2. It's misleading to suppose there's any basic difference between education & entertainment. This distinction merely relieves people of the responsibility of looking into the matter. Marshall McLuhan. Hot & Cool. 1967. "Marshall McLuhan." Wikiquote 21 October, 2009. < http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Marshall_McLuhan >
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4. Sesame Street "if you can hold the attention of children, you can educate them" - Malcolm Gladwell, Tipping Point Edutainment
5. The Wire Similar to Sesame St., but different... Edutainment ?
6. Science Museums Pros: makes science accessible and fun Cons: detracts from role of museum as place for historic preservation and deeper education Edutainment
7. The Physics of Superheroes , James Kakalios, Gotham, 2005 Entertainment as Education
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9. Homer's Odessey Epic poem centered on Odysseus, Greek hero time span: 10+ years
10. Joyce's Ulysses Novel centered on Leopold Bloom, anti-hero time span: 1 day Educational but does it entertain?
11. 24's Jack Bauer TV series centered on Jack Bauer time span: 24 hours Hero or anti-hero? Entertaining but does it educate?
12. Everything Bad is Good for You How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter Steven Johnson, 2005
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14. New Tools Alex Chapin Middlebury College October 23, 2009 Blending Education and Entertainment
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19. Apple iTunes Store iTunes integrates into one Library Music, Movies, TV Shows, Applications, Audiobooks, Podcasts and iTunes U
20. iTunes U iTunes U is a channel specifically for educational institutions that is free
21. iTunes U iTunes U allows institutions to set up their own channels
25. Blending Metadata Apple's recommendations for how to use metadata fields Metadata fields used by iTunes based on ID3 metadata specification that was designed for music
Editor's Notes
Doc | Spreadsheet | Slides This Google Doc has been set up to help write out ideas about the MBMH Seminar team topic &quot;blending of education and entertainment.&quot; In addition to this document a spreadsheet and slides have also been created.
while edutainment has some value I don't think is is want we're interested in... Historical examples: -parables and fables Modern examples: -guided nature tours that entertain while educating participants on animal life and habitats - video game that teaches children conflict resolution skills. -TV dramas that weave into plots messages about family planning, literacy Grey's Anatomy TV Series--storylines about organ transplantation and cancer Michael Resnick at the MIT Media Lab refers to it as using entertainment as &quot;sugar-coating&quot; for education
Sesame Street is one of the best examples of edutainment. What makes it exceptional is its playful creative quality and how it encourages viewers to participate -1968 first created -built around an inner-city street to attract viewers from lower income households -utilized &quot;different elements&quot; of commercial television: &quot;a strong visual style, fast-moving action, humor, and music&quot;. -encourage &quot;coviewing&quot; with the use of humor, which was written into the show so that children and their parents could appreciate it together The research team designated a &quot;curriculum focus&quot; every season, and identified and emphasized a &quot;small set of related objectives&quot; that were written into each episode
The Wire is another TV show that takes place in inner city. -The Wire has frequently been described by critics as the greatest television series of all time. [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] Sesame Street was the first children's television program that included a curriculum &quot;detailed or stated in terms of measurable outcomes&quot;. [39] The Wire is praised as a realistic portrayal of urban life, artistic ambitions, and uncommonly deep exploration of sociopolitical themes. -Both shows involve considerably research bringing in experts to inform details/methodology of shows David Simon was a police reporter. Co-writer Ed Burns a detective and public school teacher, many involved had 1st hand experience with issues covered by the show Novelistic style -no flashbacks or voice over is used. -the viewer needs to follow every conversation closely in order to understand who's who and what's going on.
Science museums are a bit more controversy.... Modern trends in museology have broadened the range of subject matter and introduced many interactive exhibits
James Kakalios wrote this book because he loves comics and because science education is so bad! Book is based on a Freshman seminar Kakalios taught called: Everything I Know About Physics I Learned By Reading Comic Books Basic premise is that some of the powers of superheroes could be possible... and teasing out the conditions that would make them possible is both entertaining and educational -How fast would Superman have to run to leap a building in a single bound? 140 miles/hour and then apply a force of 6,000 lbs against the ground... -to do this his muscles need to have developed on a planet whose gravity is 15x earth's gravity... -Did Spiderman's girlfriend die from falling or from Spiderman's attempt to save her?
