Category Archives: Research

“MOLLY OF DENALI celebrates life in a rural community—a unique one, but rural all the same. Having that commitment to rural representation carry over into the educational resources is tremendously gratifying. And, the fact that families from rural communities across the US had a hand in their creation added both value and authenticity.”—Stephanie McFadden, Alaska Public Media More than 9.3 million, or nearly one in five students in the United States, attend a rural school (Why Rural Matters 2018-19: The…

The Joan Ganz Cooney Center is thrilled to be part of the Digital Futures Commission, an exciting new initiative that launches this week. The Commission’s goals amplify our own efforts here at the Cooney Center, and we are proud to be part of an international effort to put children’s needs at the center of our increasingly digital world. Why a Digital Futures Commission? Like most transformative innovations, from television to the internet, new digital spaces and tools tend to be…

It’s interesting how much coronavirus has both distanced and gathered people. While we’re distanced physically, many have been connecting in online gathering places. Since April, I have joined video hangouts with five of my siblings and started sharing frequent updates in our new “family group chat”—although the last time we saw each other collectively in person was a few years ago. A group of friends who were inseparable in college, 20+ years ago, haven’t been together in more than a…

“It’s hard to think of a more important audience than kids who are developing their sense of self and their connections to their communities all in this fairly messy and quickly evolving media landscape.”  – Michael Preston Even before the massive disruptions that have now defined 2020, public media leaders were expressing a growing urgency to address the many and diverse needs of youth audiences, who today have more options at their fingertips than ever before within an overwhelming media…

Our colleagues at Stanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab are conducting a research survey to investigate the role of VR in educational strategies catered to children while families are sheltering at home as the COVID-19 pandemic progresses. If you are a parent or guardian of a child in grades K-12 and you have a VR headset at home, please consider participating!    Governments all over the globe have decided to close schools temporarily in an attempt to slow down the…

Young children spend about two hours each day using screen-based media, about half of which is spent on educational media, according to their parents. Many studies report that children can learn a range of skills from well-designed educational media. Yet we know relatively little about whether and how well children are able to apply skills they’ve learned from digital media in the real world. This question is particularly important for subjects that involve learning about the physical world, like science.…

With Sesame Street: Ready for School! A Parent’s Guide to Playful Learning for Children Ages 2 to 5, Dr. Rosemarie Truglio shares the research-based, curriculum-directed school readiness skills that have made Sesame Street the preeminent children’s television program for the past 50 years. The book features eight chapters on key areas of learning and child development, including language, literacy, math, science, logic & reasoning, social & emotional development, healthy habits, and the arts, and offers hands-on activities to help parents incorporate playful…

This past November 7 and 8, the Joan Ganz Cooney Center, Center for Science and the Imagination and the School for the Future of Innovation in Society at Arizona State University, and Dubit convened about 60 field leaders at the inaugural Future of Childhood Salon on Immersive Media and Child Development. As salon participants, these leaders in education, research, pediatric medicine, technology policy, content creation, hardware development, and more began thinking about the opportunities and risks of immersive media (i.e.,…

If you follow the news or have a child in school, it’s easy to believe that science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) concepts are more prominent than ever before. And certainly, the importance of STEM learning and STEM experiences are enjoying a renaissance of media coverage. The reality is, however, that our children have always been capable of STEM learning, yet we are just now learning more about how and when to encourage this type of thinking in a way…

The following excerpt from “More Than a Foundation: Young Children Are Capable STEM Learners” by Elisabeth McClure was originally published in the November 2017 issue of Young Children. It appears here courtesy of NAEYC.     Two second-graders sit on their knees with quiet intensity, stacking unit blocks on a wide tower, higher and higher. A casual observer might think they’re simply enjoying the scale of their project and looking forward to knocking it down. Their teacher might see more,…