WNET/Thirteen will produce a series of 10 one hour public television programs, "CHILDHOOD" that will explore how children grow and develop,and how parents and societies have raised children throughout history and across cultures. Extensive use of current research and scholarships from the disciplines of developmental and cognitive psychology, anthropology and sociology, education, history and culture will be used to create a coherent and revealing view of childhood development. The series will be heavily promoted on public television, will be accompanied by a trade book and viewer's guide, and should generate audiences of more than 10 million viewers in its first series airing, based on prior experience with the producers prior series, "The Brain"; the accompanying trade book sold more than 150,000 copies. The producers of this series are highly skilled at the interpretation of complex scientific subjects on television, with a number of award-winning series to their credit. They have assembled an prestigious international team of advisors and consultants. WNET has a realistic plan for raising the $7.5 million necessary to complete the project from the PBS/CPB Superfund, corporations, and co-production agreements. An award of $200,000 in FY 87 and continuing funding of $200,000 in FY 88 based on satisfactory progress is recommended.
The Lawrence Hall of Science proposes to develop two 1400 square foot interactive exhibitions based on the latest research findings on the structure and function of the human brain; one for permanent display at the Hall, and one for circulation to 12 science museums over a five year period. The exhibition will use large scale models and equipment from two television programs on the brain. Substantial input from scientists and psychologists will be combined with the educational expertise of curriculum development, museum, and design staff from the Lawrence Hall of Science to create the exhibitions. Visitor and school related curriculum materials will be developed, including a video library and an auditorium show for large group school use. The Lawrence Hall of Science has more than 300,000 visitors per year and is a major science education research and development facility; the twelve host museums will reflect museums in both large and medium sized cities well distributed geographically. More than three million people will view the exhibits over a five year period. The topic is timely, the treatment substantive and educational, and the qualifications of staff and advisors high. The re-use and relationship to a major television series, "The Brain", is an ingenious and effective strategy. The Lawrence Hall of Science is matching the National Science Foundation contribution with comparable private funds. A 24-month FY87 award of $ is recommended.
The American Museum of Natural History proposes to design and build a new permanent 9,000-square-foot Hall of Human Biology and Evolution over a three-year period. The exhibit is to start out with human biology and then move smoothly to human evolution and the fossil record and other evidences of early humans. The new exhibit will range from the molecular/genetic level to the emergence of human beings, and will include archeological excavations and findings, reconstruction and discussion of humanoids, early human evolution, human structure and function, and human diversity. In addition to stimulating the interests of visitors (2.7 million in 1986-87) in human biology and evolution through the use of traditional and interactive technology, the new exhibit program will provide curriculum supplement for elementary and high school classes and teacher-training guides and workshops to assist in the integration of the exhibition materials into classroom studies. The primary educational goal is to give the widest possible audience a concrete sense of where and how the human animal fits in the natural world through examination of the traits that we share with all creatures and those that are peculiar to humans. The exhibit promises further contribution by bridging the current exhibits on animal life and those on the rich ethnological collections on the diversity of human cultures. NSF dollars are to cover the costs only of planning, building and evaluating the exhibit, with no funds for staff.
The American Anthropological Association will develop a 5,000-sq. ft. traveling exhibit, website and educational materials on "Understanding Race and Human Variation." Through an integrated, comprehensive and learner-focused educational program, visitors will be presented with the idea that human variation is part of nature and that race is a dynamic and sometimes harmful cultural construct. The project will advance knowledge across the sciences by bringing together scientists and scholars in translating research to the public and developing a common language.
