Title
Let's Play Astronaut
Subject
Recording--Children
Description
The image is a picture of the front sleeve of "Let's Play Astronaut."
The top sound clip is the A side of the recording.
The bottom sound clip is the B side of the recording.
The top sound clip is the A side of the recording.
The bottom sound clip is the B side of the recording.
"Let's Play Astronaut" is a sound recording produced by Listen & Learn Records in 1964. Its main goal is to provide an imaginative astronautics scenario, aided by several sounds and a story, while teaching children a brief history about Columbus and Galileo and their impacts on the knowledge of Earth and space.
"Let's Play Astronaut" is an interesting item because it gives a unique understanding into both adult and children's views of space exploration. For adult's, it provides an argument against child space exploration because of the way space travel is depicted. For children on the other hand, "Let's Play Astronaut" encourages the idea of child space exploration because it helps them to imagine what it would be like to be in space on a mission.
"Lets Play Astronaut" would argue against children as space explorers, since it portrays space as dangerous. The imaginary mission for the child is to rescue an astronaut stranded in space. "Let's pretend there is an emergency," the narrator suggests to the child audience. In this emergency, the other astronaut has no way to slow down his space casual in order to re-enter the Earth's atmosphere. This scene is established in the A side of the record. Another danger is represented on the B side. On the B side, a frantic distress call is sent from the distressed astronaut to ground control. He reports he is running out of oxygen and the air is getting heavier. Mission control, in an very serious and anxious tone of voice, dramatically tells the other astronaut to use his reserve oxygen tank, implying that he will run out of oxygen if he does not. In this children's record as one can see, space is portrayed as very dangerous with many risks.
Space exploration is also portrayed as a man's job. The narrator insist that mission control "needs a brave space man to send out to bring him [the stranded astronaut] back to Earth." The other astronaut is also a male. Finally, on the B side, the narrator encourages the child that one day he may also grow up to be a spaceman and may even be one of the first to explore or set foot on one of the planets.
"Let's Play Astronaut," at the same time, also encourages the child space explorer, which is evident from its target audience and goals. Children, primarily males, are meant to pretend to be an astronaut in this record. The whole recording is meant to immerse children in the idea of exploring space by filling it with several space travel sounds like rocket boosters firing, mission control giving instructions, and sound inside the cockpit. All of these sounds helped to aid the child's imagined space exploration and enhances their experience. Also, it aids children in learning more about space and Earth through the stories about Columbus discovering the world is round and Galileo using the telescope to learn more about the universe like the Sun being the center of the galaxy. Finally, "Let's Play Astronaut," also invites male children to think about one day being one of the first space explorers to go on a distant planet or even the moon.
"Let's Play Astronaut" is an interesting item because it gives a unique understanding into both adult and children's views of space exploration. For adult's, it provides an argument against child space exploration because of the way space travel is depicted. For children on the other hand, "Let's Play Astronaut" encourages the idea of child space exploration because it helps them to imagine what it would be like to be in space on a mission.
"Lets Play Astronaut" would argue against children as space explorers, since it portrays space as dangerous. The imaginary mission for the child is to rescue an astronaut stranded in space. "Let's pretend there is an emergency," the narrator suggests to the child audience. In this emergency, the other astronaut has no way to slow down his space casual in order to re-enter the Earth's atmosphere. This scene is established in the A side of the record. Another danger is represented on the B side. On the B side, a frantic distress call is sent from the distressed astronaut to ground control. He reports he is running out of oxygen and the air is getting heavier. Mission control, in an very serious and anxious tone of voice, dramatically tells the other astronaut to use his reserve oxygen tank, implying that he will run out of oxygen if he does not. In this children's record as one can see, space is portrayed as very dangerous with many risks.
Space exploration is also portrayed as a man's job. The narrator insist that mission control "needs a brave space man to send out to bring him [the stranded astronaut] back to Earth." The other astronaut is also a male. Finally, on the B side, the narrator encourages the child that one day he may also grow up to be a spaceman and may even be one of the first to explore or set foot on one of the planets.
"Let's Play Astronaut," at the same time, also encourages the child space explorer, which is evident from its target audience and goals. Children, primarily males, are meant to pretend to be an astronaut in this record. The whole recording is meant to immerse children in the idea of exploring space by filling it with several space travel sounds like rocket boosters firing, mission control giving instructions, and sound inside the cockpit. All of these sounds helped to aid the child's imagined space exploration and enhances their experience. Also, it aids children in learning more about space and Earth through the stories about Columbus discovering the world is round and Galileo using the telescope to learn more about the universe like the Sun being the center of the galaxy. Finally, "Let's Play Astronaut," also invites male children to think about one day being one of the first space explorers to go on a distant planet or even the moon.
Creator
Sillian, Jack
Sillian, Ruth
Source
Listen & Lean Record's Lets Play Astronaut
Publisher
Listen & Learn Record Corporation
Date
1964
Contributor
Olle Larson
Rights
Listen & Learn Record Corporation
An attempt was made to contact the Listen & Learn Record Corporation; however, no current contact information could be found.
Relation
[no text]
Format
image: jpeg
sound: mpeg-4
Language
English
Type
Sound
Identifier
[no text]
Coverage
1964
United States of America
Original Format
Sound off of a 45 rpm copy of "Let's Play Astronaut" that has been digitized.
Still image is of the front cover of the album sleeve for "Let's Play Astronaut."
Duration
Side A: 5 minutes 47 seconds
Side B: 5 minutes 42 seconds
Bit Rate/Frequency
Side A: 297 kbits/s
Side B: 279 kbits/s
Transcription
The overall contents of side A include establishing the mission for the child, getting him acquainted with space, blast off, and finally a history lesson on Christopher Columbus's discovery of the Earth being round.
Side B includes a recap of the mission, more instructions from mission control, a brief history lesson on Galileo, a frantic communication between the stranded Astronaut and Mission Control, completing the mission, and a final encouraging word to children about one day becoming astronauts.