Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Sesame Deals with Parental Deployment

Sesame Workshop has finished production on a new television special titled "When Parents Are Deployed". The special focuses on the educational and emotional needs of children with parents and caregivers deployed by the military.

The half-hour show is set to premiere on December 27, 2006 at 9:00 pm on PBS (check local listings for details). The special, hosted by Cuba Gooding Jr, is targeted at educating adults about the issues and effects of parental deployment on children and what they can do, rather than targeting the effected children and their parents (which has been addressed in the special " Talk Listen Connect" support material).

The special is an offshoot of Sesame Workshop's "Talk, Listen Connect: Helping Families During Military Deployment" series, which is directly targeted at helping the kids and caregivers effected deal with the issues. These educational kits and videos are downloadable (for free) at the Sesame Workshop website.

There will be more than 700,000 kids separated from their mother or father this holiday season due to military deployment. The special will show the effects of the deployment of Muppet Elmo's father while showing interviews with military families and others.

The newly produced special, "When Parents Are Deployed", will feature a documentary-style look at the issues of parent deployment, while also including the classic fun and sincerity from the Sesame Street Muppets as they address the topic. Many local PBS stations are planning to repeat the special after the initial premiere so be sure to check local listings for further airings.

3 comments:

Nick Moreau said...

Well, they seem to be willing to let JoLeeTV produce content with Sesame Street characters, if there are funders willing to pay for it.

http://joleetv.com/kids.htm

I personally don't have any objection, the more stuff they're in the better, so long as they aren't over-exposed or exploited in any way, which Sesame Workshop seems quite smart to have avoided.

Nick

Anonymous said...

mommy and daddy can't raise you because they're off killing arabs for oil sonny, now go play with big bird.

Anonymous said...

I watched this special and I thought it was wonderful. I had to go through deployment with 3 children for a year while my husband was fighting for this country. The person who signed their name as Anonymous, which means that they are a coward to not even sign their name has no clue what it's like. My husband did what he was told to do, it's a job just like any other job.It wasn't his choice to leave his children for a year and just so you know. We are losing men and women there too who are just doing their jobs. You need to sit back and think about your comment and realize how hurtful that is to us parents who are trying to get through delpoyments, raising their children alone (many of us have no family around to help), not knowing if they will have to tell their children that daddy isn't coming home.You don't know what it's like so don't comment about it until you do. Would you put your life on the line for your country and family?
Despite the rude comment from anonymous. I thought it was a great special, I would like to get a copy for my children before my husband deploys again. Thank you!