Tech Meets Good: Puppets Teaching the Arts

One of my favorite classes as a child was art. Growing up in a rural town in Maine, art class offered me a creative outlook and education about the world outside of my town boundaries. It also made me realize my own visual talents and led me to pursue drawing, oil painting, photography and film making as an adult.

Unfortunately, my childhood experience was different than that of many children today. Lack of funding is closing down many of our schools' art programs. While this cost-cutting seems rampant in today's school systems, one organization is using modern video-conferencing technology to bring arts education to our kids regardless of location and budget.

The Center for Puppetry Arts, a recent honoree at the 2008 Tech Museum Awards, conducts live puppet-building sessions via a secure and two-way high-speed video link tailored to the educational curriculum of the classroom requesting its services. The puppeteers guide students through designing, creating and manipulating their own puppets. Together, they explore a range of topics, from rain forest ecology to African culture.

The Center has engaged 130,000 students, and its programs are especially valuable to those with autism, learning disabilities and language barriers. The cost to participants is $145 and a session supports up to three locations. While still a cost to participating school systems, this fee is of much lower cost than funding an entire arts curriculum.  The program is innovative and unique (and sounds like a heckuva lot of fun). Watch this video from this year's tech awards ... Like the idea?  You can support this "Tech Meets Good" organization here. “Tech Meets Good” is a regular feature at Tonic News.  If you have cool examples of technology doing good in our world, please email dan[at]tonic.com.