The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That! has 40 half-hour episodes. PBS Kids renewed it for a second season of 20 episodes which premiered on September 10, 2012. A 20 episode third season is currently in development. Each episode features The Cat in the Hat (voiced by Martin Short), who leads neighbours Nick and Sally, the Fish, and Thing One and Thing Two on a variety of adventures in his "Thinga-ma-jigger", a Seussian contraption that can sprout wings, pontoons, booster rockets, change size, and do just about anything else necessary to further the adventure. The adventures are prompted by a question posed by either Nick or Sally
The Cat in the Hat most important academic controversy" of the Cold War era. Academic Louis Menand contends that ""The Cat in the Hat" transformed the nature of primary education and the nature of children's books. It not only stood for the idea that reading ought to be taught by phonics; it also stood for the idea that language skills—and many other subjects—ought to be taught through illustrated storybooks, rather than primers and textbooks." In 1983, Geisel told Jonathan Cott, "It is the book I'm proudest of because it had something to do with the death of the "Dick and Jane" primers." The book led