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.

“We are committed to combining the collective strengths of the insurance industry to positively impact communities at the local and national level, specifically young children at risk of illiteracy,” said William Ross, Chief Executive Officer of the IICF.

The program, which launches in the fall of 2013, will consist of original Sesame Street video segments, downloadable materials for parents, educators and volunteers that help advance literacy for preschool children and a dedicated section of Sesame Street’s website.

Literacy remains a crisis in underserved communities across the United States. Studies show that, by age three, children from low income households knew 600 fewer words than children from families with higher incomes. As long as this literacy gap remains, Sesame Workshop will make closing it a priority.

To learn more about Sesame Workshop’s other efforts to advance literacy in underserved communities, click here.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

CA Technologies Chief Marketing Officer Andrew Wittman and Super Grover 2.0

Students in the United States are falling behind their peers globally in the subjects of science, technology, engineering and math, known as STEM. That is why Sesame Workshop and CA Technologies, a leading IT management solutions company, have partnered to encourage young children to focus on STEM learning even before they reach kindergarten.

The initiative will include a STEM hub on SesameStreet.org that will provide educational resources for preschool children. Resources will include original videos that teach STEM concepts, interactive games, hands-on lesson plans and activities. It’s all part of Sesame Workshop and CA Technologies joint effort to make math and science fun for young children.

“CA Technologies is proud to partner with Sesame Workshop and support the development of creative and interactive programs that engage children in STEM learning,” said CA Technologies Chief Marking Officer Andrew Wittman. “Through this initiative, we are hoping to help young people discover an interest in technology.”

While CA Technologies and Sesame Workshop’s partnership is new, both have focused on STEM education for some time. The organizations are participants in the 100Kin10 effort, a presidentially led effort to prepare 100,000 new STEM teachers over the next decade. CA Technologies and Sesame Worskhop are also members of the Clinton Global Initiative’s STEM education and Early Childhood Development working groups.

“We’re grateful to CA Technologies for supporting our work on STEM education and helping us reach more children with this valuable curriculum,” said Sherrie Westin, executive vice president and chief marketing officer for Sesame Workshop. “Through early STEM education we strive to help children develop strong critical thinking skills and a better understanding of how things work to help prepare them for future learning.”

To learn more about Sesame Workshop’s effort to support STEM education, click here.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

Sesame Workshop Co-Founder Joan Ganz Cooney signs a contract with Random House in 1984.

In January 1970, less than two months after Sesame Street first aired, Joan Ganz Cooney, the co-founder of Sesame Workshop, received a letter.

“Our editorial staff in particular and many other of our associates have been watching the outstanding progress of your Sesame Street show with real respect and admiration,” read its opening line.

The letter, sent by the Western Publishing Company, was the beginning of Sesame Workshop’s relationship with books, the Workshop’s very first licensed product format. Eventually Western Publishing’s classic Little Golden Books line, which included beloved children’s books such as Sesame Street’s The Monster at the End of This Book (1971), How to Be a Grouch (1976), and The Together Book (1971), was published by Random House.  Today we are still using our imaginations to rethink those classic titles — The Monster at the End of This Book now comes in an interactive app form — and to create new titles that encourage our longstanding curricular goals, such as the Elmo’s Big Birthday Bash! book app.

This relationship wouldn’t be possible without the hard work of a small group of talented and enthusiastic individuals. In the early 1970s it was Random House editor Jason Epstein and Sesame Street songwriter Christopher Cerf who formed the backbone of this relationship. Today, Sesame Workshop’s Vice President of Publishing, Jennifer A. Perry, and Naomi Kleinberg, the editorial director of the Sesame Street publishing program at Random House, carry on the tradition Jason and Christopher started.

“There’s a lot of history,” said Naomi, who has been working with Sesame Street since 1992. “We have got some of the great classics in our library. There is something about these books that gives them timelessness. They have a heart that many books don’t. There’s this wonderful humor. There’s always this message about friendship, about sharing, about community. There’s a kindness at the heart of it.”

A page for the Elmo's Big Birthday Bash! book app.

Although classic series like the Little Golden Books still make up a large part of the work Sesame Workshop and Random House do together, we’re also at the forefront of some of Random House’s newest projects. For instance, Elmo’s Big Birthday Bash! is the first app in Random House’s longstanding print series, “Step into Reading.”

“Out of all the premier children’s brands Random House works with, we are really honored that Random House selected Sesame Street to launch its Step into Reading series into the digital arena,“ said Jennifer.  “It’s also the first original story Sesame Street has created for a book app, and we hope to publish the title in print, showing that inspiration between the print and digital worlds works in both directions.”

When I sat down with Jennifer in her office to discuss Sesame Workshop’s relationship with Random House, the letter from the Western Publishing Company Joan Ganz Cooney received in 1970 was sitting in her in-box. When I asked her about it, she said she keeps the original copy on her desk. “It reminds me in a very concrete way of the legacy I am entrusted with for a short time,” she said. “Everyone who works in the Sesame Publishing Group is proud to be a part of such a longstanding tradition.”

We can’t all have the original copy of that letter on our desks, but I know she’s not the only one at Sesame Workshop who feels that way.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

From the Planet Water PSA starring Elmo

2.6 billion people don’t have access to clean sanitation water and 72% of them live in Asia. Unsafe drinking water is a major cause of diarrhea, which is the second leading killer of children. Over 880 million people in the world lack access to safe drinking water and 55% of them live in Asia.

Water health and hygiene is one of the major issues facing young children in Asia. That’s why Sesame Workshop has teamed up with Planet Water to launch the Asia Water-for-Life project. Beginning in Indonesia and expanding into the Philippines, Vietnam and India over the next few months, this multimedia educational program, which includes a social media campaign and PSAs starring Elmo, teaches children about basic hygienic practices like hand washing and why failing to do so encourages the spread of germs. The beloved Sesame Street Muppets^TM will play a critical role in ensuring young Asian children learn these important lessons.

But the Water-for-Life project isn’t just about education. A major part of the project is building ten AquaTowers, each capable of providing 10,000 liters of clean drinking water per day, in Indonesia.

For more information on why the Water-for-Life project is so critical to the health of young children in Asia, click on the infographic below.

To learn more about the Water-for-Life project, go to Planet Water’s website. To learn more about Sesame Workshop’s educational efforts in Indonesia, check out our page on Jalan Sesama, the Indonesian version of Sesame Street.

The Sesame Workshop Blog