When: March 30, 2013, 9 – 11 a.m.

Where: Alamo Drafthouse Lake Creek and Alamo Drafthouse Slaughter

• Come dressed in your best Hollywood glamour or mad scientist outfit.
• Walk the red carpet and take photos in our photo booth.
• Meet Clifford the Big Red Dog.
• Enjoy hands-on science activities in the lobby with the KLRU-TV, Austin PBS education team.
• If you are not already, now’s your chance to become a KLRU Explorers family!

RESERVATIONS REQUIRED: Click here to go the Alamo Drafthouse reservation site.

ALL AGES ARE WELCOME, BUT CHILDREN MUST BE ACCOMPANIED BY A PARENT. PLEASE RESERVE ONLY THE SEATS YOU EXPECT TO USE, AND RESERVE ENOUGH SEATS FOR ALL ATTENDEES, REGARDLESS OF AGE. ALL UNCLAIMED SEATS WILL BE RELEASED TO THE WAITING LIST AT 9:30 AM.

AGENDA:
9:00 Doors open, guest check in, red carpet photos and lobby activities
9:30 Movie starts. Fidgety guests are welcome in the lobby for activities during the show.
11:00 Event ends

In an effort to assist our community with this process, KLRU will air GED Connections starting January 7th. Engaging documentary-style videos introduce content and give learners a chance to hear from experts in various fields and advance toward their GED with programs covering each test area. Students hear and see how the skills they are learning for the GED exam relate to work, home and community life. GED Connections will air on KLRU at 5:30 am Monday to Friday and on KLRU Q 2:30 pm Monday to Friday.

If you need more assistance than the television show can provide there are several options in the KLRU viewing area.

Austin Community College’s Adult Education Division provides a variety of services and programs to help adult learners meet their education and career goals. Adult Education offers GED preparation, English as a Second Language classes, workforce certification programs, courses to ease the transition to college, and more. For more information, visit austincc.edu/abe or call (512) 223.5300

Community Action, Inc. of Central Texas’ Adult Education Program provides a wide array of adult education services across a ten county area surrounding Austin. These services include classes for GED preparation, English as a second language, English Literacy and Civics, college and workforce readiness, and basic skills improvement. For more information, visit communityaction.com or call (512) 392-1161 extension 334

Rachel Deaton, Librarian of Winkley Elementary in Leander ISD is now the proud owner of a new iPad thanks to her entry in the PBS LearningMedia Sweepstakes! Rachel is a daily user of KLRU / PBS LearningMedia in order to supply her teachers and students with relevant, engaging content and is “amazed” at the wealth of information on the site. Access to the Learning Media portal is FREE to all and offers access to over 20,000 artifacts from the PBS archives. (Two hints: Create your free login ASAP to avoid reminders, and “like” PBS LearningMedia on Facebook to receive valuable tips on contents.)

Airing on KLRU 18. 1 Tuesday, Nov. 6, 3:30 pm

KLRU Educational Services is thrilled to join the launch of Dell’s Powering the Possible initiative in 2012! Thanks to the generosity of Dell, we have acquired 20 brand-new, sleek Dell XPS 13 Ultrabooks for use in two pilot projects close to the Dell campus, at Walnut Creek and Graham Elementary Schools. We will work with Extend-A-Care staff and their kids to bring the best of our digital media resources to enhance after-school learning opportunities in order to strengthen academic skills through high-quality, trustworthy shows, games, and other activities. Apart from the Dell laptops, another brand-new resource for this project is PBS Learning Media, the user-friendly portal to PBS’ treasure trove of educational content.

www.eackids.org

klru.pbslearningmedia.org

PBS Parents has recently launched a new website with Whole Foods called Fantastic Organic where you can find collected tips, ideas, recipes, videos and games to encourage you and your family to explore organic produce and foods.

KLRU is joining in the fun, too! Saturday, August 25, the new Whole Foods Market at Arbor Trails in South Austin will have a fun run, an in-store organic scavenger hunt, and our very own Biscuit Brothers! The events start at 8:00 am with the fun run at 8:00 am, then yoga at 10:00 am. The Biscuits take the stage at noon as the scavenger hunt commences. While there, pick up a schedule of our fall PBS Kids lineup, including the debut of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, and consider the KLRU Explorers family membership!

• Rundberg and Lamar
• IH-35 and William Cannon
• E. 7th St. and Pleasant Valley
• E. Riverside
• Ed Bluestein Blvd. and Manor Rd.

The PBS Kids Summer Learning Initative connects watching of PBS Kids programs with reading and other activities. Kids who participate can return to the HEB after August 17 to pick up a certificate that they can show to their new teachers!

Now that it’s REALLY HOT outside, not just HOT, we know kids will be spending more time indoors and screen time will go up. To make sure that kids have access to quality content and quality activities, along with our friends at the Literacy Coalition of Central Texas, we’ve started the KRLU Summer Challenge.  To get started, read and download the materials below!

