(lively music) - Hello, little learners.

Welcome back to Camp Read-A-Lot, the place where we read books, sing songs and keep the learning going all summer long.

My name is Mrs. Lara, can you tell me your name?

I'm so excited that you're here this morning.

Let's start our day off with a song with Miss Maria, the mail person.

Let me fix your hat.

There we go.

Ready?

Let's sing together.

♪ Good morning, good morning.

♪ ♪ It's a sunshine kind of day.

♪ ♪ Come join Mrs. Lara for some learning and some play.

♪ ♪ Will we sing a song?

♪ ♪ Of course we will, make our brain strong, ♪ ♪ like super strong.

♪ ♪ So come a long, yes come on friends, ♪ ♪ for some learning and some play.

♪ ♪ Hello jello, what's up buttercup?

♪ ♪ We have so much to do, ♪ ♪ I'm glad that you are up.

♪ So if you are in your pajamas, and you're wiping the sleep on your eye, off of your eyes, come on, get ready, we have so much to do!

So let's walk through what we're going to do today.

So we're going to focus on a whole new book this week.

Can you guess what that book is?

Hm, I'll give you a clue.

It has something to do with what I'm wearing... Stripes, that's right!

We're going to read a book.

Then we're going to focus on who the characters are in the story, and then end our day with a project and a fun song, does that sound like a good plan?

Okay, I think I hear, could Miss Maria have brought us- (doorbell ringing) (gasps) It's the doorbell!

I think she left a letter behind the door, let's check.

Ooh, here it is.

It says, "Dear Mrs.

Lara."

Now you'll remember when we start to read, we start at the left and go to the right.

Let's sing our song.

♪ This is the left.

(snaps twice) ♪ ♪ This is the right.

(snaps twice) ♪ ♪ When we read, we start at the left, ♪ ♪ and slide to the right.

(snaps twice) ♪ "Dear.

Mrs. Lara, have I got a story for you!"

Oh, I love a good story.

Let's see what it's about today.

"All I wanted to do was impress everyone."

Impress.

(hums) Have you heard that word before?

Impress is a fancy word that means you want to leave an impression on somebody, you want someone to think that you are cool.

It says, "and now I am covered in stripes.

Can you help me be proud of my true self?"

So hm, in this letter, the character wants to be proud of her true self.

I think Miss Maria left us another book about being proud of your true self.

Maybe that'll help our character.

This is a book called The Day You Begin, and it's a story about children who are learning to love who they are.

Let's read it together.

It's by Jacqueline Woodson, that's the author.

She wrote the words, and it's illustrated by Raphael Lopez.

He drew the pictures.

Let's open it up and see, The Day You Begin.

"There will be times when you walk into a room and no one there is quite like you.

Maybe it will be your skin, your clothes, or the curl of your hair.

There will be times when no one understands the way the words curl from your mouth, the beautiful language of the country you left behind.

My name is Rigoberto, we just moved here from Venezuela.

And because they don't understand, the classroom will fill with laughter until the teacher quiets everyone.

(shushing) Rigoberto from Venezuela, your teacher says so soft and beautifully that your name and homeland sound like flowers, blooming the first bright notes of a song.

There will be times when the words don't come, your own voice once huge, now smaller, when the teacher asks, what did you do last summer?

Tell the class your story.

Well, we went to France, Sheila says.

These shells come from my beach in Maine.

A boy named Jonathan holds out a jar filled with shells so fragile they look like they'll turn to dust.

My whole family went to India, Spain, South Carolina, each souvenir, a small triumph of a journey.

Their travels going on and on."

Now look at our character from the front of the book.

She looks a little hesitant, huh?

I wonder what she did in the summer.

As you stand in front of that room, you can remember how the heat waved as it lifted off the curb and your day spent at home caring for your little sister who made you laugh out loud and hugged you so hard at nap time.

You can only remember the books you kept on reading long after she had fallen asleep.

"And in that room where no one else is quite like you, you'll look down at your own empty hands and wonder, what good is this when other students were flying and sailing and going somewhere?

There will be times, when the lunch your mother packed for you was too strange or too unfamiliar for others to love as you do."

Now we read another book about food that was a little strange, huh?

