COMMUNITY COMMENT : ‘Public TV Doesn’t Have to Sell Products’ : Public broadcasting: A teacher who has made creative use of TV sees a big difference between quality PBS programs and ‘what people will pay for.’

People always talk about how bad it is for children to watch television. The fact is, this is a TV generation. It’s a technology generation. If that’s the reality, then we have to deal with it. We can use television as a tool to help bring school lessons to life.

At the 99th Street School, a lot of children lacked some of the positive experiences that other children might have. For many of them, English was a second language. They didn’t know basic words for such things as hammers and screwdrivers. We couldn’t afford to go on field trips. TV provided them with an opportunity to learn.

Two programs were very effective. One was “Reading Rainbow.” In one of the best episodes, for example, James Earl Jones read “Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain,” which was part of our core literature. I taped the show for my class. In addition to hearing a good dramatic reading of the book, the children got to see the book’s illustrations in animation. The show explored weather and showed how forecasters use technology to predict the weather. That’s something I could have talked about and showed pictures of, but I couldn’t bring it to life.

Another series that I used was called “Inside Out.” It is no longer on the air but it dealt with issues such as divorce, death and sibling rivalry. Each drama was open-ended, so after it was over, we could discuss what happened. Then I would have the students write what they thought the characters should do next.

Many programs, especially those produced for PBS, can be assigned as homework. “Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?” uses a game show format to teach geography. “Reading Rainbow” is excellent, and the new show “The Magic Schoolbus” (based on a popular book series) is fabulous. I’m going to use it to teach science.

The show is set in a school, it uses a lot of imagination and it has interesting characters that children enjoy.

I hear about the network TV shows in the classroom all the time. They don’t teach a whole lot. It’s basically entertainment. Kids need that. We did, too. We had “Batman” and did a lot of punching, that kind of thing, just like kids do with shows like the “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.”

The difference is that public television doesn’t have to try to sell products. It has to sell messages and what they think are important messages, educational messages. That’s why public television is so good.

These shows certainly can be done on the cable channel Nickelodeon, but Nickelodeon also has commercials. And not everyone gets cable, so not everyone has access to Nickelodeon. PBS comes over the public airwaves.

When I listen to the congressional hearings, one of the things that keeps being said is: “If the public wants it, the public will pay for it.” If you look at commercial television, there are lots of tabloid shows. This is what the public wants.

But is it really good? I don’t think so.