This paper presents first results on the question, to what extent the
cartoon Little Amadeus is appropriate for children to learn about Mozart
and the way of life in the 18-th century.In the first section the process
of human learning is focussed in general while principles of children’s
knowledge acquisition are described in a theoretical section based on
latest research studies. Finally media-specific characteristics of learning
by TV are discussed.As a first step into empirical results one episode of
the cartoon series was analysed to specify characteristic information for
learning by using principles of content analysis. Based on this the
learning potential of children using the cartoon on TV was directly
checked. For data collection in a three-step quasi-experiment a written
questionnaire was chosen. Children of third and fourth grade elementary
school (altogether N=82) took part in all three testing phases.Results show
that the cartoon is appropriate for children to learn. They were able to
significantly increase their knowledge about Mozart and the way of life in
the 18-th century.Acquired knowledge was remembered middle time. Younger
children and those with little interest learnt more than older and strongly
interested children. Instructions during the intro of the cartoon released
for gaining interest and attendance of the children helped mainly younger
children to learn more. However, children who believe that TV is a medium
which is hard to learn with also benefited from the instructions as far as
related to content about Mozart.