Spaghetti in a hotdog bun, I bet this little girl feels the same way.

"When even your own friend Nadja, will wrinkle her nose and say what's in there anyway?

And you'll wonder how she doesn't see the rice beneath, beneath the meat and kimchi.

You'll wonder why she doesn't remember that rice is the most popular food in all the world.

There will be times when the climbing bars are too high, the run is too fast and far, the game isn't one you can ever really play.

I don't want him on our team, you can watch.

Maybe you can have a turn later.

There will be times when the world feels like a place that you're standing all the way outside of.

And all that stands beside you is your own brave self steady as steel and ready, even though you don't yet know what you're ready for.

And there will be times when you walk into a room and no one there is quite like you until, the day you begin.

You begin to share your stories!

My name is Angelina and I spent my whole summer with my little sister.

You tell the class, your voice stronger than it was a minute ago, reading books and telling stories.

And even though we were right on our block, it was like we got to go everywhere!"

Look it, it's like she's flying through the air.

"Your name is like my sister's, Rigoberto says.

Her name is Angelina too, and all at once in the room where no one else is quite like you, the world opens itself up, and makes a space for you.

This is the day you begin, to find the places inside your laughter, your lunches, your books, your travels, your stories, where every new friend has something a little like you and something else so fabulously, not like you at all.

The day you begin."

What did you think, was that a good story?

Now that was a story about finding yourself when you're a little bit different than anybody else.

Right?

So now we have a story called a case of bad stripes, about a little girl who did just that, found herself because she was a little bit different.

So let's watch that video story together.

(magical music) [Mrs. Lara] It's story time.

A Bad Case of Stripes by David Shannon, retold by Mrs. Lara.

Camilla Cream loved Lima beans, but she never ate them because none of her friends love Lima beans and she wanted to fit in.

Today, she was fretting even more than usual.

It was the first day of school, and there were so many people to impress.

She took one look in the mirror, and then she screamed.

(loud scream) Her mother ran into the room and she screamed too, "Oh my heavens," she cried.

"You're completely covered with stripes!"

"I feel fine," Camilla answered.

"But just look at me."

"You go back to bed this instant," her mother ordered.

"You're not going to school today."

Camilla was relieved.

She didn't want to miss the first day of school, but she was afraid of what the other kids would say.

(doorbell ringing) That afternoon, Dr. Bumble came to examine Camilla.

"Most extraordinary!"

He exclaimed.

"I've never seen anything like it.

Are you having any coughing, sneezing, runny nose, aches, pains, chills, hot flashes, dizziness, drowsiness, shortness of breath or uncontrollable twitching?"

"No," Camilla told him.

"I feel fine."

"Then off to school you go," Dr. Bumble said, as he left.

The next day was a disaster.

Everyone at school laughed at Camilla.

(children laughing) They called her Camilla crayon, and night of the living lollipop.

And when the class said the pledge of allegiance, (chorus of children speaking) her stripes turned red, white, and blue, and she broke out in stars.

The other kids thought this was great.

One of them yelled out, "Let's see some purple polka dots!"

And sure enough, Camilla turned all purple polka-dotty.

(phone ringing) That night, the school principal called her parents and said, "I'm sorry.

Camilla's going to have to stay home from school."

Camilla was so embarrassed.

She knew that a nice plate of Lima beans would make her feel better, but she had been laughed at enough for one day.

(doorbell ringing) The next day, Dr. Bumble arrived with four people in long white coats.

He introduced them, "This is Dr.

Grip, Dr. Sponge, Dr. Cricket and Dr.

Young."

The doctors went to work on Camilla.

They squeezed and jabbed and tapped and tested.

It was very uncomfortable.

"Try these," said the specialist, and they handed her a bottle filled with different colored pills.

Camilla took the awful medicine, but when she woke up the next morning, she felt different.

She looked in the mirror, and she had turned into a giant multicolored pill!

(doorbell ring) More experts came to see Camilla.

Once again, she was poked and prodded, but the experts didn't have a clue, much less a cure.

One day, a woman who called herself an environmental therapist claimed that she could cure Camilla.

"Breathe deeply," She said, "and become one with your room."

