It’s a wonderful day, and not just cause the sun is shining on Sesame Street. It’s a wonderful day because this morning we learned a new friend was moving in to the neighborhood. Armando, or “Mando” as the gang on Sesame Street has nicknamed him, is join the cast on the upcoming 44th season.

Played by actor Ismael Cruz Córdova, Mando is part of Sesame’s increased focus on engaging with and educating children in the Hispanic community in the United States. The show is constantly evolving and has a long-standing history of modeling a diverse community.  As producers were identifying the realities of the changing American population, it was important to represent that diversity in the new addition to the cast. “Armando,” a writer from Puerto Rico, will join Maria (played by Sonia Manzano), Luis (Emilio Delgado) and Muppets™ Rosita and Ovejita (Carmen Osbahr) as part of Sesame Street’s bilingual community.

To learn more about Mando and his new home on Sesame Street, check out the video above.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

Today, 2.5 billion people don’t have access to toilets. Investing in sanitation leads to healthier people and stronger communities. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Water, Sanitation & Hygiene program focuses on the development of tools and technologies that can lead to radical and sustainable improvements in sanitation in the developing world. An important component is reaching children and families with critical health messages. A new grant to Sesame Workshop will promote hygiene and sanitation among children and families in Bangladesh, India, and Nigeria. Cookie Monster was so excited to work with the Gates Foundation that he sat down with the Impatient Optimist, the foundation’s blog, and answered a few questions. Sesame Workshop looks forward to working with the Gates Foundation in the coming years.

Impatient Optimist: Cookie Monster, we know you are very busy. Why have you taken the time to speak with us today?

Cookie Monster: Well, me heard that if me be very patient, there will be chocolate chip cookies available at the end of this interview. Me not see them yet, but me optimistic.

IO: We know you’re a cookie enthusiast. Can you tell us your cookie eating ritual?

Cookie Monster: Me cookie eating reputation precedes me. Of course me have ritual! First me wash hands. This part very important because it help keep me healthy. Me not sure exactly how long me wash, but me sing the ABCs slowly and when me get to Z, it time to rinse and then look out, om nom nom nom nom. Me also like to share me cookies with Elmo and Big Bird. Little known secret, a birdseed cookie is delicious.

IO: You have traveled all over the world to places like Asia, Australia, Africa—where is your favorite place to go?

Cookie Monster: Well, me favorite place in the whole-wide-world is Sesame Street, of course. But you are right, me global traveler. On the plane, me fly Monster Class—it is luxurious space in the overhead bin. Me not a picky traveler. Me just like to see places where children and monsters are all healthy and happy.

IO: What’s your favorite thing about living on Sesame Street?

Cookie Monster: Me have so many favorites. Me love learning new things, doing Monster pilates, washing me fur at the laundromat (me prefer gentle cycle), but most of all, me love when visitors stop by—especially with cookies. Hey, if you’re planning on being in the area, feel free to stop by and say hi—me will show you Cookie eating ritual too.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

Touch screen devices have dramatically changed the way young children interact with technology. Preschoolers no longer have to struggle with a mouse or a laptop touch pad – they can now use their fingers to tap, drag, and trace items directly on the screen. When we started to develop one of our first robust iPad apps in 2010, we were extremely optimistic about all of the affordances of this new technology. What surprised us was the number of new challenges we needed to overcome to create a quality developmentally appropriate learning experience for young children.

Elmo Loves ABCs is an early literacy app that covers uppercase and lowercase letter recognition, as well as tracing, letter sounds, and alliteration. The app includes a free-play area with over 75 videos, coloring pages, and a hide-and-seek game, plus a directed-play section that has asks children to identify letters and objects that begin with certain letters. We also wanted to provide children with a lot of choice, so we put an alphabet boarder on the screen that allows them to select a new letter whenever they like.

As we do with almost all our new apps and games, we go directly to the experts—the children for whom our content is made — and watch as they navigate the experience and listen to what they have to say about it. In this case, children figured out how to play with the app immediately, but there were so many active hot-spots on screen that kids would unintentionally activate nearby letters or other spots where they placed their hands, creating a chaotic and confusing experience.

