Today is the 56th birthday of one of our most beloved childhood companions: Bill Nye (yes, the Science Guy). To celebrate, and to prove that TV doesn’t always rot your brain, Mom, we’ve compiled a list of the coolest-ever educational shows for kids, on everything from biology to grammar to drawing. Click through to see our list and indulge in a little smarty-pants nostalgia, and be sure to let us know which of your favorites we’ve missed in the comments (yes, we left out Schoolhouse Rock, but it isn’t strictly a television show). Hey, maybe you’ll even learn something! Full disclosure: we did. Read More »
When Reading Rainbow went off the air in 2006, it was a bit hard to believe. How could a show responsible for fostering a love of books and reading in kids for so many years just go away? It seemed absurd that the PBS show wouldn’t exist. Thankfully, LeVar Burton, who was the show’s host and responsible for its creation, is bringing the brand back as an interactive iPad app. He tells Venture Beat that his company RRKidz is compiling an initial library of 300 iPad and smartphone books, including roughly 50 to be voiced by Burton himself. The idea is to make the books interactive with animation, voices, games, videos, and other multimedia content. The app might be free to download or it titles could be accessed with a subscription plan; to be honest, it sounds like they haven’t figured that part out yet. Still, it’s hard to nitpick with a guy who refuses to stop trying to make reading cool. “I would be stupid to ignore history. But if I had listend to all the people when I was 19 years old who said it would be too tough to be an actor, I would not be where I am today,” Burton said. [via FastCompany]
Reading Rainbow, the book-centric PBS children’s series, has reached the end of its 26-year run, NPR reports. We remember it best as the show various babysitters parked us in front of during our formative years, but we do love to read, so maybe its message sank in. We weep for host LeVar Burton and his legion of fans, even though we have to admit that we didn’t know the show was still on the air. Blame it on the recession…oh yeah, and George W. Bush’s education policy. Because the show stresses why kids should love reading rather than how to read, it’s not in line with the Bush administration’s focus on phonics and spelling. So basically, George W. Bush killed Reading Rainbow. After the jump, a guided tour through some timeless Reading Rainbow clips. Read More »