PBS highlights one show each week during the summertime. KLRU starts from here and asks kids to do the following:

WATCH - Here are the shows for each week, and the times they air

June 4-8: Wild Kratts, Zach Attack Week 4:00 pm
June 11-15: WordGirl, Tobey's Robot Summer 3:30 pm
June 18-22: Arthur, Baby Kate Adventure Week 3:00 pm
June 25-29: Curious George, Monkey Business Week 8:00 am
July 2-6: Super Why! Royal Reading Week 9:00 am
July 9-13: The Electric Company Prankster Planet Week 4:30 pm
July 16-20: Dinosaur Train Gone Fishing Week 9:30 am
July 23-27: Martha Speaks Dog Daze Week 2:30 pm
July 30-August 3: The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That Creepy Crawley Week 8:30 am
August 6-10: Sid the Science Kid Get Up and Move Week 10:00 am

READ – We want kids to read at least 15 minutes a day, or 75 minutes a week. To track progress you can download a chart here or download Scholastic’s Reading Timer for iPhone, iPad, or Android devices.

DO - Whether your kids are completing pages in the packet or playing PBS games online or on mobile devices, they are learning!

Click here to download an activity packet for ages 4-7.

Click here to download an activity packet for ages 6-10.

Click here to download a Reading Progress Chart.

For online games, go to:

PBS Kids (ages 2-5)
PBS Kids Go! (ages 4-8)
PBS Kids It's My Life (ages 8-12)
PBS Kids Mobile for all mobile downloads (all ages)

PLAY - Not just video games! Get off the couch and go swimming, ride a bike, and run around. Kids should be active at least one hour a day, 365 days a year.

And when you’ve done all of these things, after August 13th you will be able to download a certificate that you can complete and show to your child’s teacher in the new school year.

Jim Lehrer from PBS NewsHour with Austin High School students

Guest blog by Laura Laufer
senior media arts student at Austin High School

Having been involved with the PBS Student Reporting Labs for the last year as a junior, it was a real treat to be able to tour the KLRU studio and view one of the tapings for Overheard with Evan Smith with Jim Lehrer as the guest. It was only a year ago when my teacher was showing me a video clip of Mr. Lehrer addressing me and my classmates about the journey we were about to take working with the PBS NewsHour Extra website. Having only seen a high school media studio it was mind blowing to walk around the maze of KLRU’s office to see studios the size of our classroom and a control board that looked like something off of a spaceship. It was not only the size that was impressive, but the staff of KLRU is truly amazing; being able to watch them in their element was enjoyable and enlightening. (See photos from this taping on KLRU’s Flickr page)

The taping was my favorite part, listening to Jim Lehrer crack jokes about all of the politicians he’s interviewed was the highlight of my day. My parents were also jealous that I got to sit in on such an influential political figurehead which made the gloating that much more enjoyable. It was a learning experience as well. Being the youngest crowd there Overheard gave insight to the class about the inner workings of political interviews, a process that had never been explained to us.

Before the taping, Erika Aguilar gave us a tour of the KUT studio and showed us where they record bands, interviews, and eat bagels! (morning story meeting table). It felt really cool that we also had a story meeting table and did the same thing they did, bouncing ideas off each other as a team to get the best ideas on what to put on air.

The Austin Highs Media team is so lucky to have been able to work so closely with our mentors, KLRU’s Lynn Boswell and KUT’s Erika Aguilar with the Student Reporting Labs to create our own NewsHour Reports. The experience last year, producing our news stories, was very difficult, but well worth the stress. That year taught me how to be a serious journalism and media student and gave a voice to my classmates and I, a group of individuals whose point of view often gets over looked. That experience gave us a chance to see what it means to be a journalist, and to see all the hard work that goes into finding a story that is worth creating.

Learn more about the Student Reporting Labs.

Sesame Street’s Food for Thought, a bilingual, multimedia program, is designed to help families coping with uncertain or limited access to affordable and nutritious food. With a focus on families with children ages birth to 8, the project provides resources including recipes, menu guides, shopping lists and tips for families. Sesame Street’s Food for Thought also features one of the show’s newest characters that will help children learn about food issues.

“It’s an important sign of the times that Sesame Street has introduced a new Muppet, Lily, who lives with food uncertainty, and that the nationwide reaction to Lily has been so strong,” said Ben Kramer, KLRU’s Director of Educational Services. “We’re thankful to take part in this project, a remarkable collaboration of Austin organizations tackling hunger, nutrition, and education.”

November’s Literacy Night/Meals for Minds at Pickle Elementary takes place from 5-7:30 p.m. on November 15th and includes dinner for the invited families, teaching activities and food distribution. The event is part of a Target and Capital Area Food Bank grant called Meals for Minds, which brings food to feed elementary school students and their families most in need. With nearly 1 in 4 Texas children now living at risk of hunger the Capital Area Food Bank in partnership with Target, created this program to combat childhood hunger, and its impact on children’s education, while increasing parental involvement in their child’s education. Other sponsoring agencies include Austin ISD, City of Austin Parks and Recreation, Austin/Travis County Health and Human Services Department, Austin Public Library.

About KLRU:
KLRU-TV, Austin PBS, presents quality multimedia content that engages people in the thoughtful exchange of ideas, the expression of the arts, and enjoyable lifelong learning opportunities, resulting in a more vibrant community and a higher quality of life. In addition to providing locally produced and quality national television programming, KLRU is also a non-profit organization helping to build a stronger community through educational workshops, community engagement projects and public events. Known as the producing station of the longest-running live music television show AUSTIN CITY LIMITS, KLRU has also worked on several other national productions including OVERHEAD WITH EVAN SMITH and documentaries like CITIZEN ARCHITECT and LAST BEST HOPE. Get more information about KLRU at klru.org.