Suddenly Camilla turned into her bed.

Camilla's parents didn't know what to do.

Everything they tried made it worse.

Until one day there was a quiet little knock at the door.

(knocking) There stood an old woman who was just as plump and sweet as a strawberry.

She said brightly, "I think I can help.

What we have here is a bad case of stripes," She said.

She pulled some Lima beans from her bag and said, "These might do the trick."

The truth is I really love Lima beans, Camilla said.

She was still worried that people would laugh at her, but she decided to have a plate of Lima beans anyway.

- [Child] Mmm, yummy, mmm yummy!

(sparkling noises) - [Mrs. Lara] Suddenly the whole room swirled around and when it stopped, there stood Camilla and everything was back to normal.

"I'm cured," she shouted.

(cheering) Camilla heard the old woman say, "I knew the real you was in there somewhere," as she walked out the door.

The end.

(song ends) Well I hope that you like that story.

Remember you can check out more stories on the Sora app and at your local library.

Now I love sharing stories with you, but I would love it even more if you read stories to me.

So in order for you to do that, we have to practice and take apart the book.

Today we're gonna focus on the characters in a story.

Have you ever heard that word, characters?

Characters are the people, animals or things in a story that can think, feel or act.

So what a couch in a story be a character?

No boo to that.

A couch can't really think, huh?

But our story, The Bad Case of Stripes, had a few characters that I want to point out.

The first character was Camilla Cream.

Now, do you remember what happened to her in the story?

She had a huge problem.

That's right, She was trying to impress people and she developed stripes.

And then she turned into whatever anybody else called out.

Oh no!

She was the main character, or who the story was about.

Let's put her right here.

Now there were other characters in the story.

There were Camilla's parents, they're the ones that were trying to find a remedy or solution for Camilla's stripes.

Now do you remember the principal called them and said, Camilla can't come to school.

I think that's who they are on the phone with now.

Let's put them on right here.

Were there other characters in the story?

Let's think, there was another character that came and prodded and poked Camilla.

That's right, the doctors.

And there were four of them.

There was Dr. Bumble and the three other doctors that came, and they gave her medicine and Camilla turned into a pill bottle.

Oh no, if I woke up and I was a pill bottle, I don't know what I would do.

Let's put our character right here.

So so far we have Camilla, who's the main character, the doctors and the parents.

So this one's going to be a little lopsided here.

I'll take her off.

And then we have another character.

Do you remember the sweet, old lady who was plump, just like a strawberry?

She came in and fixed Camilla's problem.

Do you remember what she did?

She gave Camilla Lima beans.

That's right!

So let me see if I can put that there.

And we'll review our characters before we go to our project.

So so far we have four main characters.

We have Camilla Cream, the parents, the doctors, and the sweet little old lady.

Now there were more characters in this story.

Can you name them?

If you can, let me know.

I'd love for you to tell me what the mystery characters were.

Now in order for you to practice these skills at home, of course I have a project for you.

So let's move over to our project place.

Ready?

Let's walk on over, me and my stripes.

Here we go.

Now you are a character too, you're a character in the story of your life.

And it's so important that all of the things that you are, make you special and that you be proud of them.

So I have an art activity just like Camilla Cream and the character on The Day You Begin will help you be proud of who you are.

This is what our art project is gonna look like at the end.

Ooh, it's super colorful, isn't it?

Just like you.

It's gonna have a background with lots of different patterns, which we're going to do today.

And then on the second day, we're going to make a portrait of ourselves with colorful stripes.

And we may even add a bow and earrings, or a hat, or glasses, that would be fun too.

So here are the materials that you'll need.

You'll need a piece of paper, some water colors, and crayons and some water.

Okay, so to get started, we're gonna take our paper and we're gonna take a black crayon.

Now it is important that you use black because that will show up.

How I did my pattern, if you'll notice here, is I kind of made it come out from one point in the center, all the way out to triangle shapes.

So we can do that here together.

So you're gonna pick one point right in the middle, which is what the center is right here.

And you're gonna make it come out like this.

Ooh, you're going to make it go to the edge of the page, and then you're gonna stop.

All the way into the top, like this.

Now we all have characteristics and things that make us colorful, don't we?

