only by accident . . .

[realthog]

. . . was my attention drawn to this. Yes, sure, I noticed a mention in avengangle's blog but, as the program concerned had never meant anything to me (what with my having been brought up in a foreign country where, doncha know, jackbooted NHS feminazis eradicate all who would resist their sadistic whims), I didn't react. Now, though, because my tame Google Alerts thought the article was about moi, I've learnt more:

Did you hear the news? The Rainbow has evaporated. The oil slick it shimmered on has dried up into the concrete. No more butterfly. No more LeVar Burton. No more storybooks and pan-and-scan illustrations on PBS. Didn't you hear? The money is in CGI. The money is in math, computers, and phonics.

They ceased producing new episodes of Reading Rainbow in 2006 and now the show has been canceled completely, airing its last episode yesterday. The show will have no replacement, neither functionally nor philosophically, and this is an intentional government policy. The show has been taken off the air for political reasons. For educational reasons.

Here's NPR interviewing PBS content director John Grant, who explains why Reading Rainbow is going off the air:

"The show's run is ending, Grant explains, because no one – not the station, not PBS, not the Corporation for Public Broadcasting – will put up the several hundred thousand dollars needed to renew the show's broadcast rights.

"Grant says the funding crunch is partially to blame, but the decision to end Reading Rainbow can also be traced to a shift in the philosophy of educational television programming. The change started with the Department of Education under the Bush administration, he explains, which wanted to see a much heavier focus on the basic tools of reading – like phonics and spelling.

All of which really means that the Bush Administration's education gurus must have been completely fucking stupid, and if the Obama Administration's equivalents aren't reversing the policy fast then they're just as bad. Yes, some kids require phonics and spelling, and who would deny that their school education should include this. But I know -- from my own childhood, and from watching my kid when she was small, and from a zillion other sources -- that what makes kids learn to read is realizing, by observation, what fun reading is.

Ideally, what gets the message through is that the child's parents are constantly wrapped round yummy books, but we have to recognize there are far too many homes in which that ain't gonna happen. So one of several next best things is a tv program promoting reading as fun.

And now kids don't have that any more.

Good move, PBS. Good move, US.

Comments

[avengangle.livejournal.com]

the Bush Administration's education gurus must have been completely fucking stupid

Well, that goes without saying.

I think if you ask anyone in the Obama Administration about this, they'd say that they have bigger dragons to slay. Yeah, I know that this one small thing isn't the most important thing in the world, but it's something that means a lot to a good deal of people like me. I don't know that a hasty about-face on this policy would have saved Reading Rainbow this year, but it would at least be a smart change.

I wish I could link you to a whole episode of Reading Rainbow to show the glories of being taught that reading is fun by Lt. Geordi La Forge Kunta Kinte LeVar Burton, but I can't find any.

[awallens.livejournal.com]

I was one of the kids who was very affected by Reading Rainbow. Every time I got home from school and if my parents would let me, I would watch Reading Rainbow. I will have to write more about this in my personal journal. I will post it publicly and link it back here, if it's not an inconvenience.

[realthog.livejournal.com]

"link it back here, if it's not an inconvenience"

By all means please do: I'm honoured. The relevant post by avengangle is at http://avengangle.livejournal.com/379227.html, should you want to link to that, too.

[awallens.livejournal.com]

My post is at:
http://awallens.livejournal.com/691339.html
Just a contemplative entry...

[realthog.livejournal.com]

Thanks for giving this link to an excellent post.

[hutch0.livejournal.com]

You've started spelling `programme' `program.'

[realthog.livejournal.com]

"You've started spelling `programme' `program.'"

I did so deliberately to avoid any of my wingnut readers picking me up on my "spelling error".

[hutch0.livejournal.com]

Hm...

[realthog.livejournal.com]

Troof!

(You're only being like this because you're jealous of my new icon, I know.)

[hutch0.livejournal.com]

I'm only being like this because I'm engaged in a life-or-death struggle with our subs, who insist on spelling `computer program' as `computer programme.' I keep telling them, `It's television or radio programme, it's computer program.' Do they listen? Do they buggery.
I was going to say I liked the icon. It's a nice pic.

[realthog.livejournal.com]

I was going to say I liked the icon. It's a nice pic.

And still you're not a cricket fan?

[hutch0.livejournal.com]

Well, I did pay some attention to the Ashes...

[realthog.livejournal.com]

Ms Guha doesn't play for that England team, with its occasional success, but for the one that's #1 in the world, has claimed the Ashes twice in a row, and has beaten all comers in all forms of the game for the past two years or so . . .

[hutch0.livejournal.com]

*sigh* Yes, Paul, I know. I just answered your query about my interest in cricket by saying I'd paid some vague, passing attention to the recent tournament. Actually, I only did it so I could take the piss out of someone in the office who's a real fan, but England confounded me by winning the Ashes.