Sesame Street changed everything about education. This "edutainment" was welcomed with open arms by educators, but it changed how children see education itself. It makes them much more receptive to being taught, but only so long as school is Sesame Street style. Postman doesn't of course, blame Sesame Street itself, but rather the creators of television in general, and Postman also doesn't deny that Sesame Street is educational. Television, Postman says, has created the third great learning crisis in the western world, because it is fundamentally changing the way that we learn and what we learn.
The three commandments of television are as follows:
Thou shalt have no prerequisites.
Thou shalt induce no perplexity.
Thou shalt avoid exposition like the ten plagues visited upon Egypt.
Teachers more and more rely on entertaining their students in order to teach them. The Department of Education endorses the use of television as a learning medium, despite evidence otherwise. Education has to become entertainment, or it becomes irrelevant in this society.
How has the internet changed these "commandments?"
Has modern "edutainment" changed the model that Sesame Street began?
Is Sesame Street's long success related to its endorsement by educators?
No comments:
Post a Comment