Learn & Play
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Learning at Home | Week of 4/18 – 4/22

Take advantage of this week’s Learning at Home broadcast schedule – great for students engaged in hybrid or distance instruction, and families looking to spend some extra, quality time together!

After watching these fascinating programs, explore the PBS LearningMedia and web resources to learn more.

Highlight of the Week

The Resilient Ones: A Generation Takes on Climate Change
Thursday, April 21, 1 PM

Go on a journey with a group of high school students seeking solutions to climate change. The Resilient Ones: A Generation Takes on Climate Change invites you along to meet with the local leaders and expert innovators as these students work to make a difference in the Adirondack mountains of Northern NY.

Learning at Home
Week of 4/18 – 4/22

Monday, April 18

1 PM: NATURE: American Arctic

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska has long protected survivors of the Ice Age, but this frozen fortress is melting due to climate change. For the caribou, musk oxen, polar bears and Arctic foxes, the Ice Age is slipping away.

2 PM: The Great Polar Bear Feast

Every year, up to eighty polar bears gather on the frozen shores of Barter Island, near the village of Kaktovik, to feast on the hunter-harvested bowhead whale remains. This extraordinary gathering is not only highly unusual, it turns dangerous as the whale bones are picked bare, and the huge group of polar bears heads for the town.

Tuesday, April 19

1 PM: Holy Silence

Take a fresh look at a topic that has sparked controversy for decades. During the years leading up to WWII, what was the Vatican’s reaction to the rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany? After the war began, how did the pope respond to the horrors of the Holocaust? In telling that story, “Holy Silence” focuses on American officials who worked behind the scenes to influence the Vatican’s actions.

2 PM: Rise of the Nazis: Dictators at War | Barbarossa

At the peak of his powers, Hitler tries to deceive the Russian leader with a plan to invade Britain, while secretly preparing an attack on the Soviet Union. But Stalin has a spy in Hitler’s HQ. With Germany facing defeat on the Eastern Front, resistance builds as he pushes Germany to untold destruction. This is the story of why dictatorships fail, and of the hubris that nearly destroyed freedom, but ultimately destroyed itself.

Wednesday, April 20

1 PM: My Native Air: Charles Evans Hughes and the Adirondacks

Four of New York’s Governors went on to be elected President. Martin Van Buren, Grover Cleveland, and both Frankin D. Roosevelt and Teddy Roosevelt. All famous names in both New York and national politics. Another former governor, who was born in the Adirondacks, came within just a few thousand votes of winning the White House, narrowly losing the 1916 Presidential Election to Woodrow Wilson. Despite that loss, he would later serve as U.S. Secretary of State and then as Chief Justice of the United States. Yet many people have heard very little over the years about Charles Evans Hughes. A new documentary is looking to change that. Maury Thompson, a longtime reporter with the Post Star newspaper in Glens Falls, has teamed up with filmmaker Caitlyn Stedman to produce a new film on Hughes’ life and legacy.

2 PM: Songs to Keep: Treasures of an Adirondack Folk Collector

Follow the musical trail of folk collector Marjorie Lansing Porter as we explore gorgeous American vistas. In the 1940s, ’50s, and ’60s, Porter tirelessly recorded folk songs that were on the brink of disappearing. Now, contemporary singers and musicians honor her collection by re-recording these traditional tunes in Songs to Keep: Treasures of an Adirondack Folk Collector.

Thursday, April 21

1 PM: The Resilient Ones: A Generation Takes on Climate Change

Go on a journey with a group of high school students seeking solutions to climate change. The Resilient Ones: A Generation Takes on Climate Change invites you along to meet with the local leaders and expert innovators as these students work to make a difference in the Adirondack mountains of Northern NY.

2 PM: Uninvited: The Spread of Invasive Species

Uninvited: The Spread of Invasive Species is an exciting and informative film by Westfield Production Company. The documentary introduces the concept of invasive species and highlights some of the species threatening New York’s environment and economy, while also showing some innovative ways that New York State is combatting these threats. Uninvited features the collaborative work of DEC and its partners including NYS Department of Agriculture & Markets, the eight Partnerships for Regional Invasive Species Management (PRISMs), New York State Invasive Species Research Institute (NYISRI), and more.

Friday, April 22

1 PM: Poetry in America: Sonnet IV; I shall forget you presently, my dear

In 1920s Greenwich Village, Edna St. Vincent Millay wrote Shakespearean sonnets that toppled clichés of love and romance. To probe this unsentimental break-up poetry, host Elisa New speaks with musician Natalia Zukerman, poet Olivia Gatwood, New York Times advice columnist Philip Galanes, writer Leslie Jamison, scholar of Greenwich Village Jeffery Kennedy, and a chorus of National Student Poets.

1:30 PM: Articulate | Reflexive Cognition

The observations and experiences of poet Paul Muldoon and multidisciplinary artist Daniel Arsham are powerfully rendered in their work. Through poetry, Paul Muldoon sought reconciliation with the violence of his early life in Northern Ireland. He found acceptance. Daniel Arsham has thrived in fine art, architecture, design, film, fashion, and performance by approaching each with creativity, intellect—and science.

2 PM: Great Performances | Now Hear This “Florence Price and the Great Migration”

Host Scott Yoo follows the trail of great African American composer Florence Price, learning that West African music and European hymns inspired nearly all American popular music. He begins with the Arkansas archives that house Price’s work, which was originally found in the attic of an abandoned Chicago house. Then, Yoo joins pianist Karen Walwyn to discover where Price grew up and the spiritual music she was surrounded by in the South before moving to Chicago seeking equality and opportunity. Yoo explores Southern migrants’ musical impact on the city and gospel music with singer Vernon Oliver Price and former choir director Lou Della Evans Reid. Other performances by musicians inspired by Price, include pianist Michelle Cann, blues musician Jonn Primer, opera singers Rod Dixon and Alfreda Burke, showing how powerful Price’s influence remains today.

Learning at Home on Mountain Lake PBS is supported by:
Adirondack Foundation