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DM
DeMarkay
Confirmed:
https://www.centralfifetimes.com/leisure/national-entertainment/18444457.blue-peters-new-presenter-make-debut-home/
NT
NorthTonight
One thing we all realise when looking back on shows of that era is many of them had only one or two series of 13 episodes, so what was the SeeSaw policy of the time - was it generally just one or two new series a week?


I think there were “ cycles “ when there were no new programmes. I think 1981 saw a large number of new additions - Postman Pat, Pigeon Street, Chock-a-Block, and Stop-Go! Gran and Hokey-Cokey came along in 1983, with a second series of the latter in 1984. By the time they had dropped the afternoon repeat of Play School in April 1985, they could then use the later afternoon programmes in the See-Saw slot and vice versa. Of course other later additions in the earlier slot were Chris and Crumble and Charlie Chalk. Although Heads and Tails continued until early 1988, I get the feeling Animal Fair was lined up as the replacement. ( However the songs from H&T were re-used in the afternoon programme Two By Two, presented by Jenny Powell )
SW
Steve Williams
One thing we all realise when looking back on shows of that era is many of them had only one or two series of 13 episodes, so what was the SeeSaw policy of the time - was it generally just one or two new series a week?


Nothing as much as that, there'd be a new series in the slot every few months but many weeks would just be five repeats.
TM
ToasterMan
I think there were “ cycles “ when there were no new programmes. I think 1981 saw a large number of new additions - Postman Pat, Pigeon Street, Chock-a-Block, and Stop-Go! Gran and Hokey-Cokey came along in 1983, with a second series of the latter in 1984. By the time they had dropped the afternoon repeat of Play School in April 1985, they could then use the later afternoon programmes in the See-Saw slot and vice versa. Of course other later additions in the earlier slot were Chris and Crumble and Charlie Chalk. Although Heads and Tails continued until early 1988, I get the feeling Animal Fair was lined up as the replacement. ( However the songs from H&T were re-used in the afternoon programme Two By Two, presented by Jenny Powell )


One thing worth noting about Chris and Crumble is that it aired exclusively on BBC Two twice in 1989 and 1990, and didn't air in the Children's BBC afternoon strand at all, like the other See-Saw programmes did - years later, BBC Two became the hub of CBBC/CBeebies programming outside of the afternoon strand on BBC One.

I also remember in the last few months of the See-Saw name being used for the strand, they were still using the outdated BBC Two slide design, despite the new Quintel Paintbox slides being introduced a month prior:
RW
Robert Williams Founding member
If it's of interest, a couple of years ago I compiled a spreadsheet using data from the Genome website, which shows the morning/lunchtime Watch with Mother/See-Saw programmes scheduled week-by-week from 1952 to 1991. I was looking at maybe converting it to a more web-friendly format, but at the moment I only have it in Excel form.

Hopefully the colour coding will make sense to anyone on this forum; debut airings are shown in bold type.

https://www.desandmick.co.uk/television/programmes/seesaw.xlsx
TM
ToasterMan
If it's of interest, a couple of years ago I compiled a spreadsheet using data from the Genome website, which shows the morning/lunchtime Watch with Mother/See-Saw programmes scheduled week-by-week from 1952 to 1991. I was looking at maybe converting it to a more web-friendly format, but at the moment I only have it in Excel form.

Hopefully the colour coding will make sense to anyone on this forum; debut airings are shown in bold type.

https://www.desandmick.co.uk/television/programmes/seesaw.xlsx

Another thing is that from 1985, many of the programmes consisted of ones that previously aired in the afternoon slot on BBC One, and after the strand name was dropped in 1989, when it officially became an extension of Children's BBC.


Two heavily repeated See-Saw programmes, Bric-a-Brac and Chock-a-Block, had their last showings on BBC Two, to make way for newer shows, like Fireman Sam and Charlie Chalk, (the final three episodes of the latter premiered as part of See-Saw earlier that year).
Last edited by ToasterMan on 13 May 2020 9:22am - 3 times in total
TM
ToasterMan
One programme that had it's last repeat showing on BBC One, Stop-Go, didn't make the transition to BBC Two, despite airing in the final week on Tuesday June 16th.
CA
Capybara
If it's of interest, a couple of years ago I compiled a spreadsheet using data from the Genome website, which shows the morning/lunchtime Watch with Mother/See-Saw programmes scheduled week-by-week from 1952 to 1991. I was looking at maybe converting it to a more web-friendly format, but at the moment I only have it in Excel form.

Hopefully the colour coding will make sense to anyone on this forum; debut airings are shown in bold type.

https://www.desandmick.co.uk/television/programmes/seesaw.xlsx

Excel, PowerPoint and Word documents can all be "converted" as such by uploading to Google Drive. Once it's uploaded, you can share by changing the link settings so that anyone with the link can access. For example, here's a web-friendly view of your spreadsheet, which might take a few seconds to load owing to your use of almost 25000 cells Shocked !

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1oIBnZxkWKLvZV5EndOj_TGo4qWQQv98g/view?usp=sharing
Robert Williams and ToasterMan gave kudos
JO
Johnr
The new Blue Peter presenter started today, amusingly you wouldn't know looking on Twitter as they're far too busy talking about former Blue Peter presenter and wife of Charlie Brooker Konnie Huq!
DB
dbl
The Daily Mail comment board sure know though...
NT
NorthTonight
I think there were “ cycles “ when there were no new programmes. I think 1981 saw a large number of new additions - Postman Pat, Pigeon Street, Chock-a-Block, and Stop-Go! Gran and Hokey-Cokey came along in 1983, with a second series of the latter in 1984. By the time they had dropped the afternoon repeat of Play School in April 1985, they could then use the later afternoon programmes in the See-Saw slot and vice versa. Of course other later additions in the earlier slot were Chris and Crumble and Charlie Chalk. Although Heads and Tails continued until early 1988, I get the feeling Animal Fair was lined up as the replacement. ( However the songs from H&T were re-used in the afternoon programme Two By Two, presented by Jenny Powell )


One thing worth noting about Chris and Crumble is that it aired exclusively on BBC Two twice in 1989 and 1990, and didn't air in the Children's BBC afternoon strand at all, like the other See-Saw programmes did - years later, BBC Two became the hub of CBBC/CBeebies programming outside of the afternoon strand on BBC One.

I also remember in the last few months of the See-Saw name being used for the strand, they were still using the outdated BBC Two slide design, despite the new Quintel Paintbox slides being introduced a month prior:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxh7gOO7pDc



Chris and Crumble with the short lived version of the BBC Two holding slide from 1989. Interesting how it’s still a See-Saw slide, albeit the newer generic version, despite fewer mentions of See-Saw by this time.

https://youtu.be/onFnBhMHC3I
JO
Johnr
The first film on today's Blue Peter looks suspiciously like it was knocked up by the Top Gear production team!

Also I couldn't help thinking of this...

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