Ode to Reading Rainbow
“Butterfly in the sky … “
I just learned that the last on-air broadcast of one of my favorite kids’ shows, Reading Rainbow, came to pass on August 28th. For those of you who might not remember it, Reading Rainbow has run on PBS since 1983, teaching children about the joy of reading. New episodes actually stopped airing three years ago, in 2006, but the show lived on in reruns until August. Now, after 26 Emmys and hundreds of books, it’s over.
I loved the show for, among other things, the theme song (that is, the Tina Fabrique version, with all respect to Chaka Khan’s rendition) and the beautiful cover titles but also for its wonderful approach to reading. Host LeVar Burton (aka Geordi La Forge) walked his audience through new literary adventures each episode, and then each show ended with a series of mini-book reviews, presented by kids themselves. (“Hi! I’m Jenny Smith, and I want to tell you about a GREAT new book I just read!”)
However, the decision to cancel the show was motivated in part by economics (no one was willing to put up the hundreds of thousands of dollars required to renew the show’s broadcast license) but also, it seems, by a change in philosophy about how children should be taught reading skills. The Department of Education, as part of initiatives first introduced under the Bush Administration, is embracing a more technical, skill-based approach to reading education that involves spelling drills, phonics, and the like — as opposed to the more holistic view espoused by my favorite show. In other words, Reading Rainbow didn’t reach you how to read so much as it taught you why to read, by showing viewers how books could capture the imagination; in doing so, it was reflecting the prevailing educational thinking of the times (the 1980s), but nowadays the trend is toward more basic reading fundamentals.
Anyway, cheers to Reading Rainbow, and the many children and children’s books that it celebrated.
