Using the theories, we learned about Affect; in this blog I will try to analyse how Sesame Street and Puppetry revolutionised children’s educational learning.
Everything began with the contentious wager that young children might truly learn from television. Episodes devoted to the letter n or the number 5 in its first seasons demonstrated the fervour of its instructional mission and its laser-like emphasis on pedagogy. Sesame Street, however, had more ambitious goals from the moment it was initially conceptualised in a 1967 report delivered by its inventor, Joan Ganz Cooney.
The world created by Sesame Street, which made its debut at the end of the 1960s, was founded on an audacious, if not utopian, vision. The show was proud to be ethnically diverse, big city urban, gritty, and unafraid of controversy. It was also occasionally psychedelic and most scary to some of its early listeners.
If you think about it although the show is targeted at 4-year-olds, and in between its charming, mainstream skits on literacy and numeracy, Sesame Street felt by turns avant-garde, iconoclastic, and revolutionary.
It speaks to a much older audience as well. For example, the primary audience are adolescents, while the secondary or tertiary audience are their parents. Imagine a child watching it with their parent, some of the jokes might be subliminal but a parent would instantly get it. If they approve, they would let their child watch it and in turn encourage other parents to watch it their kids. So, in a way it has an effect on promoting educational viewing.
There is no disputing that the programme redefined the role puppets may play in your upbringing and deserves praise for addressing issues that affect kids (which are also still prevalent). Initially starting off as just a tv show largely funded by Children’s Education Theatre, has expanded into a billion-dollar franchise with multiple tv series, films, video games, musical videos and an ever-expanding merchandise to become self-funded.
Puppets are safe, entertaining, and a logical development from the instructional cartoons that kids probably see at home, puppets are ideal for attracting their (children’s) attention. Puppets encourage children’s imaginations to flourish as they mature and improve their social skills while also boosting the creative avenues that are already available to them.
For example, puppets can be of various colours, sizes and faces and these abstract features lead to characters being more empathetic. Child would instantly associate with such. For them puppets would be like another toy or plush toy. Even in therapy e.g., children how have become voluntarily mute are seen to share their feeling and thoughts only to puppets rather than a being. The best thing about puppets is that you send all kinds of messages through them to every age group and no one would mind. The visuals of the puppets create a sense of relatability and that is what has made sesame street so effective.
The impact that it had is enormous. It was not only translated into different adaptations but every country or so has its own localized version of Sesame street with some of the same principal characters.
It tackled on topics from divorce and school bullying up to sexual harassment and racism. They created emotional engagement not only through their script but characters designed are what sold it. The characters designed are mostly animals, caricatures or similar to child’s crayon drawing. No matter the audience, this revolutionary program is able to appeal to all ages and genders, as each viewer can see him or herself in at least one, if not all, of the characters and that is the beauty of it.
References
Anon., 2013. University of Wisconsin Madison. [Online]
Available at: https://news.wisc.edu/uw-analysis-shows-learning-impact-of-sesame-street-around-the-world/
Anon., 2017. Fast Company. [Online]
Available at: https://www.fastcompany.com/3067108/how-sesame-street-taught-kids-about-emotions-long-before-schools-caught-on
Anon., 2019. Estyn. [Online]
Available at: https://www.estyn.gov.wales/effective-practice/using-puppets-promote-childrens-emotional-understanding
Anon., 2020. Grant Larson Productionns. [Online]
Available at: https://www.grantlarsonproductions.com/blog/why-sesame-street-iswas-so-important-for-kids
Lattman, S., 2019. USC Dornsife. [Online]
Available at: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/3108/sesame-street-turns-50-the-secret-to-educational-success-at-tvs/
Merrill, S., 2019. Edutopia. [Online]
Available at: https://www.edutopia.org/article/how-sesame-streets-muppets-became-revolutionaries/
Romano, A., 2017. Voxx. [Online]
Available at: https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/10/9/16447882/sesame-street-traumatic-experiences-series
Arsalan Awais 