Our first attempt to resolve the issue of children accidentally activating buttons was to create a “boundary box” around the play screen so that if a child was tracing or drawing and accidentally dragged her finger over a button, it would not register. She would have to pick her finger up and place it on a letter to select it. The boundary box helped, but it wasn’t enough. Children were still resting their hands and wrists on the bottoms and sides of the iPad screen and unintentionally launching new activities and letters.

Our second attempt was to add “touch with intent” where the child would need to lift his finger and place it on a button for at least half a second to make a selection. The hope was that if we could discern an accidental tap from an intentional tap, we could provide children with more control over their experience. It didn’t work – children were no longer accidentally triggering new letters, but now they couldn’t select the ones they wanted. Rather than holding their finger on a button longer, children started to rapidly tap the screen expecting immediate feedback. Kids now thought the app was “broken” because it wasn’t responding to their initial touch in the way they expected.

Finally, one of our brilliant producers came up with the idea of using a two-step activation where an initial tap on the border lights up the buttons for five seconds to show that they are now “on”, and a second tap makes the selection. It worked! Young children were now in control of their experience and were able to freely explore letters.

Given that we successfully tackled a literacy app, we thought the math version, Elmo Loves 123s, (the sequel to ABCs) should be easy. However, when we started to work on the companion app a year and a half later the tablet market had already changed.  There was now a variety of new tablets with different screen sizes for which we had to plan. Some of the tablets were substantially smaller than the iPad, so if we used the same type of border that we have in Elmo Loves ABCs, the rest of the screen to watch videos, color, and play games would be very small. We had a brand new design challenge to conquer.

In developing Elmo Loves 123s, we decided to abandon the border entirely, and instead put all of the number choices and the directed play button on a menu that could be accessed at any time from an arrow at the top of the screen. To ensure that children remember how to access the number choices given that they are not constantly visible on the screen, Elmo provides reminders and the arrow blinks. The new design worked – we found that children were even more successful in navigating the app and freely exploring the numbers 1-20 in both the free play and directed play sections.

One of the best parts of creating a sequel app is that we can apply the knowledge from the formative testing of the first app to the development of the second app. For Elmo Loves 123s, we were able to include everything from its predecessor, add even more activities to the free play section (including a number find game, a counting activity, and 60 jigsaw puzzles), and provide more intuitive navigation for children.

Despite the thousands of hours we spend creating games and watching children engage with them, each new piece of technology brings another set of opportunities and obstacles, which, at the end of the day, is what keeps my job of creating content for digital games so exciting. And the children for whom we create these educational digital offerings make it all worthwhile.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

Sesame Workshop is best known for our commitment to the mental and emotional development of children around the world. But we’re also committed to the physical safety of children. That’s why, as part of the U.N.’s Decade of Action for Road Safety, we’ve launched a new major road safety campaign in Australia.

Between 2006 and 2008, there were 6 deaths and 430 seriously injured pedestrians aged 0-14 in the province of Victoria alone. Driveway run-overs in the province resulted in the death of 14 children under the age of six and 73 serious injuries between January 2000 and September 2012.

Our campaign, spearheaded by Sesame Street’s Elmo and Grover, hopes to educate children, parents and teacher on simple road safety practices so in the future children’s lives can be saved. The campaign, created in partnership with Australian child safety advocates Kidsafe, the TAC, RACV and Holden, includes a storybook entitled Elmo Stays Safe: How Furry Little Monsters – and Children – Play Safely. The stories, games and activities in the book help encourage important safety tips like holding a parents hand while crossing the street, treating driveways like roads instead of safe play spaces and using correct restraints when traveling in a car. Additionally, a Community Service Announcement featuring Elmo and Grover is being broadcast on television and social media platforms and urges children and families to play in safe places away from driveways and roads.

