Numberjacks & Wordsmiths

Numberjacks is a pointless, stupid, annoying and somewhat confusing CBeebies kids programme that has highly-contrived numbers-gone-wrong situations which talking numbers with irritating voices and bulging eyes try to solve, such as: the number six vanishing off a dice (it’s usually the fault of a blob of green slime). It’s quite possible it has no educational value at all.

What’s really needed is a words-based programme: I’m calling it Wordsmiths. What with teachers and parents being unable to read, spell, write or use grammar correctly, it’s hardly surprising our children can’t either. Companies spend millions on advertising... and still have atrocious apostrophes (or lack of), such as Selfridge's recent press campaign: ‘Lets Shop Online!’ Likewise, CDs and DVDs, even on music websites, are usually listed as CD’s and DVD’s. There are millions of examples turning us into a nation of illiterate idiots.

Wordsmiths would address the problem by hunting down and weeding out the bad spelling, punctuation and grammar in the country. Visiting schools, offices, advertising agencies, government agencies, shops and greengrocer stalls – in short, anywhere notorious for bad spelling and grammar, our team of cuddly letters and punctuation, armed with dictionaries, pens, spray paint and assorted weapons, will forcibly correct any offending spelling and grammar irregularities.

Just for the hell of it, let’s also have a Comic Sans Exterminator who burns all examples of the font Comic Sans.