Remember the golden days of “Sesame Street” and “Electric Company?” While many of us have outgrown the games and antics, these shows have obviously withstood the test of time and taught millions of children how to count and spell. And even though Grover and Big Bird are just as cool as they ever were, it’s nice to get some new blood into children’s television programming, and that’s exactly where Andy Oliver steps in.

His kids’ TV show, “Magic Jungle Great Adventure,” promises to give local children an after-school alternative to those other public access programs. “Magic Jungle” airs on Channel 10, and a new episode will appear tomorrow at 10 a.m., Sunday at 1 p.m., and next Tuesday and Thursday at 4 p.m.

Oliver, a senior in child and family services, has always been interested in helping kids learn; he wants to get a job in the field of children’s television once he gets out of college.

“‘The Magic Jungle,’ actually, started a couple years ago,” he explained. “I wanna get into children’s television shows, and I figure if I get involved in college, that might help me get a job.”

And Oliver understands that the influence of media, especially television, is overpowering. Rather than trying to compete with its influence, he has decided to work with it.

“Kids learn a lot through TV,” Oliver said, “and I wanna teach kids through TV.”

He has gleaned many tips and ideas from both the classic kids’ TV shows and his employment stint in Walt Disney World in Florida. Oliver dons his “Crocodile Dundee hat,” thus transforming him into Amazon Jon, and then he joins his purple puppet, Apollo (how’s that for alliteration?), for some “Magic Jungle” adventures.

Oliver shuffles footage from zoos and roller coasters all over the country with FunFacts: why does a zebra have stripes? How do fish breathe? Apollo also takes over for the spelling lesson and guides kids through that pesky alphabet. Amazon Jon also features the “Animal of the Day,” where kids learn an awful lot about the lion, gorilla or shark.

“The main focus is education and entertainment, to combine it,” Oliver explained. “We give lots of facts; kids love facts.”

Jon also gets kids’ creative juices flowing with arts and crafts. These projects, too, involve a lot of animals: a lion mask made out of a paper plate, an egg-carton giraffe head, etc. “It’s stuff kids can do by themselves so they don’t need their parents’ help,” Oliver said.

So parents and kids alike who are interested in learning about “anything from sharks to manatees to lions” should tune in to Channel 10 this weekend.