Goodbye, Reading Rainbow 1983-2009

[TheMightyFavog]

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112312561

Reading Rainbow comes to the end of its 26-year run on Friday; it has won more than two-dozen Emmys
The show, which started in 1983, was hosted by actor LeVar Burton. (If you don't know Burton from Reading Rainbow, he's also famous for his role as Kunta Kinte in Roots, or as the chrome-visored Geordi La Forge on Star Trek: The Next Generation.)

(snip)

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.

[redqueen]

1. Instilling a true love of reading can't be done by focusing on things like phonics and spelling.

It's sad that a focus on nuts and bolts means the end of this wonderful show.

*sigh*

[Deja Q]

4. Well, people thinking sex education is just describing what parts go where too...

The deeper WHYs to things, and their philosophies (the human factor), are forgotten in our plastic fantastic society. Then wonder why disease and unwanted pregnancies keep going up and up.

[redqueen]

10. Good point.

A lot is being left out, not sure why.

There are courses on sexuality in college... seems like the time to discuss that would be in a sex ed class, while learning the mechanics.

[Deja Q]

2. PBS just wants royalties from Elmo products - from the laughing doll right down to the Elmo vibrator

They don't give a damn about anything else.


Was LeVar Burton the host for ALL 26 years? He was a good presenter.

[supernova]

3. Once again, mindless drills replace love of story

and characters and imagination.

*sigh*

RR wasn't about teaching kids to read, it was about getting kids to find books they liked, LOVED even.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

5. One of my favorite shows growing up.

What a shame.

But you don't have to take my word for it.

[redqueen]

11. That was my favorite line in the show...

'but you don't have to take my word for it'. :)

[HopeHoops]

6. The Bush War on Education has been terrible.

NCLB is all about shifting funding out of public schools and into private or deceptively named "charter" schools. The emphasis on JUST reading and math has caused many districts to cull all classes like art and music. In some lower-end districts, the "low-performers" take nothing but reading and math classes. No science, nothing. It is all "teach to test" programming. The federal funding is tied directly to the test scores. It is class warfare and nothing less. Underfunded districts that don't perform well end up with less money - great idea, eh?

This isn't education.

Reading Rainbow can and probably will return at some point. It was one of the only reasons we got cable at all (for nine months while my youngest was in kindergarten). Mr. Rogers and Between the Lions were the other two.

[tabbycat31]

7. We watched that in school in the 80s

I have fond memories of that show

[TheMightyFavog]

8. My Faves...

The dinosaur one, the Magic Paintbrush one where they went to Chinatown and the computer graphics studio, the one where they visited the set of ST:TNG, and, of course, the one where they had Pete Seeger do Abi-Yoyo.

Come to think of it, they had some great celebrities reading the books.

Lou Rawls, Al Roker, Pete Seeger, Eartha Kitt,

[City of Mills]

9. LeVar Burton

:)

[ceile]

12. That makes me very sad.

I still watch it sometimes just to see if it will have the same effect on me. It does. Such encouragement of imagination....

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

13. Awww... :-(

I used to love that show when I was a kid. I discovered so many great books because of it. Hats off to the producers, crew, etc. for a great run.

[GreenPartyVoter]

14. Phonics and spelling are very important, but so is exposure to good literature. There

should be a balance and I am so very sorry that this excellent show that reached so many children will no longer be on the air. :(

[gauguin57]

15. I was already a grownup when this show came on ... but I still watch it sometimes!

And I don't have kids. Sometimes, the little field trips LeVar Burton takes us on are very interesting! And I love seeing those little kids do their book reviews. They get so jazzed about the books they're reading ... it's inspiring!

I will miss this show. There's a new baby in our extended family, and I am heartbroken that she won't get to watch Reading Rainbow in a few years. I'll have to check for DVD's for a future Xmas gift to her.

So sad to see this go. And yes ... LeVar has been a wonderful host!

[proteus_lives]

16. That's sad.

I loved that show when I was little. It's a great teaching tool.

[defendandprotect]

17. Corporation for Public Broadcasting is a PRIVATE corporation which the Repugs . . .

put in charge of PBS . . .

one day last weekend, one of my PBS stations was playing a re-run of "Bonanza" . . .!!!

Repug efforts to destroy public TV and public radio have succeeded and evidently the

public has barely noticed so entranced were they by fundraising!!!

If we truly want public broadcasting - TV or radio -- we need to sell licenses as other

nations do to support it. Directly from the public to public networks.

[SidneyCarton]

18. Another casualty of the war on thought.

We aren't supposed to be able to read anymore to expand our minds, so long as we can read the crawl on F*x news, who cares about anything else.

[Junkdrawer]

19. George Carlin was right...

"Well we know what they want. They want more for themselves, and less for everybody else, but I’ll tell you what they don’t want – they don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that – that doesn’t help them. That’s against their interests. That’s right. They don’t want people that are smart enough to sit around a kitchen table, and think about how badly they’re getting screwed by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago. They don’t want that. You know what they want? Obedient workers – Obedient workers, people who are just smart enough to run the machines, and do that paper work. And just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime, and vanishing pension that disappear the minute you go to collect it, and now they’re coming for your social security money. They want your retirement money. They want it back so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street, and you know something? They’ll get it – they’ll get it all from you sooner or later cause they own this place. It’s a big club, and you aint in it. You, and I are not in The Big Club."