Tag Archives: literacy

If you happened to be visiting Independence National Historical Park in late October, you might have seen some of us educators and park rangers walking around with cell phones and taking pictures of things not normally featured on the postcards sold in the Park’s gift store. In addition to the Liberty Bell and the Mall, these photos included steam coming out of manhole covers, late budding plants growing along the parks’ edges, sidewalk patterns made of river stones, bricks and…

This guest post summarizes a research paper discussing how Latino children collaboratively search the internet with their adult family members to solve family needs. The research for this project began while Jason Yip was a Research Fellow at the Cooney Center in 2013-14, and has just been presented at the ACM Computer Supported Collaborative Work Conference on November 5th. Read the paper here. Searching for online information is not equitable. People search online to find recipes and to plan trips, but also to find…

It’s August. August? How did that happen? We are facing a new school year, which as a parent of a 6- and 8-year-old I am simultaneously saddened about (where has the time gone?) and relieved by (these kids need to get back to school!). As the end of summer approaches, it’s time to start thinking about preparing for school. Are the kids ready? Not just in terms of getting their stuff ready (school supplies, anyone?), but also emotionally and academically.…

This week, libraries, schools, and organizations across the country are highlighting the importance of media literacy. Regardless of the type of media, children and adults need to be savvy consumers. According to NAMLE, media literacy is defined as “the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, create, and act using all forms of communication.” Headlines about fake news and misinformation have driven home the vital need for critical thinking skills among all ages. While much of the media literacy attention focuses on…

Imagine: a young child looks up at an adult expectantly and hands them a book. It’s hard to say no to a simple request like that, so the adult settles down next to the child and dives into the story. When we break this adult-child book-reading interaction down, there are many elements that vary. For example: The physical proximity and orientation of the adult and child. Is the child sitting in the adult’s lap? Are they next to each other at a…

The “Endless” apps by Originator (Endless Alphabet, Endless Numbers, etc.) all follow a reliable and effective formula: genuinely funny antics + solid educational content = learning that sticks.  Most of their apps feature a lovable and irreverent cast of cute monsters who help to illustrate the definition of words, the meanings of sentences and the value of numbers through silly animations.  I was pleased to be able to interview Originator founder Rex Ishibashi in this most recent episode of the App Fairy to…

Welcome 2017!  For the Joan Ganz Cooney Center team, this is a very special year.  In December, we will celebrate our tenth year as an organization dedicated to advancing learning for children in the digital age. For those who follow our work closely, you will recall our first report—an analysis of the rapidly evolving digital landscape of educational toys, software and games called D is for Digital which found that the marketplace was full of products that may have had…

When we think of apps for kids, we often think of games for either entertainment or learning. But apps aren’t limited to just games or books—they can also provide important social, emotional, and physical experiences too. In Family Time With Apps, we explore how to find the best apps to fit your child’s needs, provide tips on how (and why!) to use apps together, and highlight resources to make the process of selecting apps less overwhelming, and more fun. To help you…

Over the past several years, New America and the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop have become known for our book Tap, Click, Read and for our joint research and analysis on how digital technologies could be used to improve, instead of impede, early literacy.  Now our two organizations are going a step further: This month we are releasing a toolkit of materials designed to help educators and other leaders put these insights into practice to help children learn…

This month we’re kicking off a series of posts on media mentorship, a term coined by Lisa Guernsey in 2014. We’re thrilled to have Claudia Haines and Cen Campbell, authors of the recently released Becoming a Media Mentor: A Guide for Working with Children and Families, share their expertise as librarians. Have you been to your local public library lately? On any given day, all across the country, something amazing happens. Herds of young children, caregivers in tow, tumble through…