The Exploratorium will conduct a four-year project to explore the physical nature of sound, the physiology of hearing and the perception of sound, and the process of attentive listening. "Listening" creates 30 exhibits, three listening spaces, and related visitor experiences to complement the Exploratorium's existing "Sound and Hearing" collection. Listening encourages visitors to explore the scientific, physiological, and cultural content of sound, from the physics of sound waves, to the mechanics of the inner ear, to the information, mood, and emotions sound can convey. Listening will inform the public of the scientific, physiological, and cultural content of sound, as well as the negative impact of ambient sound on their health and environment. Listening integrates public programming, exhibit development and visitor studies, representing a new model of collaboration and communication among educators, scientists, artists and the public. At the conclusion of the Exploratorium venue for "Listening," a traveling exhibition of 30 exhibits will circulate to science museums nationwide, supported by materials and training for education programs. A workshop at the annual meeting of the Association of Science-Technology Centers and additional conference presentations and publications will present science center professionals with Listening strategies.
The New York Hall of Science is overseeing a complex, four-year applied research and traveling exhibit development project on "precursor concepts" to the theory of evolution. These concepts pertain to key ideas about life -- variation, inheritance, selection, and time (VIST) -- and are organized around the principle that living things change over time. The central research question is: Can informal, museum-based interventions prepare young children (5 -12) to understand the scientific basis of evolution by targeting their intuitive pre-evolutionary concepts? The work involves many collaborators -- museum personnel around the country, university researchers, exhibit designers and evaluators, web designers, the Association of Science-Technology Centers and a number of advisors in the biological sciences, psychology and in informal and formal education. The products include applied research studies that will add to the conceptual change knowledge base in cognitive psychology, a 1,000 square-foot exhibit plus discovery boxes, a section on the UC-Berkeley Understanding Evolution web site, extensive on site and online staff training opportunities for participating museums and others, several dissemination activities including two research symposia, and bilingual (English and Spanish) exhibit materials and family guides. The project is positioned as a new model in informal science education for integrating research, development and evaluation, with applicability beyond the life sciences to other STEM fields.
This is a planning grant to Independent Broadcasting Associates, Inc. to enable them to obtain and evaluate scientific data about the ecological condition of the Ganges river in South Asia in preparation for a series of documentaries for National Public Radio. The series would combine both science and humanities to consider the meaning of the river in terms of the broad continuum of the Ganges ecosystem. During the planning stage, the PI will: review published literature and determine whether relevant unpublished information is obtainable; screen the obtainable information on the ecological condition of the Ganges/Padma river and identify major causes of the degradation of the river; contact relevant government related bodies within India in order to locate suitable experts and written reports; establish relationships with and conduct interviews amongst relevant non-governmental parties including scientists, industrialists and agriculturalists in order to facilitate future interactions for the purpose of producing the series ; and assess the suggestion that one of the problems with initiatives such as the Ganga Action Plan has been its reliance upon Western models -- both technological and conceptual -- which are often inappropriate to local conditions and realities.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Julian Crandall HollickEmma TomlinTriyugi PrasadGraham ChapmanRoberta Farrell
Kikim Media requests $743,316 to produce four half-hour television documentaries and associated outreach programs based on Michael Pollan's best-selling book, The Botany of Desire. The project explores the reciprocal nature of people's relationship with plants. The programs focus on the connections between apples and the human desire for sweetness; tulips and the desire for beauty; marijuana and the desire for intoxication; and corn and our desire for control over nature. The project will increase public understanding of diverse subjects including genetics, evolution, cognition and biochemistry as well as biodiversity, genetic diversity and the consequences of their loss. The project will have a broad impact through a national primetime PBS broadcast, an outreach program targeting adult audiences, and an educational module delivering appropriate content (excluding intoxication) to middle and high school audiences. Knight-Williams Research Communications will conduct the evaluation for The Botany of Desire television broadcast and outreach efforts.
