When Boomers were kids, playing in the stream meant just that. But now, it refers to a generation of kids “with the average preschooler now more able to play video games than ride a bike or tie a shoe, and with three-quarters of all middle school- and high school-age kids already owning a phone.”

So when, how much and from whom should our kids be learning about digital technology? After all, we can't leave it all up to Salman Khan.

Sara DeWitt, VP of PBS Kids Interactive, believes the transmedia approach to learning works best with kids today and comments on the ease of touchscreen technology in this video from SXSW 2012: "How Kids Learn With Technology."Continue reading...

Over the last 10 years or so, Procter & Gamble's Connect + Develop program has forged hundreds of relationships with outside vendors and inventors that have led to myriad big new products for the company — including the Crest SpinBrush, Swiffer Dusters and Olay Regenerist — have brought refinements and ingredients that weren't thought of or available internally, and have helped lead a surge in innovation at the Cincinnati-based giant.

Connect + Develop is still at it in a more challenging era, including looking for ways to out-license Procter & Gamble brands, products, processes and ideas as well as bringing still more interesting stuff from the outside in. And while archrival Unilever has been generating some buzz recently with news that it is setting up a new online platform as part of its own "open innovation" strategy, the head of P&G's longer-tenured operation believes Connect + Develop remains well in the lead among the company's competitive set.

"They got quite a bit of publicity, and that's cool," Jeff Weedman, P&G's vice president of global business development, told brandchannel. "I expect us to do well in an open marketplace."Continue reading...

Jamba Juice keeps on spreading its brand mojo in new places, now including American schools and the supermarket tea aisle.

"Whatever it is that defines you, Jamba Juice wants to be part of helping you live a healthier and more wholesome life," Julie Washington, SVP and recently named chief brand officer of the California-based smoothie chain, told brandchannel. "We're trying to make sure everyone knows the wealth and breadth of Jamba's food and beverage offerings."

Jamba, which has an endorsement deal with tennis pro Venus Williams, has been in expansion mode beyond its smoothie menu for some time now, including introducing oatmeal and flatbreads, expanding into South Korea and the Philippines, diversifying into coconut water and CPG goods for stores. Lately, its gambits have included acquiring Talbott Teas and testing an in-school-outlet concept, in addition to new fresh-squeezed juice blends.

"Two years ago, our biggest competition probably could have been considered McDonald's, because they were getting into smoothies," said Washington, who was Jamba's general manager of consumer products before moving earlier this year to the new branding post. "Today, people talk about Starbucks," she added, as Jamba's main rival because the company began selling its recently acquired Evolution juice line in its coffee stores and in a standalone store in Bellevue, Wash., last week.Continue reading...

Khan Academy, the free, nonprofit online educational service, has been around for about five and a half years, but its brand is suddenly rising fast, thanks to a 60 Minutes segment Sunday night and the announcement Monday that the TED Conference is launching TED-Ed, “an online collection of free video lessons delivered by the best teachers on a range of subjects,” according to the Washington Post.

It also doesn’t hurt that investment dollars have come in from the Gates Foundation and Google, whose chairman, Eric Schmidt, is a big fan. The Post notes that Khan is “beginning to be used experimentally in a couple dozen schools” as well.

The Academy was started by former hedge-fund analyst Salman “Sal” Khan to help his cousin learn algebra, but then his videos started going viral on YouTube as parents and teachers stumbled across them. The idea is that “students watch videos to learn the lessons at home, and then work through problems in school with their teachers’ assistance,” the Post reports.Continue reading...

When invitations to Apple’s education press conference in New York went out last week, rumors spread quickly of a "Garageband for e-books," something Steve Jobs was reportedly working on before his death last October.

No more note-passing in class, kids, as Apple today announced its digital education platform. Specifically, it's launching iBooks 2 for iPad ($15 textbooks for the iPad), an expanded iTunes U app for K-12 schools, and a custom e-book authoring platform called iBooks Author.

"Education is deep in Apple's DNA and iPad may be our most exciting education product yet. With 1.5 million iPads already in use in education institutions, including over 1,000 one-to-one deployments, iPad is rapidly being adopted by schools across the US and around the world," said Philip Schiller, Apple's SVP Worldwide Marketing. "Now with iBooks 2 for iPad, students have a more dynamic, engaging and truly interactive way to read and learn, using the device they already love."Continue reading...

YouTube for Schools is a just-announced platform giving teachers and school administrators access to educational content from YouTube EDU (while limiting other YouTube content) to feature in their classrooms, offering a curated section of more than 400,000 educational videos from 600-plus partners including the Smithsonian, TED, Steve Spangler Science, and Numberphile.

Sensitive to teacher’s time, YouTube EDU offers over 300 playlists parsed by subject and grade level, such as, Math, Science, Social Studies and English Language Arts, listed at youtube.com/teachers. Its pitch to educators:Continue reading...

In 1999, British filmmaker Jeremy Gilley launched Peace One Day, a non-profit organization to promote an annual day of peace and global ceasefire, encouraging nations at war to put down their weapons for just one day — and hopefully inspire them to keep them down. In 2001 the United Nations unanimously adopted Peace Day, making September 21 the day each year that Gilley's dream would take place.

For Peace Day 2012, Gilley's Peace One Day is hoping for not only a global truce, but the biggest reduction in global violence in recorded history. In order to achieve the biggest ever call for peace, the organization needs to brand its day and effort more effectively, and is reaching out to young people for help.

Peace One Day has partnered with D&AD, the UK's Design & Art Direction organization, on a student award inviting creative work to brand Peace Day 2012 and, on a bigger scale, the mission of Peace One Day. It's a creative brief designed to inspire tomorrow's creative superstars, and inspire real change in the world.Continue reading...

When two of the three news stories on your university's own homepage involve steps the university is taking to address sexual abuse, you know you have a PR problem on your hands. When your university's highlight video, allotted each school during football games, features your president talking candidly about the steps the university if taking to address sexual assault, you definitely have a PR problem. And what a problem Penn State has.

The ongoing Penn State scandal, in which the school is accused of covering up the long term sexual abuse of minors by then-assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, is working its way to being a guaranteed case study in every PR, marketing, education and MBA program in the nation. But is the light at the end of the tunnel already appearing?Continue reading...