Nebraskans for Public Television is developing the math strand in Reading Rainbow. Under this grant, the project will "re-purpose" 30 existing Reading Rainbow program for use in mathematics learning, produce two new math-focused programs, and institute a comprehensive outreach campaign. Books currently being considered for the new programs are Mama Bear, which looks at money and its uses and examines some simple economics; and Echoes for the Eye which explores patterns in nature. The outreach will solicit and involve families served by the National Urban League; recruit school and community-based children's librarians in the math-based literature effort; and expand the local public broadcasting outreach efforts related to the math focus of the series from the eight model stations in the previous year to all interested public television stations. The target will be to involve at least 75 stations in substantive outreach to families and schools. The project also will develop and disseminate a new print piece modeled after the very successful Math is Everywhere Reading Rainbow Teachers Guide which has been used by over 3,000 teachers. Twila Liggett will continue as Executive Producer and Project Manager and LeVar Burton will remain as host and Co-Executive Producer. Cecily and Larry Truett will be Supervising Producer and Producer/Director respectively. Advisors include Herbert Ginsburg from Teachers College, Columbia University; Lucille Mahon, Math Coordinator, NYC Community School District 2; Solomon Garfunkel, Executive Director, COMAP, Inc.; and Judith Jacobs, Director of the Center for Education and Equity in Mathematics, Science, and Technology at California State Polytechnic University.
WGBH Educational Foundation is producing Season I of Zoom, a daily half-hour television series for children aged 8 to 11. Zoom, which is based on the highly successful 1970's series of the same name, features a cast of seven children who engage in activities and examine ideas submitted by youth who watch the show. The new Zoom will have an enhanced educational concentration, an emphasis on science and math activities and projects, and a comprehensive outreach campaign. A major focus of the series will be to develop "Habits of Mind" which promote the capacity to think about the same ideas and evidence in multiple ways; collect, organize, and recognize patterns in data; identify questions that can be answered through scientific investigations; and develop skills of estimation, judgment, and data literacy. Season I will have three over-arching science and math-based themes: Structures, Things That Go, and Living Things. Each program will include two or three science and math segments, as well as encouragement to try these activities at home. From time to time, the cast will provide a "challenge" for viewers by asking them to conduct an activity as home and send in their results for presentation on a later show. Field-produced segments will feature children engaged in science or math projects that they have found particularly fascinating and have done on their own. The series also will revisit projects or "challenges" over the course of a season to demonstrate that science is an on-going, evolving endeavor and that new information may change old assumptions. Zoom outreach activities will include a Zoom science guide for educators, a World Wide Web Site, museum Zoom rooms, community partnerships with three national organizations that work with underserved children. In addition, every viewer who writes, calls an 800 number, or sends an e-mail will receive a free four-page newsletter with directions needed to complete activities from the series and to tackle challenge s that the cast issues to the audience. Kate Taylor will be Executive Producer for the project. She has been co-executive producer for Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? and for Degrassi Junior High. The Science and Math Director will be Candace Julyan, Senior Project Director at TERC. The Director of Outreach will be Beth Kirsch who oversees the development and implementation of national outreach campaigns for WGBH. The staff will work closely with a group of consultants and advisors with expertise in such areas as science and mathematics, informal science, outreach, and evaluation.