The California Science Center (CSC) proposes to develop Goosebumps!, a 5,000 sq.ft. traveling exhibition on the science behind feeling scared for the Science Museum Exhibit Collaborative. The exhibition will utilize emotional engagement, as well as aspects of popular culture, to involve visitors in aspects of physiology, neurology, psychology and sociology that relate to the fear response. Exhibit experiences will evoke the fear response in a nonthreatening way and then make those responses the subject of personal exploration. The exhibition will also provide an opportunity for visitors to participate in a Caltech scientific research project based on the fear response. The Science Museum of Minnesota will collaborate with CSC in developing this exhibition. BROADER IMPACT: The exhibition will reach some five million visitors during a five-year tour to 12 other science centers, including the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, PA; the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History in Fort Worth, TX; the Museum of Science in Boston, MA; the Science Museum of Minnesota in St. Paul, MN; the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) in Portland, OR; and the Columbus Museum of Science and Industry (COSI) in Columbus, OH after opening at the California Science Center in Los Angeles, CA. It will advance the field through offering new ways to engage the public in science through explicit focus on visitor emotional engagement.
Universal BEATS developed by The Music Research Institute at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, North Carolina State University's Department of Mathematics, Science, and Technology Education, and NCSU's Kenan Institute for Engineering, Technology, and Science improved elementary education by developing instructional resources for 2nd-5th grade students that infuse cutting-edge content from the emerging field of biomusic into standards-based elementary science and music curricula. The approach used the musical sounds of nature to help students learn concepts in biology, physical science, and anthropology.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
patricia grayEric WiebeDavid TeachoutSarah Carrier
This project will provide for a national tour of a 5,000 square-foot exhibit about the great Inca archaeological site of Machu Picchu, and will give a national public audience the opportunity to view one-of-a-kind and seldom exhibited Inca artifacts, while also learning about archaeological science through engaging interactive exhibits and displays. The exhibit demonstrates how understanding the past through science has made it possible to determine the purpose, activities and the nature of daily life on a royal Inca estate. Laboratory research is at the core of the visitor experience, which will include osteology, paleopathology, astronomy, stable carbon isotope analysis, faunal analysis of animal bones, compositional and structural analysis of metals and ecological analysis of the flora and fauna of the Machu Picchu National Researve in Peru. Project funding will also create a Website including a virtual exhibit tour, a self-guided tour of Machu Picchu and web-based archaeological science curriculum for classroom use. The larger project also includes an international scholarly symposium entitled "The Archaeology of Inca Cuzco." The exhibit will open at the Yale Peabody Museum in January, 2003, and after six months, will travel to Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Denver, Washington, DC and Chicago, before it returns to New Haven for long-term installation at the Peabody. The project will reach an audience estimated at well over 2,000,000 visitors, school children, and Website users.
Massachusetts General Hospital, representing Partners HealthCare System, Inc., is producing a large format film on the brain that is designed to increase the popular understanding of brain biology and recent advances in neuroscience. Framed within the larger question of the unique abilities of the human mind, the project will take an interdisciplinary look at brain science and raise questions about the nature and biological basis of diverse aspects of human experience including consciousness. By following a rider in the Tour de France, the film will illustrate how the brain functions in both normal and stressful situations. Major sequences will explore vision, memory and emotion. Slightly shorter sequences will delve into imagination and creativity, language, dreams and pain. Brief "interludes" will allow the film to reflect on the brain as it is represented in a range of human capabilities. Finally, the film turns it attention to consciousness, self-awareness and the totality of experiencing life as a human. Outreach components of the project include: A weeklong national symposium for museum educators, teachers, and community organizations from all regions of the country. Follow up regional "Brain Workshops" designed to provide more focused project support. "The Brain: Exploratory Trips Into the Final Frontier" -- An Educator/Student Activity Guide Fun Facts Family Guide to "The Brain" An Educational Lobby Kiosk "Head Trip: A Voyage Through the Young Human Mind" -- An illustrated instructional brochure A Brain Website The film will be directed by Bayley Silleck whose prior large format films include "Cosmic Voyage" and "Lost Worlds: Life in the Balance." The lead scientific advisors are Dr. Dennis Selkow, Professor of Neurology and Neuroscience at Harvard Medical School, and Dr. Anne Young, Julieanne Dorn Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School. There also will be a seven-member advisory committee composed of neuroscientists, psychologists and philosophers.