This piece in the New Yorker by Jonathan Franzen suggests then writing need not necessarily be &quot;difficult&quot; to be good. see: Mr Difficult: Wiliam Gaddis and the Problem of Hard-to-Read books Ben Marcus takes a opposing view see: Why experimental fiction threatens to destroy publishing, Jonathan Franzen, and life as we know it: A correction Jess Row sides with Franzen and attempts to de-polarize the arguement, see: Marcus vs. Franzen: The latest literary wrangling in Harper's leaves everyone confused. I really want to side with Franzen on this point, simply that good writing need not be difficult to follow and can be entertaining and educational at the same time... Modernism (and post-modernism) in their attempts to break with the past, critique the present have a bias against the accessible and the popular Franzen distinguishes 2 models for how writers and fiction relate to readers. Status model: -The value of a work of art is independent of how many people can appreciate it Contract model: -work of art as writer and reader, a balancing act between writer and their audience/community
Odysseus Greek hero -embarks on long journey -overcomes many obstacles -wins back wife Odysseus characterized as having mētis &quot;cunning intelligence&quot; particularly in use of disguise and deceptive speech - Odysseus flaw is hubris &quot;arrogance and pride&quot; Many works of art inspired by the tale including: -the tales of Sinbad the Sailor -Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey -The Coen Brothers' film O Brother, Where Art Thou? -
Joyce's Ulysses great example of &quot;difficult&quot; modernist literature -Homer's Odysseus is a great war hero The Odyssey covers 10 years -Joyce's Ulysses, Leopold Bloom, is a regular bloke Ulyssess the novel covers 1 day Joyce said that he &quot;put in so many enigmas and puzzles that it will keep the professors busy for centuries arguing over what I meant&quot; entertainment comes from comparisons with the past Ulysses for Dummies
24's Jack Bauer is similar to Homer's Odysseus in that he is a heroic figure, prone to be arrogance and defying of authority, hierarchies -Jack Bauer's stories are like Joyce's Ulyssess in that they occur in one day.... check out comparison, see: The Longest Day: Fox TV's '24' educates in that it &quot;exercises&quot; your brain keeping track of all the different social networks which are as complex as you would find in a Jane Austen or George Eliot novel. Johnson, p. 113
This book makes the case that popular culture has become increasingly sophisticated over the years. TV: in the 60's most TV shows had simple plots, often a single plot per episode. Now TV shows such as ER, Lost, Sopranos feature multiple plot lines with many characters moving in and out of central roles 1981- Hill St. Blues introduced &quot;multi-threading&quot; in plotlines Flashing arrows- multithreaded plots difficult to follow, often do not explain what is going on, contain references that audience cannot understand or need to wait for explanation social networks: -good tv shows often have complex social networks Gaming: Modern games involve more than just quick reflexes, require in depth knowledge of game environments/rules and complex problem solving skills
Douglas Rushkoff makes the case that the internet is enabling a new &quot; renaissance .&quot; This &quot;internet&quot; renaissance has resulted in new literacies and new forms of expression. The point to be made is much innovation is coming from popular culture...
-McLuhan thought of tools/technologies and media as extensions of ourselves -tools and media are used almost interchangably since the medium is the message. -medium can refer to media be it printed word, radio, TV through which messages travel OR the tools/technologies used to &quot;send&quot; those messages -main point is the the medium &quot;shapes&quot; the way we express ourselves and the way we perceive the world
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms Neutral: images, text, audio, video is all just packets of data on the internet Decentralized: Internet consists not of a single network but of many interconnected networks. Flexible: internet protocols are designed to route data efficiently by being flexible, choosing routes based on load, performance -New tools are fast. -content can be created, edited and published far more efficiently than ever before -the cost of producing and consuming content is going down (Moore's Law and cost of computing) -nobody is in control, is increasingly difficult for individuals, institutions, corporations, government to control these new tools and the content produced with them. -tools don't care about the physical characteristics of content, all is reduced or transcoded into binary data
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms -Neutrality of networks makes us more passionate, gives us a place to say whatever we want -Decentralized nature of tools enables true collaboration because participants can work together as equals... -Flexibility enables greater expressiveness -Extensibility enables greater creativity -efficiency and scalability enables us to be more social connected
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
New tools I'll focus on are -internet -web services -publishing platforms
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