I have a lot of Reading Rainbow tapes. And in 24 years they were the heart of my days. As a 1st grade teacher this series took my children outside of the room to look at the world making a connection through pieces of literature. Now my Sheltered Immersion can watch the series, it took awhile for this group to get there....such is the improvement forced on my school.
I own enough Reading Rainbows that every theme, or unit of study, is supported by the series in some way. It's a part of our routines now. I personally think LeVar Burton did more for children with this series than can ever be written in my volumes on the net. He's the "real thing."
Anyway on a tape I labeled friendship at some point...is Koko's Kitten. ( More for 2nd-4th in Koko Love, Conversations with a Talking Gorilla)The book from which this show is pulled sits in my book boxes. I recommend them both. We are taken to meet this endearing creature, gorilla, involved in a long term study of language, American sign,really a study of communication. I want to say...something other than animal or gorilla, but I can't figure out a structure for that. This...being. The book is the story of Koko, who is given a pet kitten she named AllBall. In sign a very fitting name, her name putting together the words she knows and uses to express meaning. I have the book too, many years of wear on her now from children reading over a decade.Excellent book. As you learn of the signing I'm also in 1st concurrently teaching simple signs, first for alphabet letters (while singing songs like A You're Adorable or Taj Mahal's incredible Alphabet Blues, Funky, Funky ABC. ) then sight words, then colors, numbers, days of month, week...the banks of words we teach with kids categorized to read.... it actually works in developing literacy. Sign it, read it, practice on many levels, sign all your songs, perfect. It's not in the mandated scripts NOW REQUIRED as the way to do the job of teaching reading, the script writers weren't as good in Underperforming schools...Anyway I show this particular Reading Rainbow and read this book every year when we turn to mammals and animal classification actually. It expands our understanding of how classification works. Evolving abilities. So to speak. Or sometimes to talk about care and love.
Koko is the most tender story. Just watching her life is fascinating, but to see it through the story of her two kittens, here in spring when children are having pet babies...it is so interesting. She loses her kitten to a terrible tragedy, how her grief is expressed has always spoken to me, to kids. I read quite eclectically but watching her sign, and grieve this kitten somehow elevated my relationship to living things and all life. It really did. It taught me something about the function of loving biologically, and need for caring. I believe Koko has elemental truth. So of course I practically have to threaten my kids to share the book. Nothing like our real life dichotomies.
Koko gets a second pet, Lipstick so the story does not leave you lost in her grief. Having lost kittens and cats I connected on many levels to this story as I'm sure children did too. At some point it's not a story about "animals". It's a story about life. We have to just go on.
At one time you could not get the book, it's re-issued, so I need to order again to replace a book about beat to pieces because quite honestly the lessons here are timeless and important for use with 1st graders. For anyone. There are other movies and material about Koko too if working with older students. Koko has captivated many of us. Here are TWO FILMS with a description i lifted .......
The first was from 1977 when I first saw and heard of this, as I was preparing to leave high school, learning about Stanford...
The second video is from Nature narrated by George Page ( I've rented this one for older kids, with much interest in learning more about this project)In 1977, acclaimed director Barbet Schroeder and cinematographer Nestor Almendros entered the universe of the world’s most famous primate, to create the captivating documentary Koko: A Talking Gorilla. The film introduces us to the remarkable Koko at the age of three, recently brought from the San Francisco Zoo to Stanford University by Dr. Penny Patterson for a controversial experiment—she would be taught the basics of human communication through American sign language. An entertaining, troubling, and still relevant documentary, Koko: A Talking Gorilla sheds light on the ongoing ethical and philosophical debates over the individual rights of animals and brings us face to face with the amazing "individual" caught in the middle. (Lifted from Amazon)
This program doesn't just talk with an ape, it carries on an intimate, decades-long dialogue with her. The story documents the incredible development of a gorilla named Koko, whose learning of American Sign Language (and understanding of spoken English) gives new meaning to the ideas of animal intelligence and inter-species communication. Witness an animal who not only expresses wants and needs but also exhibits creativity and complex, human-like emotions. After being told that her pet kitten died in an accident, Koko demonstrates deep and sincere sadness-and seems to express exactly that when left alone that night. Most amazingly, she maintains a deep and enduring friendship with her human teacher and playmate, Dr. Penny Patterson. But will Dr. Patterson's innovative experiment end with Koko? Or will Koko give birth and transmit her knowledge to a new ape generation? Narrated by Martin Sheen, this inspiring, unforgettable program seeks the answers. The Gorilla Foundation - The mission of the Foundation is to bring interspecies communication to the public, in order to save gorillas from extinction, and inspire our children to create a better future for all the great apes. Established in 1976, The Gorilla Foundation/Koko.org promotes the protection, preservation and propagation of gorillas. Project Koko, a primary focus of TGF/Koko.org, involves teaching a modified form of American Sign Language to two lowland gorillas, Koko and Michael. In addition, TGF/Koko.org is developing a unique preserve for gorillas on the island of Maui, Hawaii. (Lifted from Amazon...)Thanks for a book that changed a teacher's work. Thanks for presenting to children something of your research and revealing just how fascinating it can be to try to understand our cousins and thus understand ourselves.
I'm getting this these years for my nephew who loves nature and learning from "real" things more than anything.
It looks like here are some spots to check out.....
Koko's World / KokoPix - www.koko.org/world/daily.php
Koko the Gorilla - www.koko.org/friends/index.koko.html
Gorilla Intelligence and Behavior - www.koko.org/world/
The Gorilla Foundation / Koko.org
Here was a question used to hit this on my blog
ReplyDelete"do you think there are any ethical concerns with a study such as project koko?"
Well I didn't design this project, and I wasn't in charge of anything connected to it. From what I have read a young woman wanted to do something and a zoo had a young being that fit her concept. On the surface I think it reasonable to state she probably wasn't aware what kind of long term thing she was falling into. Maybe no one could see that, but I have read quite a few good articles on animal studies that really were difficult long term for the animal. I flinched very hard today as my daughter discussed something. She's entering into research on mice . She was talking about research where a spinal column is severed in a mouse and with some chemical component later restored. Now I understand the need to develop spinal cord solutions better than most as I am living the nightmare of a degenerative spinal condition, a syrinx and still the thought of severing a cord and this kind of work makes me ill. I eat meat, though I wonder why, I can't believe I do it.
I'm answering the ethical concerns are valid things to think about. No one worth two cents can ignore those incapable of thinking of even fellow man as worthy of concern and care....man used experimentally. I just think sometimes what we do in public school gets way too close to just experimenting for the h of it. Because we can.
The greater question is do you think Koko has been used unethically, that this hasn't brought forward valid work, that the awareness of her species and their capabilities, do you think this work was an ethical issue, or unclear ethically?
If I ran the universe, and that's lodged in many a cerebrum, if I ran this world I think this is probably not the biggest screw up I'd like to see explained. I'd like to hunt down those people ( who are probably all gone) that put those chimpanzees I think in that experience with a mom, doll, sock, nothing to study how important a mom is. They I'd like to literally take out in a parking lot and duke it out. i cannot believe the nonsense I've seen perpetrated on children in the name of "current educational praxis" and I am still appalled at so much of what was done to harm in the 20th century I cannot even speak to the magnitude of stupidity that goes in the name of man deciding to figure out something. So, on a sliding scale I've got Koko somewhere, but I'm literally in complete shock over just so many fronts.
You get to the point where you wonder if we should be allowed to act on all our thoughts.