Adult Learners’ Week: A range of programmes will be broadcast to support the week, May 15-21, including Consenting Adults, Channel 4, Monday, May 15, 8pm, which looks at the role of mentoring. There will be mini-documentaries encouraging adult education on BBC television, plus information about local activities and contact addresses provided by ITV regions.
The Wild West 1845-61 Westward Ho: Channel 4, Sunday, May 14, 8pm. This first episode in a new six-part American history series tells the story of the opening up of the west to agriculture and industry. In 1845 there were only 20,000 white Americans west of the Mississippi, but with the 1848 Gold Rush hundreds of thousands of people spilled westwards, establishing much of the map of the modern United States.
The Net: BBC2, Monday, May 15, 8pm. The second series of a programme dedicated to demystifying cyberspace. Among the features will be a guide to favourite Internet sites, cool pages in the World Wide Web and news of the complex legal position of publishing in the stateless world of the Internet.
Early English Saints: Radio 3FM, Monday, May 15, 9.45pm. The Anglo-Saxons, beloved of primary history lessons, are considered here, in a new series that looks at the lost religious heritage of pre-Norman Conquest Britain.
I Camcorder: Channel 4, Wednesday, May 17, 8.30pm. There are 15 million people in Britain with access to a camcorder, claims this new series devoted to getting more from the home video. Instead of repetitive scenes of relatives smiling anxiously into the lens, the programme suggests more imaginative ways of filming. In this first episode there is a feature on an amateur video newshound, who sells footage of events such as fires to local television stations. There is a Channel 4 video of the series, priced Pounds 10.99.