This grant provides support for Season IV of The Magic School Bus, the fully animated PBS series targeted at youth ages 6-9. Components of Season IV will include 13 new episodes, educational support for teachers and youth leaders, dissemination and presentations at major educational conferences, promotion, and summative evaluation. The new programs will bring the total number of programs to 54 making it possible to broadcast the series as a daily strip without undue repeat broadcast which might cause the series to loose its freshness. All of the current principal staff of the project will remain for the fourth season. Cheryl Gotthelf will be PI and Executive Project Director. Jane Startz will be Co-PI and Executive Producer for the series and Michael Templeton will be a Co-PI and Science Content Director. Kristin Martin will continue as Supervision Producer.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Deborah ForteCheryl GotthelfJane StartzMichael Templeton
The Genome Radio Project, through the Pacifica Foundation, will produce nine one-hour radio documentaries and a live two-hour Town Hall on current genome research. The goals of the project are: o to provide background information on the theories and techniques of human genetic science, o to raise the social, ethical, and legal issues and concerns associated with human genetic research, and o to provide an opportunity for the public to interact with the scientific experts and policy makers. The specific programs include: o DNA and Behavior: Is Our Fate in Our Genes? o Prenatal Genetic Testing: Better Babies Through Science? o Gene Testing; Do You Really Want to Know Your Future? o Gene Therapy: Medicine For Your Genes. o DNA and the Law o The Commercialization of Genetic Information o Eugenics, Past and Present o Race, Evolution, and Philosophy in the Age of Genetics o The Human Genome Project: Roadmap to the Human Body The radio programs will be supplemented by a variety of printed and electronic ancillary materials exploring the science, ethics, and social impact of human genetic research. The project will be under the Bari Scott who will serve as PI. She has most recently been Executive Producer for The Telecommunication Radio Project. The Co-PI's will be Mat Binder, an Independent radio producer and instructor at the University of California, and Jude Thilman, the Project Director/Host of The communications Revolution, the nationally syndicated, live series on new telecommunications technologies. The principal consultants responsible for the science content of the project will be Sylvia Spengler, Deputy Director of The Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory Human Genome Center and Lane Conn, Coordinator of the Human Genome Education program at the Stanford University Human Genome Center. The science consultants and production staff will work closely with approximately thirty genome scientists nationwide who have formally agreed to advise the project.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Barinetta ScottJudith ThilmanMatt Binder
National Public Radio will produce and distribute a weekly, one-hour program entitled, "Weekly Edition: Science, The Environment, and Technology," which consists of a compilation of the best science stories aired during the previous week on "Morning Edition," "All Things Considered," and "Weekly Edition." Each program will be varied, looking back at the week in science and reviewing main stories. The hour format also will enable the producers to go into greater depth than was done in the daily coverage. They will expand the news pieces with additional interviews and/or out-takes reporters were unable to use on the daily programs. As part of the NPR outreach program, the project will develop "Weekly Science" on "Kids Connection (Science Friday)" as part of the World Wide Web. Each week, that week's program as well as additional science information and bibliographies will be entered on the "Science Friday" homepage. The PI and executive producer for the series will be Anne Gudenkauf, Senior Editor at NPR. Richard Harris and Joe Palca will host the series. Harris has been an on-air host for NPR produced summaries of congressional action on health reform and both have substituted for Ira Flatow on NPR'S TALK OF THE NATION: SCIENCE FRIDAY. The program producer will be Jane Greenhalgh.
Discovery will develop and disseminate museum activity manuals and hands-on science activity materials to Magic School Bus museum sites nationwide. These materials will enable participating museums to: o provide enrichment activities, demonstrations, tabletop exhibits, and other science programming to support seasons III and IV of The Magic School Bus series; and o maintain and nurture collaborations at each site between schools and teachers, public television stations, youth-serving organizations, libraries, and the museum. The key staff will include Jerald H. Reynolds of Discovery Place who will be PI and will have responsibility for coordination of The Magic School Bus collaborative. Marcia Rudy, Director of Public Programs at the New York Hall of Science will lead the development team for the museum activity manuals. Rhonda Kiest, Director of Educational Exhibits at the Children's Museum of Houston, will have primary responsibility for design of the new tabletop exhibits and for upkeep of the two Scholastic's The MAGIC SCHOOL BUS Inside the Earth exhibits that are now traveling to museums. Cheryl Gotthelf, the Executive Project Director for The Magic School Bus television series will assure coordination between the museum project and series development.
The Science Education Department of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics will produce and evaluate a pilot for a series of after school television program targeted at youth aged 9 -12. The series, which is based on the research into children's misperceptions about science conducted by the applicant, will help viewers make sense of often poorly understood or misunderstood science principles. The project will be highly interactive through the use of the Internet and 800 numbers. In the television series, viewers will see "evidence" for different ways to interpret basic science concepts and will be called upon to make sense of the key evidence, conduct further investigation on their own, and register their findings via the Internet and World Wide Web or by calling an 800 number. In response to the viewer's verdict, local stations will air either a "guilty" or "innocent" resolution -- both of which will clarify the science concept being considered. The PI for the project will be Philip Sadler, Director of the Science Education Department at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. The Project Manager will be Matthew Schneps, Director of the Science Media Group. Education and science content will be the responsibility of Hal Coyle, a science teacher and curriculum developer, and Roy Gould, an Education Specialist at the Center. The principal science advisor will be Irwin Shapiro, Director of the Center for Astrophysics, and the chief educational advisor will be Charles Whitney, Prof. Emeritus Harvard University. The video will be produced in cooperation with Terra Associates in New York.
