science

Little Einsteins

Little Einsteins is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Little Einsteins rather than just read about it. In short: Little Einsteins is an American live-action/animated children's television series developed by Douglas Wood. Produced by Curious Pictures in association with The Baby Einstein Company, the series follows the adventures of a team of four young children, Leo, June, Quincy, and Annie.

Key takeaways

Little Einsteins belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Little Einsteins to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Little Einsteins from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Little Einsteins is an American live-action/animated children's television series developed by Douglas Wood. Produced by Curious Pictures in association with The Baby Einstein Company, the series follows the adventures of a team of four young children, Leo, June, Quincy, and Annie. Together, they travel around the world in Rocket, an anthropomorphic red rocket ship, and undertake various missions, with the goal of solving a problem, helping someone, or finding something. Little Einsteins was developed after The Walt Disney Company acquired The Baby Einstein Company. Extensive research was done to ensure the series was appealing to preschoolers. Production of each episode was located at Manhattan, New York. Little Einsteins started with a direct-to-video film Our Huge Adventure; it was released on August 23, 2005. The series later premiered on October 9 on Disney Channel's programming block Playhouse Disney. It was concluded on December 22, 2009, after two seasons and 67 episodes. Critics opined that Little Einsteins introduced children to classical music and art without lowering levels of intelligence. Several reviews lauded the quality of music, animation, and visuals; others deemed the series educational, well-crafted, and valuable to children. Little Einsteins received high viewership and influenced the development of merchandise, video games, and others. It was nominated for two Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Children's Animated Program in 2008 and 2009. The album Disney's Little Einsteins Musical Missions also received a nomination for Best Spoken Word Album for Children at the 49th Annual Grammy Awards.

Overview

The curriculum of Little Einsteins primarily focuses on teaching art and music appreciation. In each episode, a famous or culturally significant work of art will be integrated within the plotline; these are most often paintings, but other art forms (such as sculptures) have been featured occasionally. The artwork featured is frequently connected to a specific culture or part of the world, and special episodes will have more than one piece showcased. In addition, a composition of music (typically from the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic eras) will be played multiple times throughout the episode and likewise affect the plot. The show also promotes recognizing different kinds of musical instruments, notation, and terminology. The show is also designed to encourage viewer participation. Over the course of an episode, the Little Einsteins will regularly interact with the audience and require their assistance at several points throughout their journey. The characters will also prompt the audience to perform specific actions that include patting their laps, identifying objects, solving puzzles, and singing or dancing along to help them overcome obstacles and complete their mission.

Episodes

Home video and streaming After the direct-to-video film Our Huge Adventure, Little Einsteins had several DVD releases. In 2006, Little Einsteins became available to purchase on iTunes. The show is available on Disney+.

Production

Background In March 2001, a licensing agreement between The Baby Einstein Company and The Walt Disney Company was announced, allowing Disney to develop Baby Einstein products. On November 6, 2001, a Disney press release announced that it acquired The Baby Einstein Company after two years of pursuit. Robert Iger, Disney's president and chief operating officer from 2000 to 2005, stated that there were plans to extend the Baby Einstein brand into a Little Einstein product line aimed at preschoolers, initially set to launch in late 2002.

Development According to Disney Channel's then-senior vice president Nancy Kanter, the series was started "from scratch" since the Baby Einstein entries had no specific story lines and characters. Extensive research was done to produce an episode of the series. Executive producer Eric Weiner and Kanter developed the Book-a-Matic, an electronic storyboard, for research of the series. The production was located at Manhattan, New York, with each episode shipped to the headquarters of Disney Channel in California. Approximately 100 employees worked on the series, taking up to nine months for an episode to be completed, with six to ten episodes being in production at the same time.

Conception, writing, storyboards, and testing The series' concept originated in several schools located at Manhattan, where Weiner and the production team interviewed children that if they could go anywhere in the world, where would it be. The most popular answer was "One Dollar Store"; the second most popular answer was New Jersey. Their answers inspired them to create the concept of travel since they wanted to "open them up to wider possibilities." Jeff Borkin, the head writer for the series, did not model the characters after anyone, but created a balanced dynamic within the group of friends by adding individual traits. Leo and Annie were developed to become siblings, while Quincy was developed to become the comedian of the group as a way to ease possible tension. The plot for an episode was written first. After the storyboards of each episode were finished, music, artwork, and backgrounds were chosen to accompany an episode. Dialogue was later added in storyboard panels. Because classical music was used to accompany the animation, writing had to be tweaked and honed to match the music. To ensure an episode appealed to children under five, many writers read stories to a group of preschoolers to monitor their reactions. Storyboard forms and rough-cut versions of each episode were also tested on children from elementary schools and nurseries in New York City. Only episodes praised by children were completed.

Animation The producers of the series wanted the series to be "seamless" with a combination of live-action footage and animation. Testing with different textures, images of animals, nature, well-known locations, and several others were added to create a combination of 2D, 3D, and computer animation by using Corel Painter, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Flash, and Adobe After Effects. Animators use drop shades to create an illusion of depth of the characters against the backgrounds. Twelve animators animated each 22-minute episode of the series at Curious Pictures. After animation of a scene was finished, the music score required post-production work to synchronize the animation.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Little Einsteins

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Little Einsteins claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Little Einsteins before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Little Einsteins ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Little Einsteins

In research: Little Einsteins appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Little Einsteins in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Little Einsteins is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2000s American animated comedy television series, 2000s American children's comedy television series, 2000s preschool education television series, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Little Einsteins outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Little Einsteins in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Little Einsteins means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Little Einsteins out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Little Einsteins in simple terms?

Why does Little Einsteins matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Little Einsteins?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Little Einsteins.