Joe Hennes works at Sesame Workshop and is the co-proprietor of Tough Pigs.
Over the course of Sesame Street’s 43-year history, characters come and go. Not everyone can be a Grover or Cookie Monster, lasting decades while still staying fresh and entertaining. For every Big Bird, there’s a Roosevelt Franklin. For every Bert and Ernie, there’s a Biff and Sully. Despite the fact that these characters aren’t around anymore, we still hold a lot of love for them and the joy they gave us over the years.
One of our favorite examples is the great Don Music, the absent-minded composer who fought through his frustration to pen such classics as “Mary Had a Bicycle” and “Drive, Drive, Drive your Car”. He showed us that creating art isn’t easy, and the final result isn’t always what you expected it to be. Read More
It is with great sadness that we relay the news of the passing of Jane Henson, wife of Jim Henson and a beloved member of the Sesame Street community. Born Jane Ann Nebel, she married Jim Henson in 1959 and gave birth to five children: Lisa, Cheryl, Brian, John and Heather. In addition to being a loving wife and mother, Mrs. Henson was an artistic collaborator of her late husband’s, performing Muppets alongside him on both Sesame Street and earlier projects. The entire Sesame Street community mourns her passing. She will be missed.
To learn more about Jane Henson’s life and achievements, visit The Jim Henson Legacy.
The beloved Sesame Street Muppets have a long and storied history of visiting the White House. But that doesn’t mean we’re any less excited when we get invited back! This past weekend Gordon, Abby Cadabby, Rosita, and Elmo stopped by home of the first family to take part in the White House’s annual Easter Egg Roll.
The theme this year was “Be Healthy, Be Active, Be You!” The day was focused on ways families could eat healthy and stay physically active, a cause to which both the first lady Michelle Obama and Sesame Workshop are dedicated.
To learn more about the White House’s Easter Egg Roll, click here. To learn more about Sesame Workshop’s commitment to encourage healthy living habits in our children, click here.
Literacy. It’s been at the heart of Sesame Workshop’s mission since Sesame Street began airing in 1969. We’re continually spreading our message of laughter and learning to new countries and utilizing emerging technological platforms to educate American preschool children. All the while, literacy remains a central element of Sesame Worskhop’s curriculum, no matter where or how a child is seeing our educational material.
That’s why we’re excited to partner with the Insurance Industry Charitable Foundation whose National Early Childhood Education Initiative focuses on literacy for young children, particularly those in underserved communities around the U.S. The partnership will develop a program that provides children, parents, caregivers, and facilitators with tools to support young children’s development of essential literacy skills around rich conversations, reading, and writing. This program will provide rich and engaging opportunities for IICF Volunteers. Read More
Fire Safety, disaster recover, serious illness, healthy eating habits, and divorce. All of these topics have been covered as part of Sesame Street’s long and diverse history of outreach initiatives. When Sesame Street first aired in 1969, there were significant obstacles to Sesame Street reaching children in poor communities – the very children the show most wanted to reach. Meeting this challenge became the Workshop’s first outreach program. Read More
Over 43 seasons, Sesame Street has featured hundreds and hundreds of famous actors. Due to the law of averages, a certain percent of those actors will have gone on to receive a coveted Academy Award statuette. And it seems that those averages are correct, because a lot of Sesame’s famous friends have an Oscar on their mantle.
Just last night, at the 85th annual Academy Awards, Anne Hathaway won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her performance of Fantine in Les Miserables. Hathaway stopped by Sesame Street a few years ago to sing “I Want a Snuffy for Christmas” with her pal Big Bird. Now you can add her to the long list of Oscar winners who count Big Bird and the rest of the Sesame Streetgang among their friends. Read More
Jason Milligan is the Creative Director of Sesame Workshop’s Innovation Lab.
“Kids won’t know what that is!”
It wasn’t the first time I heard Sesame Workshop Curriculum Specialist Sue Scheiner say that, but this time it threw me a bit. We were reviewing Elmo’s World episodes to include in Season 2 of Kinect Sesame Street TV. Sue was referring to a camera. The camera was an old fashioned black box with a huge flashbulb attached. And one old fashioned camera in Mr. Noodle’s hands wouldn’t have mattered so much if any of the cameras in the piece looked and worked like current cameras do. But they didn’t. They were clunky film cameras and video cameras with tapes. There was a scene in which a kid takes film to a store to have it “developed.”
Not one person in the entire episode took a picture with a phone, or was able to immediately show Elmo his image on the back. The way today’s kids experience digital photography (often on smart phones) is completely, utterly, totally different than it was only a few years ago, apparently when this episode of Elmo’s World was made in 2005. Seriously. I checked the air date. It freaked me out a little. The same way it freaked me out when my niece pointed to a phone booth in a video and asked my sister what it was. Or when I explained to my kids how television used to show programs at certain times of day and you couldn’t pause or rewind or even decide which show you wanted to watch right now. Sue is right. Kids don’t know what those things are. Some Sesame content will always be relevant. Ernie will always be able to sing about the joys of bathing with his Duckie. C will always be for Cookie. But not this.
We couldn’t use Elmo’s World: Cameras. It was simply out of date.
Big Bird is an 8’2″ tall resident of Sesame Street. He wrote the letter, below.
Dear Mrs. Obama,
Wow! What a great time I had visiting you at The White House! Thanks for showing me around. I especially liked when we snuck into the White House kitchen for a healthy snack! (Most people think I eat a lot, but really I eat like a bird!). But my favorite part of our visit was getting to exercise by running and jumping and dancing around – right there in the White House!
Maybe next time you can come visit me at my home on Sesame Street again. My nest doesn’t have a West Wing, but I do have two wings that can’t wait to give you a big hug when I see you again!
When going through a divorce or separation, parents and children have a lot of questions. Young children are often confused and parents are often uncertain of how to explain such a challenging transition. On top of that, if parents and children have questions, it’s not always clear where they should look for answers.
Luckily Sesame Street’s Abby Cadabby and her friend Rocio Galarza, Senior Director of Outreach and Content Design for Sesame Workshop, are here to help. On Wednesday, February 20, Abby and Rocio will be taking questions about divorce and separation from parents, children, friends and anyone who has questions about staying resilient while navigating a divorce or separation.
Email us at divorce@sesame.org and Abby and Rocio will record an answer to your question in a video segment that will be posted online next week. In addition to your question, please include your name, age (if you wish) and your hometown so we can give say hello if your question is picked. We will also write you back directly if Abby and Rocio have the opportunity to answer your question.
Let your friends, family and colleagues know too! Everyone is welcome to send in a question. We can’t wait to hear from you.
In October of 2010, everyone’s favorite, lovable, adorable, furry pal Grover took to YouTube to explain the word “on.” His adventure began in a shower, took him to a boat, and ended up on a horse cow.
And last year, Cookie Monster, the vociferous cookievore himself, showed us that everything — even eating cookies! — is better when you share.
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Joe Hennes works at Sesame Workshop and is the co-proprietor of Tough Pigs.
