The Mane Event
Move over, Big Bird. A new children's TV show aims to make stars of a lion family that lives at the public library
Diane Bakst -- School Library Journal, 3/1/2000
Diane Bakst is a freelance writer who lives in Green Village, NJ.
If the names Theo, Cleo, Lionel, and Leona don't mean much to you now, just wait. They're the characters from a new children's television show called Between the Lions, and within a few weeks, they--and the magical library they inhabit--could be all your young patrons are talking about.
Conceived by some of the same people who created Sesame Street and The Electric Company, the half-hour show aims to crush illiteracy. Starting April 3, it will air daily on PBS. And not only might it get America's kids jazzed up about reading, but it could just kill off any lingering stereotype of the library as a buttoned-up, silent place.
"It's a great opportunity for libraries to become mainstream," says Peggy Barber, the American Library Association's associate executive director for communications. Barber is among dozens of outside experts that the Between the Lions' producers involved in their planning. "We know from a lot of consumer research that people think highly of libraries, but they're not necessarily high in the mind. This show will go into millions of homes, and if it's as good as I think it will be, these characters will become part of pop culture. Just like everybody knows Big Bird or Cookie Monster, they'd better well know Theo and Cleo."
The program's premise is that somewhere, somehow, a book-loving pack of lions has taken over a huge, neglected library. There are devoted parents Theo and Cleo, who don colorful African-inspired jewelry and resemble the majestic stone lions that flank the famed entrance of the New York Public Library. Besides managing the library's staff and collections, they've got two cubs, Leona and Lionel (whose ages, though never specifically mentioned, correspond roughly to the target audience of the show, ages four and seven, respectively.) Though the lions and other characters are Muppet-like puppets, Between the Lions also includes animation and guest appearances by celebrities. (In the first season, watch for visits by Boston Red Sox baseball players and letter sounds sung by mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves.)
Each episode focuses on key words and sounds, such as "short a" or "long o," and displays text on the screen so that viewers will see important words as well as hear them. The lions will read loads of books, and can even ask their technophile buddy, Click the Mouse, to use her mousepad and "drag and drop" them into their favorite stories. From there, they might interview historical figures or change a fable's ending.
Overall, the show strives to unite phonics-based lessons with a "whole-language" approach of storytelling and talk. They're two teaching camps that have clashed in the past, but those involved with the production believe the combination will serve Between the Lions well. "I think kids learn in different ways, and they're trying to reach as many kids as possible," says Susan Roman, executive director of ALA's Association for Library Service to Children.
The program is unusual in its ambitious scope--getting children to read well by age seven, and getting them to like it--and unusual because its production team spent years talking to librarians, literacy groups, and reading experts before shooting a single frame. Led by Sesame Street veterans Christopher Cerf, Norm Stiles, and Michael Frith, the show's creators knew they could dream up lovable characters and stock the episodes with enough intelligent humor to make Lions a winner. But when it came to developing a reading curriculum, they determined early on that they'd need advice from outside educators. "We wanted to do it right,'' Cerf said one afternoon last fall on the Lions' New York set. "I love libraries, but I don't know everything about them. And I don't know everything about how kids read, either."
Cerf and his buddies have been kicking around the idea of a reading show for primary-school kids for years. According to the U.S. Government's National Institute for Literacy, about 10 million children have difficulties learning to read, and more than a million eventually drop out of high school. Between the Lions is designed to get to children at the crucial period between kindergarten and second grade, when significant reading skills and attitudes are being formed. "A lot of shows talk about reading, but don't really teach it," Cerf explains. Shows like Sesame Street may get young people on the right track by familiarizing them with numbers and letters, but Lions was conceived as the next step: actually demonstrating how to read.
By 1995, the Lions team had picked up some members from corporate America, including former Apple Computer CEO John Sculley. The production company had a name, Sirius Thinking Ltd., but needed money if Lions were to proceed. So they pitched a loose plan to WGBH, the Boston-area public television station that produces such children's powerhouses as Zoom, Arthur, and Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? The station signed on immediately, finding that while other shows might aim for the four- to seven-year-old set, nothing came close to the Lions concept of tackling the nitty-gritty of learning to read.
Though they considered a bookshop and other settings, the producers quickly settled on the idea of a library because of all its nooks for characters to live in and explore. With WGBH (and its $4.2 million in financial backing) on board, the producers went into the field--and, quite literally, into the boiler rooms, beneath the stairs, and behind the reference desks of America's libraries.
They started with a tour of one of the country's grandest: the Thomas Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress, in Washington, D.C. There, John Cole, director of the Center for the Book, took them from the gloriously domed main reading room down to the inner workings of the book carrier system in the basement. "I kept thinking they'd want to take a break, but they just wanted to go on and on, up and down, looking for hidden staircases from the basement to the attic," says Cole. The set designers, who went on to create a "mane reading room" resplendent with polished wood and imposing twin staircases, took inspiration from such visits.
