Scholastic Media’s Soup2Nuts animation studio has begun production on 26 half-hour episodes of WordGirl, a property that debuted as a series of shorts on PBS KIDS GO! and pbskidsgo.org/wordgirl last November. The weekly series will debut in September as part of the late afternoon PBS KIDS GO! programming block.
WordGirl chronicles the adventures of Becky Botsford, a mild-mannered fifth grader who transforms into WordGirl, caped crusader with an impressive vocabulary which she uses to defeat outlaws bent on ‘word’ domination. With the help of her faithful monkey sidekick, Captain Huggy Face, WordGirl spends takes on a quirky cast of misfit bad guys and gals, while promting a love of language and fostering better reading comprehension among young viewers. The show’s cast of veteran actors and comedians includes Tom Kenny, Dannah Feinglass, Chris Parnell, Jeffrey Tambor, Cree Summers, Ryan Raddatz, Maria Bamford and Fred Stoller.
The dedicated companion web site at pbskidsgo.org/wordgirl features clips of the series in the ‘Adventures of WordGirl’ section. It also includes games and activities that are specially designed to expose children to new words and encourage them to use them in daily conversation. A Parents & Teachers section contains educational activities, as well as lesson plans for teachers and links to additional resources that support vocabulary development and general literacy.
Wordgirl is created by Boston studio Soup2Nuts, which previously brought us Comedy Central’s Dr. Katz: Professional Therapist, Cartoon Network’s Home Movies, ABC’s Squigglevision, BET’s Hey Monie and The N’s O’Grady. As scholastic’s newest series, Wordgirl joins a roster of hit shows that includes Maya & Miguel, Clifford’s Puppy Days, The Magic School Bus, Goosebumps and Animorphs.
