Media Menu, July 31, 2010

Here are home viewing suggestions for the week, selected from online advanced TV program listings and aligned with the state and national K-12 academic standards available online. Please consult local listings also, since actual broadcast times may vary. The Websites cited in the “Log on“ box below the tv listing provide further details about the show’s topic and may contain links to video clips from the show or a complete streaming video version of the show.

Saturday, July 31, 2010,
7-8 p.m. E/P
History Channel
Science and Geography
Middle and High School

“Modern Marvels: Tuna’’

It's the most popular fish in the American diet. From the school lunch box--to the high end sushi bar--to the outdoor barbecue, tuna crosses all demographic lines. This documentary follows the men who risk their lives to bring in a haul of tuna, stops in at Bumble Bee, the only major tuna cannery still operating in America, and visits the world's largest fish market in Tokyo, where a single tuna can sell for as much as $100,000. We'll also explore worldwide efforts to save the giant bluefin tuna, which has been over-fished to a point of peril. Then we'll head to sea with scientists who track the tunas' inter-oceanic migrations, and travel to South Australia, where entrepreneurs seek to breed the mighty bluefin in captivity TV-PG

Sunday, August 1, 2010,
8-9 p.m. ET, 5-6 p.m. PT
National Geographic Channel
U.S. and World History
Middle and High School

“Inside The Green Berets”

In a remote outpost in south-central Afghanistan, a group of Americans stand in the breach between the rule of law and the rule of terror. They are Green Berets, part of an elite division of the U.S. Army Special Forces, charged with protecting local civilians from the wrath of the Taliban. For this film, the Pentagon waived their 48-hour limitation on embedded media and allowed NGC cameras to chronicle the lives of these war-hardened Americans for 10 days.

Log on HTTP://CHANNEL.NATIONALGEOGRAPHIC.COM/EPISODE/INSIDE-THE-GREEN-BERETS-3162?SOURCE=EMAIL_CHANNEL#TAB-OVERVIEW#IXZZ0UVVUVJXE

Monday, August 2, 2010,
10-11 p.m. E/P
Animal Planet Channel
U.S. History and Economics
Middle and High School

“Last American Cowboy”

This is the final episode of a documentary miniseries about the beef industry. An entire season boils down to one day as the future of the American Cowboy hangs in the balance. After eight months of struggling through blizzards, fires, accidents and death, three families prepare to sell their calves and collect their one paycheck of the year. Early snowfall brings costly delays for one ranch where honor and loyalty get put to the test. The ranching community rallies around a family struggling with tragedy and all the cowboys cling to their traditions as they hope their legacy will continue. TV-PG

Log on http://animal.discovery.com/tv/last-american-cowboy

Tuesday August 3, 2010,
4-5:30 p.m. E/P, (also available on DVD)
Documentary Channel
Arts
Middle and High School

“Speaking In Strings”

This Oscar-nominated documentary explores the passionate & energetic presence of renowned Italian violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg (she moved to the Unites States at the age of eight to study at The Curtis Institute of Music and later studied with Dorothy DeLay at The Julliard School.) The film focuses on her professional life, starting in 1981, when she burst onto the classical music scene as the youngest (at 17) recipient ever of the Walter W. Naumburg International Violin Competition.

Log on http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181835

Wednesday August 4, 2010, 4-5 p.m. E/P
Discovery Channel
Science and Geography
Middle and High School

“Survivorman: Deadly Waters”

This is an episode in a documentary series in which outdoorsman and survival expert Les Stroud permits himself to be stranded for a week in a remote location with no equipment or supplies apart from his one-man camera rig, documenting his experience and providing insight into how to manage whatever hurdles the wilderness might throw at you. In this episode Stroud ventures to five of the most notorious shark-infested waters in the world to find out which is the most dangerous.

Log on http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181835

Thursday, August 5, 2010,
7-8 p.m. E/P
National Geographic Channel
Science and Technology
Middle and High School

“Naked Science: Lightning Chasers”

Have you ever seen lightning strike from the ground to the sky or float in midair? In this documentary spectacular and exotic forms of this natural phenomenon are slowed down on film to reveal minute detail. Luminous spheres that linger in airplanes are recreated. The film shows how rockets launched into storm clouds coax lightning down to earth.

Log on http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/naked-science/3625/Overview

Friday, August 6, 2010,
6-7 p.m. ET, 3-4 p.m. PT
Ovation Channel
Arts and World History
Middle and High School

“Matisse And Picasso’’

Picasso once said, “ You have to be able to picture side by side everything Matisse and I were doing at the time. No one has ever looked at Matisse's painting more carefully than I; and no one has looked at mine more carefully than he.” Henri Matisse (1869-1954) and Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) are the acknowledged twin giants of modern art, between them having originated many of the most significant innovations of twentieth-century painting and sculpture. In spite of their initial rivalry and their different temperaments, each came to acknowledge the other as his only true equal. Françoise Gilot, Picasso's companion from 1945-53, has written: “They were as complementary as red and green and as opposite as black and white intense mutual curiosity opened the door to their friendship.” Gilot is a contributor to this documentary , along with Claude Picasso, Maya Widmaier-Picasso, Jacqueline Matisse-Monnier and others. With archive footage, photos and a wealth of examples of their work, the film traces the separate paths Matisse and Picasso followed, looks at their points of contact, and sheds light on how the genius of each artist nourished that of the other. Matisse said, “I want an art of balance, of purity, that neither harasses nor worries. I have chosen to keep torment and worries inside me and only to paint the beauty of the world.” e Picasso declared, “The viewer must be wrenched from his torpor, shaken by the throat, made to recognize the world he lives in and for that you first have to take him out of it. “

Saturday, August 7, 2010,
2-5 p.m. ET, 11 a.m.– 1:30 p.m. PT
Ovation Channel
Literature, Arts and U.S. History
Middle and High School

“The Crucible”

Pulitzer prizewinning playwright Arthur Miller's stage play, “The Crucible” , is the basis of this Oscar-nominated film. The play is often studied in school. The author also wrote the screenplay for this movie version The story: After being spurned by a lover (Daniel Day-Lewis), young Abigail Williams (Winona Ryder) stirs up a frenzy of hysteria and fear with accusations of witchcraft. Paul Scofield (who won a BAFTA Award) and Joan Allen co-star. The movie is centered around the Salem Massachusetts witch trials of 1692. A small group of teen girls in 1692 Salem, Massachusetts caught in an innocent conjuring of love potions to catch young men are forced to tell lies that Satan had invaded them and forced them to participate in the rites and are then forced to name those involved. Thrown into the mix are greedy preachers and other major landowners trying to steal others' land and one young woman infatuated with a married man and determined to get rid of his innocent wife. Arthur Miller wrote the events and the subsequent trials where those who demanded their innocence were executed, those who would not name names were incarcerated and tortured, and those who admitted their guilt were immediately freed as a parable of the Congressional Communist witch hunts led by Senator Joe McCarthy in 1950's America. Rated PG-13 for intense depiction of the Salem witch trials

Log on http://www.gradesaver.com/the-crucible