education

GUEST: Dr. Jacqueline Harding | http://drjacquelineharding.com

Originally aired on2026-06-02