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Clip description
Host Sam (Angela Kelly) explores floating and sinking with parrot Muppet Portia, testing various objects in a basin of water. It is from the 'Play the game’ segment, designed to encourage parents to try some of these activities with their children at home afterwards.
Curator’s notes
Learning about sinking and floating is made fun watching these two play. As the delightful host Sam, Angela Kelly engages with the audience in a very open and friendly way. Kelly makes communicating with the puppets and with an audience through the camera at the same time look easy, when in fact it is very tricky to get the tone and balance right. In this example, the relaxed banter between Sam and the Muppet Portia is actually tightly scripted and very purposeful, designed to build up the audience’s knowledge about the topic, and unobtrusively motivate them to try some sinking and floating experiments for themselves. This discussion is also the lead into the main narrative about Portia’s desire to float, which continues through the rest of the episode.