This project will examine the implications of the intersection of art, science, and technology as revealed by the events occurring around the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the first general electronic computer, ENIAC-50. The finished product will be radio programming and audio material that presents the coming together of scientists, artists, and other participants in Philadelphia. It will build on the previous research and explorations in both of these fields toward finding commonalties and ways in which each has influenced the other. The finished product will be broadcast for the general public and also can be made available to scientists and educators in the field as resource material for courses, seminars, and lectures as they explore the intersections of science and art and implications this has for research and education.
The American Society for Microbiology will undertake a planning effort to further develop the key themes and scientific elements of a television-based project to inform the general public about current research and theories in microbiology. The specific planning activities will include: o Clarifying the vision of how the science will be made accessible and interesting for the general public o Expanding the composition and role of the scientific advisory panel o Reviewing and modifying the scientific content of the project o Improving the coherence and clarity of the scientific themes in the television series A principal means of achieving these goals will be to convene review meeting in conjunction with a colloquium held by the American Academy of Microbiology which many of the leading scientists in the field will attend.
David Grubin Production, Inc., in conjunction with Thirteen/WNET, is producing a multimedia project entitled, The Secret Life of the Brain. The project will examine new understandings into the processes of the human brain that have developed over the last decade. Through an exploration of the brain's normal development from conception through old age, the project conveys the most recent knowledge available. The series will enable audiences to appreciate the current revolution in neuroscience, understand how new technologies have enabled scientists to unearth a wealth of information, and learn how neuroscience research impacts the health and future well-being of the average person. The five one-hour programs in the series will explore the brain from conception through age two, childhood from age two through puberty, adolescence, adulthood, and normal aging process in older age. Educational outreach materials for use in informal and formal setting will include two separate sets of printed materials, one for adolescents and one for adults. A Secret Life of the Brain Web Site will include Brain Games, the Brain Quiz, and the Live Brain that present learning opportunities for adults and teens. The project Principal Investigator will be David Grubin who will serve as Executive Producer. Grubin previously was the producer of Healing and the Mind with Bill Moyers and the critically acclaimed biographies of Lyndon Johnson, Franklin Roosevelt, and Theodore Roosevelt. June Kinoshita, an internationally recognized science reporter and editor, will serve as the Series Science Editor. Lead advisors for each program will be Bruce McEwen, President-elect of the Society for Neuroscience and Professor at Rockefeller University (Program 1); Steve Petersen, Director, Division of Neuropsychology, Dept. of Neurology and Neurological Surgery at the Washington University School of Medicine (Program 2); Steven Hyman, Director of the National Institute of Mental Health (Programs 3 & 4); and Carl Cotman, Director for the Institute for Brain Aging and Dementia at the University of California, Irvine (Program 5). Robert Miller of WNET will be responsible for the educational materials to accompany The Secret Life of the Brain.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
David GrubinTamara RobinsonWilliam Grant
This Communicating Research to Public Audiences (CRPA) proposal is based upon Dr. Melanie Stiassny's and her associates' taxonomic and biodiversity research of the fauna in the lower Congo River. The PI has used innovative hydrologic modeling, remote sensing, habitat mapping and spatial analysis to explore and explain the biological richness of this unique river system. The CRPA request will support the production of a short documentary film that will be produced and distributed by the American Museum of Natural History's high definition video current science program Science Bulletins. The video will be captioned in both French and Spanish to make it accessible to colleagues in Africa and Spanish-speaking students throughout the United States. In addition, the AMNH will host the PI presenting a public program about her research discoveries. This live program will be rebroadcast by the New York Academy of Science via their podcast series "Science and the City."
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Melanie StiassnyEdward GardinerVivian Trakinski
READING RAINBOW, produced by Nebraskans for Public television/Great Plains National ITV Library, is a fifty part continuing PBS children's television series which entices children ages five through eight to read good books. The present project seeks to integrate quality science books into their nationally successful PBS series, thus encouraging children's interest in science and making science books more visible. Six science programs have been produced with prior NSF support; this award will support the production of nine additional half hour READING RAINBOW programs with scientific themes that will become an integral part of the on-going series. A special promotional effort will also be funded to reach early elementary teachers who have not yet discovered Reading Rainbow programs. Targeted at five to eight years olds, READING RAINBOW receives heavy in- school use as well as at-home viewing. It is carried by virtually all PBS affiliates, reaching 95% of the nation's households and 8 million series viewers. In addition to receiving all major children's television awards, READING RAINBOW has demonstrated both increased summer reading and increased requests by title for the books reviewed. The opportunity for increasing attention to science books for early readers is outstanding. NSF support is 31% of the total budgeted; the remainder will be provided by the Kellog Company, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and by PBS station.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Twila LiggettLee RockwellJack McBride