The Children's Television Act is a rule that was enacted in 1990 by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in the United States, which was designed to increase the amount of educational children's programming on television. The Act requires full-service television stations that offer children's television programming to serve the educational and informational needs of children through their overall programming, including programs that are specifically designed to serve these needs (or "core" educational programming). In August 1996, the FCC adopted new rules to strengthen the enforcement of this statutory mandate. These new rules were:

• Adopt several public information initiatives designed to give parents greater information about the core educational programs being aired by television stations (these initiatives are explained in greater detail below).
• Set forth a clear definition of what type of programs qualify as core programs: they generally must have serving the educational and informational needs of children as a significant purpose; be aired between the hours of 7:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m.; be a regularly scheduled weekly program; and be at least 30 minutes in length.
• Establish a guideline that calls for every full-service television station to air at least three hours per week of core educational programming.

A central goal of the rules in the FCC's revision to the Act is to provide parents and other members of the public with greater information about educational television programs, in order to help parents guide their children's television viewing and also encourage an ongoing dialogue between the public and television stations about the station's performance under the Children's Television Act. To help accomplish this, the 1996 revision to the rules implemented by the FCC require commercial television stations to identify core educational programs at the beginning of the program (such as with a verbal announcement or an icon), and to provide information identifying these programs to publishers of television program listings (either print or electronic).