According to Gikow, Sesame Street went against the convention of hiring teachers to write for the show, as most educational television programs did at the time. Instead, Cooney and the producers felt that it would be easier to teach writers how to interpret curriculum than to teach educators how to write comedy. As Stone stated, "Writing for children is not so easy." Long-time writer Tony Geiss agreed, stating in 2009, "It's not an easy show to write. You have to know the characters and the format and how to teach and be funny at the same time, which is a big, ambidextrous stunt." The show's research team developed an annotated document, or "Writer's Notebook," which served as a bridge between the show's curriculum goals and script development. The notebook was a compilation of programming ideas designed to teach specific curriculum points, provided extended definitions of curriculum goals, and assisted the writers and producers in translating the goals into televised material. Suggestions in the notebook were free of references to specific characters and contexts on the show so that they could be implemented as openly and flexibly as possible. The research team, in a series of meetings with the writers, also developed "a curriculum sheet" that described the show's goals and priorities for each season. After receiving the curriculum focus and goals for the season, the writers met to discuss ideas and story arcs for the characters, and an "assignment sheet" was created that suggested how much time was allotted for each goal and topic. When a script was completed, the show's research team analyzed it to ensure that the goals were met. Then each production department met to determine what each episode needed in terms of costumes, lights, and sets. The writers were present during the show's taping, which for the first twenty-four years of the show took place in Manhattan, and after 1992, at the Kaufman Astoria Studios in Queens to make last-minute revisions when necessary. Media Early in their history Sesame Street and the CTW began to look for alternative funding sources and turned to creating products and writing licensing agreements. They became, as Cooney put it, "a multiple-media institution." In 1970, the CTW created a "non-broadcast" division responsible for creating and publishing books and Sesame Street Magazine. By 2019, the Sesame Workshop had published over 6,500 book titles. The Workshop decided from the start that all materials