To learn more about our efforts to encourage road safety, click here.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

David Cohen is the director of domestic research for Sesame Workshop

When my friend tried to explain her divorce to her 8-year-old niece, her niece reflected “It’s going to take me awhile to process this.” Her niece’s reaction might be considered precocious, but it also shows the deep emotions children grapple with when faced with such a life altering effect.

Young children need ongoing and sensitive help from trusted adults who approach this event in age appropriate ways. In fact, young children are at risk of having more adjustment problems than older children, since they are still in the early process of developing the coping skills necessary to deal with all the changes associated with divorce. They also often blame themselves for the divorce or feel that it is their responsibility to bring their parents back together.

Given the special relationship that children develop with Sesame Street characters and the human cast, we believed that we could play a role for families going through this often traumatic situation. Clearly tackling a topic like divorce, especially with preschoolers, required a sensitive and thoughtful approach. Typical of all Sesame Workshop initiatives, our approach included the input of advisors, who included psychologists and other mental health professionals specializing in the impact of divorce on younger children. We also conducted preliminary research with divorced parents and their children, who viewed working drafts of the materials and provided suggestions and recommendations which could be incorporated into the final version.

We are incredibly grateful to the parents who shared their own stories and provided invaluable feedback about how we described and portrayed divorce. Feedback from parents helped fine tune the video in which Abby Cadabby’s friends show their support when she tells them about her parents’ divorce. For example, the moms and dads suggested that different types of divorce situations should be portrayed in the video, and not just those in which the divorced parents live near each other (as is the case with Abby’s parents in the video). To address this, producers included live action films of real families talking about how they cope when divorced parents live farther apart. These live action films were included with the Sesame Street story in the final version of the video.

Parents also mentioned that in the draft version Abby acted calm and composed when speaking about her parents’ divorce and that was not realistic. Instead parents suggested that Abby should show the feelings that they’ve seen in their own children — anger, confusion, and sadness. As a result, Abby was more explicit in expressing her complex emotions in the finished version of the video — she tells Gordon, “Yeah, I am angry! And sad… oh, I love my mommy and daddy so much!”

Great wisdom and sensitivity went into the creation of the materials. In the words of an 8-year-old girl, it took a lot to “process this.” With the help of the advisors and families who helped shape this project, we were able to launch “Little Children, Big Challenges: Divorce” which is available here. We’re hopeful this initiative will make a difference for families of divorce as they help their preschoolers navigate the challenges and experiences they’ll face together through this major life event.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

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

With that legacy of innovation in mind, we are proud to announce a new collaboration with Qualcomm centered on researching and developing new ways to educate children using mobile devices and applications. By bringing together Qualcomm’s cutting-edge mobile technologies and Sesame Workshop’s expertise in educating young children, Qualcomm and Sesame hope once again to revolutionize early childhood education.

The partnership was announced on Tuesday at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada.

One of the first educational products created by this collaboration will be Big Bird’s Words, an app that will feature Qualcomm’s Vuforia augmented reality platform. The app will make teaching literacy an interactive experience by encouraging children to use a virtual “wordscope” to search for and find new words in their surrounding environment.

And American pre-schoolers won’t be the only children whose educational experience will be improved by this partnership. Qualcomm and Sesame Workshop will continue collaborating in China and India through Qualcomm’s Wireless Reach program. In India, Sesame Workhop’s Galli Galli Sim Sim, the Indian version of Sesame Street, is using 3G mobile technology to distribute radio content, videos and fun lessons about healthy living, hygiene, literacy and math. This program is critical to reaching children in rural areas where televisions are not commonly owned.

In China, a project launching later this year will provide tips, activities and other tools to help families with young children prepare for emergencies. These are just two examples of ways mobile devices can positively impact young children around the world.

With each passing day mobile devices and applications are reshaping the way we engage with one another and the rest of the globe. With the help of Sesame Workshop and Qualcomm, it will also reshape the way we educate our children.

The Sesame Workshop Blog

Congratulations to the entire Sesamstrasse team for making young children in Germany laugh and learn for the last 40 years.

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

The Sesame Workshop Blog