Guest Author - Marci Ann Peterson
Cyberchase, a much loved animated PBS show, kicks off their sixth season with “Digit’s B-day Surprise,” on Wednesday November 7. We love to watch Cyberchase at our house! The girls love it because it’s fun and I love it because it’s educational. After we do our schoolwork, the girls are allowed to watch Cyberchase to help reinforce math principles that we have or will be talking about in the future.
The basis of the show is that three “earthlings” are sucked into cyberspace. With the help of Digit, a cyber bird, they must help Motherboard save cyberspace and thwart Hacker’s evil plans to take over cyberspace. Hacker who is voiced by Christopher Llyod, is always coming up with some scheme to take over one website or another and will ultimately lead to him being the ruler of cyberspace. With the help of his two bumbling followers, Buzz and Delete, Hacker always has something up his sleeve. The “earthlings” Matt, Inez, and Jackie are always there to stop Hacker from taking over cyberspace.
“Digit’s B-day Surprise” starts off with Digit thinking that everyone has forgotten about his birthday. Unbeknownst to him his friends are actually planning a surprise party for him. Digit wanders off with his own personal pity party, the only party he thinks he will have that day. Hacker overhears Digit lamenting his sad state and decides to concoct an evil plan to get Digit to tell him all of Motherboards secrets. Hacker pretends that he is the only one who has remembered Digit’s birthday. Hacker convinces Digit that his so-called friends really don’t like him which is why they have forgotten his birthday. Hacker convinces Digit that if digit will allow the Hacker to reprogram him he can fix the problems so his friends will like him again. With Hackers true plan being that he will reprogram Digit to tell him all of Motherboard’s secrets and passwords! Does Hacker prevail or will Digit figure out what is going on before it is too late? Sorry, you’re going to have to watch it yourself to find out that answer.
I love the fact that Cyberchase helps teach and reinforce math concepts to my two girls. The show teaches that math can be found anywhere, everyone can be good at it, and that math can be fun! Some of the math concepts that have been featured have been how to figure out the area, perimeter, estimating, and many many more. In “Digit’s B-day Surprise” the kids learn how to read a thermometer and how to keep themselves and the chocolate statue of Digit cool without a refrigeration unit.
After the cartoon segment is over there is a short segment called “Cyberchase For Real.” This features two real teens Bianca and Harry who then use whatever math concept that was taught in the animated part and apply it to everyday life in the real world. While both Bianca and Harry are both dramatic and play their parts over the top it does enforce the concept that was learned.
I recommend Cyberchase with no reservations, it is a great show to help teach and reinforce math concepts.
