This post was drafted in August, right after I attended the PBS Fall Preview event for press. I intended to complete it (including names of the people who were speaking to us at the event!) when I got close to the airdate. I had not counted on having surgery a few days prior, or on being in too much pain to deal with work over the weekend... so it was auto-posted to the blog before I had a chance to review and fix it. I have since removed the bits that are incomplete. I apologize for the way I handled this.
If you are younger than I (and you probably are), you probably can't remember a time when Sesame Street wasn't teaching and entertaining the world's pre-schoolers. The show is celebrating its 40th anniversary tomorrow, and I remember its debut well: I was 13 years old (like my daughter is today), and watched it because I happened to be babysitting its target audience.
The program and its producers at Children's Television Workshop received a ton of press at the time for its then-revolutionary approach to kids' TV.
According to one of the producers, "When it premiered the goal was to use the most up-to-date medium that was most attractive to kids – TV – to help them learn."
She said they did this by taking accepted pre-school curriculum and presenting it in the manner of the hottest prime time programs on the air in 1969: Rowan & Martin’s Laugh In, which was known for its rapid pace of short-form comedy vignettes and high speed velocity of jokes that flew at the viewer in rat-at-tat fashion.
Today, Sesame Street is seen in more than 140 countries around the world and may be the globe's largest educator of young children.
The format has been revised more than once over the last four decades to reflect changing times and new research into how children learn.
"Today, kids are more used to long form programming," she says -- and tomorrow, Sesame Street begins its 41st season with a whole new format and rhythm.
"We believed in 1969 that children had short attention spans," another of the producers said. "As a developmental psychologist, I don't think they’ve changedm but their viewing experiences have. Now with video, children are watching feature length films. So we're not interrupting the story any longer, because research showed that children were getting upset at the interruptions."
"We're moving away from a traditional magazine format into an “integrated block,” she said. New to the show will be its first ever CGI segment, a new host (Murray the Muppet) and new curriculum. There will be a "surprise third act" that’s an "experimental corner," and (of course!) Elmo’s World, which she acknowledged is everybody’s Sesame Street favorite.
However, the program still features the same cornerstones that have made it so successful around the world: literacy, math, social & emotional and healthy habits for life (obesity crisis & health issues). "These have not changed," the producer said. "It's the same kind of curriculum you would see in quality preschool."
"We are able to focus on critical means within a whole child curriculum," said the producer. This year, they will focus on science, through the lens of nature.
"When you connect children through the world around them, they develop positive attitudes," she said.
The CGI segment will be called Abby’s Flying School, and the curriculum will be focused on critical thinking, which the Sesame Street folks describe as a crucial 21st century skill.
An added benefit of using CGI is that the elements can be used on the PBS website to create games that immerse child in stories they see on the show and practice their critical thinking.
The producers of the show had praise for Hollywood's celebrity community. More than 30 stars of television, movies, sports and music who have agreed/participated in 40th season, including Jason Mraz, Jimmy Fallon, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kobe Bryant, Cameron Diaz, Adam Sandler, Ricky Gervais and Paul Rudd.
PBS is marking the anniversary tomorrow with the release of a new home video retrospective of the series' 40 years. available now.
Disclosure: I received no compensation for this post. The Amazon link to the DVD is NOT an affiliate link; I will receive no commissions if you choose to purchase.
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