WGBH Educational Foundation

Hunt for the Supertwister: Chasing Nature's Most Powerful Tornadoes (2004)

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Little on this earth can withstand the violent fury of an F5 tornado. A churning vortex with winds over 300 miles an hour, these tornadoes create immense swaths of death and destruction in a matter of seconds. But today, experts are exploring the supertwister's complex inner working in bold new ways in the hopes of one day being able to accurately predict the occurrences of tornadoes.

Grade Level:

Middle

High

Length:

01:00

Hunt for the Supertwister: Chasing Nature's Most Powerful Tornadoes

World in the Balance: The Population Paradox (2004)

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Part 1: The People Paradox: Startling trends in population are discussed as the program looks at the aging populations of Japan, Europe, and Russia. But in parts of Africa and India, more than half of the still growing population is under 25. The conclusion: the world population is careening in two dramatically different directions.

Grade Level:

High

Length:

02:00

World in the Balance: The Population Paradox

Darwin's Dangerous Idea (2001)

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Evolution offers a groundbreaking and definitive view of the extraordinary impact the evolutionary process has had on our understanding of the world around us.

Grade Level:

Middle

High

Length:

02:00

The Art Institute of Chicago; The Cleveland Museum of Art (2001)

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Program 1: Art Institute of Chicago (60 min.): Sister Wendy Beckett looks at American Gothic by Grant Wood, Chimu (pre-Incan) art from Peru, Joan Mitchell, Edward Hopper, Picasso, 18th century ceramic art, a West-African drum, Manfredi, pre-Columbian art from Central America, Manet, Marc Chagall, Renoir, Chinese sculpture, 12th century Korean pottery, George Innes, Puryear, Georges Seurat.

Grade Level:

Middle

High

Length:

02:00

The Art Institute of Chicago; The Cleveland Museum of Art

Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas; Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2001)

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Program 1: Kimble Art Museum (60 min.): Sister Wendy Beckett introduces the Kimbell Museum in Fort Worth and looks at several artists and works including Maillol, a terracotta head of a Nigerian king, Cezanne, Hindu scultpture, Piet Mondrian, a Japanese screen, Caravaggio, George de la Tour, Caspar David Friedrich, Standing Maitreya Bodhisattva from Thailand, sculpture from Pakistan, Ercole d

Grade Level:

Middle

High

Length:

02:00

Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas; Los Angeles County Museum of Art

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (2001)

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Progam 1: The Metropolitan Museum Of Art (60 min.): Sister Wendy Beckett introduces the museum and looks at a fragmentary sculpture of an Egyptian queen, Islamic art and a page from the Koran, Watteau, porcelain figures from the Commedia dell'Arte, Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux, art from New Guinea, Balthus, Medieval Art and the Cloisters, Velazquez, Egyptian art, women as artists, Marie-Denise Vill

Grade Level:

Middle

High

Length:

02:00

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston