Happy 40th Birthday, Sesame Street!!

November 10, 9:10 AMIndianapolis Homeschooling ExaminerBetty Malone

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Happy Birthday Sesame Street Gang!!

Sesame Street is 40 years old! Wow, how did I miss this news? Well, almost missed it! Forty years of some of the most educational, enlightening, and powerful children’s television ever made that continues to provide amazing educational value to children around the world.  Happy Birthday Big Bird and all the gang. I must admit a fondness for Grouch, who certainly allowed my grouchy children to realize it was okay to be grouchy sometimes, but when you overdid, you went in the trash can! And of course, his goodness shown through his grouchiness so artfully that children didn’t even realize they were learning how to be a good heart.

In a recent conversation with a Christian homeschool mother, she expressed reservations about the secular world view presented on Sesame Street and I have spent some time thinking about what her concerns might mean to parents wanting to communicate their values. I cannot dismiss her concerns but after carefully evaluating my own children’s experience and all the excellent truths they learned from Big Bird, Ernie, Cookie Monster and all, I think the risk is minimal to corruption of your family values.

There is no hardsell on Sesame Street. Every lesson, and many are just plain academic, is delivered with so much fun involved and so gently and unobtrusively, that if you as a parent feel that something doesn’t quite jibe with your family values, you have ample opportunity to explain and discuss. From the objections I’ve read, most of them appear overblown and at times suspect of paranoia. E.g. the supposed homosexual relationship between Bert and Ernie. I asked my adult children if they ever thought there was anything odd about Bert and Ernie, along those lines, when they were kids. They laughed and emphatically said, “No!” And all three sons have grown up to be quite manly..although there is a touch of Ernie is all of them, curious, interested, compassionate and involved in life.

This season’s theme is bringing health and nature into children’s lives and the premiere episode today, November 10, has First Lady, Michelle Obama guest-starring and sharing her love of vegetables, via gardening with Big Bird and the gang at Sesame Street.

Sesame Street began in 1969 with multiple joint grants from the Carnegie Institute and the federal government with one distinct goal: to bring the latest knowledge about child development, television innovations and preschool education to American’s children in an effort to enrich their environment.

From the beginning, Jim Henson’s Muppet characters like Big Bird were central to the show’s success. Curricular goals for Sesame Street included letter recognition, math skills and communicating life skills that would enable school success in our modern culture. Those goals still remain the focus of Sesame Street producers and writers. With 100 Emmy Awards and countless other accolades, Sesame Street is considered to be one of  the most influential television shows of all time, impacting children in 125 countries worldwide.

 For educational value, the Sesame Street website is packed with fun and educational opportunities for preschoolers and young elementary students, like the Counting Eggs Game. So easy, so simple but so fun. And that sums up Sesame Street. What a legacy Jim Henson and the producers and writers of Sesame Street through the years have left future generations.

Amazon has new copies of our favorite Sesame Street Sings video..It's quite fun to watch a 32 old bearded man (my son) sing Lady Bug Picnic with our granddaughter. It's a lovely, fun video of songs to sing together. And you can purchase it for under $5.00!

And for absolute fun, here is Cookie Monster singing my favorite Sesame Street song, C is for Cookie!!www.youtube.com/watch