At the main branch of the Brooklyn (NY) Public Library, the producers met with children's librarians. There, they learned how staffers explain a library's structure to kids: that books have "addresses" just like people and must live on the shelves at the proper addresses. They listened attentively to the ways children phrased their queries. Cerf recalls one little boy presenting himself at a reference desk and stating plainly, "I want 12 black women." Further questioning revealed the student needed to research a dozen accomplished females for a report on Black History Month--but it was the straightforward way he phrased his initial question and the skillful librarian's investigation that stuck with the producers. "The biggest thing we learned was the kind of questions that librarians get and how they answer them," Cerf says. "The person who does the reference interviews has to be a detective to find out what kids want."
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Much of what the Lions team learned from its partners will be reflected in the show's look and feel. The 1,500 volumes on the set's shelves are not only real books but were donated by libraries in Georgia and New York. The set's magazine rack boasts staples like Highlights and Popular Science, while the check-out desk has both a computer and old-fashioned rubber stamps to mark due dates on books. "We wanted to show the high-tech end of libraries today, so we'd be introducing families to how technology is used. But it's also homespun and cozy, a bit of what you might have in your own library," says Beth Kirsch, WGBH's director of educational outreach.
When it came to the nuts-and-bolts of teaching reading, Kirsch and her teammates again turned to outside specialists. "We met with many reading experts and asked them, 'Where do kids have trouble?' We wanted to know, even the kids who are good readers, what do they have problems with?" Kirsch says.
The top answers--pronouncing short vowels and multisyllable words, for example--have been wrapped into Lions episodes. Short vowels are belted out by The Vowelles, a Supremes-style female ensemble that backs up singer "Martha Reader." In another recurring segment titled "Long Word Freak-Out," complex words are patiently sounded out by Dr. Ruth Wordheimer. And yes, that's the diminutive therapist Dr. Ruth Westheimer in the role, which raises another key point about Lions: it's layered with adult-level humor to keep grown-ups enthused, too.
In fact, adults were given significant consideration. They'll make up about 35 percent of the 6.5 million viewers WGBH expects for Lions each week. Cerf, who, like much of the Lions team, tends to slip puns and one-liners into his everyday conversations, says adding adult jokes was essential to the goal of promoting literacy. "If parents like it, they'll be more likely to tune it in [and watch with their children]," says Cerf. "And whether English is not their first language, or whether they're having literacy problems themselves, maybe some adults will learn how to read better, too."
To ensure that the lion gang becomes as well known as Big Bird and friends, Between the Lions has already initiated massive outreach to public librarians nationwide. For starters, the producers are letting libraries and literacy programs use the show's characters, free of charge, to promote reading programs of their own. In conjunction with ALA, they're offering posters and other materials that highlight the show's pro-reading stance. And that's to say nothing of the baseball caps, stuffed toys, and other Lions merchandise that will be appearing in stores everywhere. The products include stuffed lions with "library cards" around their necks. The idea is for children to exchange the doll's card for a real one at their hometown library. (For more information on obtaining materials, see "How to Create a Lion-Friendly Library," below.)
The producers are also turning to librarians to help them come up with ways to get Lions to some of the people who might need it most: families who don't generally visit libraries or might otherwise be at risk for illiteracy. WGBH and ALA will se
lect 20 public libraries to participate in an in-depth local outreach campaign (for details, see below). The station also plans to issue a teaching guide by early fall that will suggest ways Lions can supplement classroom instruction. For example, an educator trying to cover "short o" sounds might be directed to the segment when the lions cook up a batch of "hot chop cheese drop soup in a pot with no top."The entire concept of a quality
children's show being set in a library is long past due, according to Jo Ann Pinder, director of the Gwinnett County Public Library in Lawrenceville, GA. She's the woman behind most of the 500 feet of books featured on the Lions set. Blessed with a healthy materials budget, Pinder jumped when she heard ALA members had been asked by the producers to contribute surplus books.Pinder likes the fact that the show will reflect libraries as the diverse, vibrant gathering places they have become. "As we view the library more as a community center than a quiet, shushed place," she explains, "it makes sense we'd want to have a show that would reinforce that."
That's what Cerf believes, too. "I would imagine a lot of people might think a library is kind of a quiet place with not much going on. But we're trying to say it's the universal place, the one place you can go to find out anything," he says. And after a moment, with a giggle, he adds: "Some people may think we've gone too far. A librarian told me, '[Your library] is too much fun! Now the kids will think they can throw books around, dance, and do anything in a library!' Well, I don't think that will happen. But it wouldn't be so bad, right?"
How To Create a Lion-Friendly Library
- PBS stations will broadcast Between the Lions at different times across the country, so check local listings for airtimes.
- For general information on the show, visit www.pbskids.org/lions. The Web site will provide summaries of each episode, including the text of the stories being read each day and related activities to try in the library.
- Over the next few weeks, WGBH will send free information packets to every main and branch public library in the country. The mailings include a poster and brochure introducing the show. The packets are also free to school libraries, but will not be mailed automatically. E-mail your school's request to : WGBH_materials_request@WGBH.org, or write: WGBH Educational Print and Outreach Dept., 125 Western Ave., Boston, MA 02134.
- ALA Graphics has added a Lions poster to its "READ" series. (See "$30 and Under," p. 125)
- For information on winning a $2,500 grant to implement a Between the Lions library outreach program to families and youth, go to the Association for Library Service to Children Web site at www.ala.org/alsc/btl.html.
