Summary: Introduce viewers to three women who have found gainful employment in the engineering field. This program profiles Elizabeth Nethery, a product support engineer who tests and customizes prosthetics; Elisabeth Paul, a computer software engineer in the aerospace industry; and Daisy Lung, an environmental engineer who conducts site assessments for real estate clients. Commentary from co-workers...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: A Meridian Production. One 13-minute video.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program offers an overview of genetics and cloning as they occur both in nature and in the laboratory while addressing the ethical and social implications of genetic engineering. Genes, chromosomes, and DNA are identified, and the process of cell fertilization is demonstrated. Identical human twins are presented as an example of naturally occurring clones. The synthesis of human insulin...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: A Meridian Production. One 28-minute video.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Many scientists and consumers believe that genetic engineering will vastly improve life on Earth, while others believe it will spell the ruin of the planet. What are the facts behind the rhetoric and the hysteria? In this program, Dr. David Cove surveys past and probable future applications of genetic engineering while calmly presenting possible benefits and liabilities. The case is stated for...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: How does cDNA differ from normal DNA? Can a bullet really implant genes? And why is a gene for bioluminescence so valuable to researchers? This program answers those and other questions as it introduces the process of genetic engineering. Dr. David Cove deftly explains how reverse transcriptase is used to isolate genes, how isolated genes are cloned, how cloned genes are delivered via benign...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Any discussion of genetic engineering first requires a knowledge of how organisms replicate. In this program, Dr. David Cove describes the structure and function of DNA as he covers how coding sequences and promoters work together to create proteins from amino acids. DNA's remarkable suitability as a medium for duplicating the blueprints of life both rapidly and accurately in a simple yet...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Using original source footage, this program examines several major disasters, including the space shuttle Challenger, and discusses the scientific principles behind the engineering failures. Analyzing each project, a professional engineer uses practical demonstrations to illustrate the miscalculations that cause bridges to collapse, the fuselage of planes to crack, and the roofs of a newly...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Nick van Bloss possesses astonishing musical talent. He is also afflicted with Tourette's Syndrome. As this program illustrates, the two are often linked, leading those born with the disorder to view it as both a curse and a gift. Nick's journey-taking him from the humiliating loss of his career as a concert pianist toward a more self-assured acceptance of his condition-is not only inspiring;...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: Still in its infancy, tissue engineering has already made it possible to grow human-based substitutes for basic bodily systems. In this program, experts from MIT, the Georgia Institute of Technology, and Advanced Tissue Sciences, a commercial leader in tissue engineering technology, focus on synthesized skin and arteries, as well as cellular growth-inducing patches. Applications of these...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Once scientists succeeded in identifying and organizing the 92 naturally occurring chemical elements, the challenge then became how to manipulate them into amazing new configurations - and how to tap their essentially limitless energy. A tale of struggle meeting serendipity and of accident meeting design, this program focuses on element-related flashpoints in modern science history: the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: Mute until the age of nine, Stephen Wiltshire learned to communicate through realistic, richly detailed drawings. Alonzo Clemens sculpts clay animal figures with great precision, even though he can barely form a sentence. Matt Savage faced extraordinary developmental problems as a child but has become a teen prodigy among jazz musicians. What is the relationship between creativity and autistic...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: If we're all born with creative potential, why do many children lose their inventive tendencies as they grow older? What role does organized education play? This program observes a group of 25 seven-year-olds and their families in order to study childhood creativity, why it frequently fades, and why it matters. Exploring the impact of school and whether or not it dampens the creative impulse,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
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Summary: Amy Tan is the author of several bestselling novels, including the The Kitchen God's Wife, The Hundred Secret Senses, and the beloved Joy Luck Club, which has been translated into 35 languages and became a commercially successful film in 1993. Tan has said in the past that "books were my salvation. Books saved me from being miserable." In this TEDTalk, she speaks further on the human response...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: Following acclaimed poet and memoirist Maya Angelou on a visit to her childhood surroundings in Stamps, Arkansas, this Bill Moyers interview remains a classic of broadcast journalism and a valuable teaching tool for African-American studies. "I was terribly hurt in this town," Angelou tells Moyers, "and vastly loved." She recalls her rapturous discovery of Shakespeare (while savoring a favorite...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: In this lively, far-ranging Bill Moyers interview, students receive a firsthand look at the creative mind and collaboration that gave birth to All in the Family, The Jeffersons, One Day at a Time, and other groundbreaking TV comedies. Moyers talks with producer Norman Lear about inspiration, writing, working with actors, and the ratings-driven interests with which any network television creator...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Hollywood icon John Huston shares numerous insights and experiences in this classic Bill Moyers interview, filmed five years before the director's death in 1987. Answering questions on art and personal adversity at his secluded Mexican villa, Huston also allows Moyers to join him behind the camera during the shooting of Annie. Topics include the many false starts that prefaced Huston's career;...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 1982
View online at AVOD
Summary: Why don't we get the best out of people? Author/educator Sir Ken Robinson argues that it's because we've been educated to become good workers instead of creative thinkers. In this TEDTalk, Robinson makes an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that cultivates creativity and acknowledges multiple types of intelligence. An excellent discussion-starter in the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: From selective breeding in agriculture to animal cloning and the production of recombinant proteins, science continues to develop ways to modify the genetic code. This program spotlights the basic tools and techniques for manipulating DNA and how these are also used to investigate genetic functions. Viewers will learn about the coding and non-coding sections of DNA; the basics of PCR or the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Whether it is a computer screen or an airplane engine or a bridge, someone has to decide how big it will be and how it will work. The men and women in the scientific, engineering, and technical services field create the designs and draw up the plans that determine how things will be built. This program will offer insights into the jobs of a civil engineer, an electronics technician, a hazardous...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: How do multiple intelligences and different thinking styles relate to traditional IQ scores? What role should teacher creativity and the family play in shaping student intelligence? In this interview by Phillip Harris, of Phi Delta Kappa, Robert Sternberg-IBM Professor of Psychology and Education at Yale University-answers questions about the IQ-based "single trait notion of intelligence"; the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005