(hums) It's like Mrs. Hammock, she's a great jokester, I love that about her.

Okay, so now in each of these triangles, we're gonna put a pattern.

Now I thought to myself, hm, what types of patterns might we put on?

So, I have a little list here.

We can do lines, curves, or shapes.

And if you really can't decide, what you can do is make some, a dice like this, which I bought at the place where everything costs a dollar, and then I put different patterns on it.

And then you roll the dice.

And look it landed on, kind of like hatched pattern.

So let's do that one to begin with.

So I'm gonna make some lines across like this, and then down.

I'mma keep going.

I think my next pattern is going to be zigzags.

Do you like zigzags?

Can you make a zigzag with your finger?

Up down, up down, up down.

We're gonna try that here, up down, up down.

Now this, activity that we're doing is an example of process art.

That means that we're not gonna finish it today.

We're actually gonna do the rest of it on day two or the next day.

Hm, which one should I do next?

Oh, I'll do stars.

Remember Camilla Cream?

She turned into stars and stripes when all the kids were singing or saying the pledge of allegiance?

Oh no, I would not want that to happen to me.

Maybe next I'll do some dots.

Maybe some large dots like this.

Some spots, just like Camilla with her purple dots.

That was not nice of those kids to call out different things that she should turn into.

huh?

Although if I saw someone turning into something, I think I would want to have some fun with it too, with their permission of course.

I did some lines straight down, hm, maybe I can do some triangles, that would be fun.

My next one here.

Do a triangle, which is a three sided shape.

And I'm just gonna fill it up here.

Continue with my pattern.

I have a couple more to do, a couple means two, look one, two.

What else should I do?

Maybe I'll roll the dice gently.

Ooh, it says dots, let's do that again.

This time I'm gonna make smaller dots.

Ooh, small ones like this.

Now when you're working on this project parents, this one takes a little while.

So it's not something you can just sit down and do in one sitting.

Experience has taught me that your little ones will get bored.

So just try to do it a little bit at a time.

Ooh, how about some swirls?

Let's see swirls.

Let's keep going.

I wonder how many swirls I can fit in here.

I tried to make my hair swirly today so it can look like a pattern but, it is very hot where I live right now.

And my hair falls flat, does that happen to you?

Okay, once you have your whole page like this covered in patterns, you're going to want to take your water colors and you're gonna wanna pick what color you want to use.

Now what I did on my sample, is I wanted it to be really colorful.

So I went ahead and colored some pieces with my crayon, and whatever you color with your crayon the water color won't go to.

So it kind of leaves this cool pattern.

You can try that too, but for now we'll just try water colors.

Let's see, open it up.

And then I always feel so bad because I have to pick my favorite color out of the bunch.

Hm, I don't want the other colors to feel left out.

I'll pick you all, don't worry, wait your turn.

So I'm gonna swirl it in the orange.

Orange is going first today.

Make sure you have enough water to pick up the pigment or the paint, And then we're going to paint, let's see the hatch one.

Ooh, came out pretty light, but I like it.

Sometimes I like to be very colorful and sometimes I like to be muted, or not so colorful.

Do you ever feel that way?

All right, let's try another color.

Who shall be next?

How about purple?

Purple, we're not gonna leave you out.

Hey purple, you tricked me you look more like blue.

I think blue and purple are playing tricks on me.

Let's see if I can really get a purple in there.

There it goes, very soft colors today.

And you can use the same color all around or you can pick different colors.

It's completely up to you.

Now of course, if you don't have watercolors, you can just choose to color in your pattern.

But I will tell you that it does take a while to color in a whole page.

So watercolors just make it very fast.

All right, this is what it's looking like so far.

This is day one of our project of making a character like ourselves.

Colorful, unique, and special.

All right, it looks like it's time to sing our goodbye song.

And if we don't make it through all the letters, don't worry boys and girls, we'll sing it again tomorrow.

Here we go.

♪ A, B, C you later, ♪ ♪ D E F. ♪ ♪ G, I'm gonna miss ya.

♪ ♪ H, I have to go now.

♪ ♪ J K buh-bye now ♪ ♪ L M N. ♪ ♪ Oh I had a good time.

♪ ♪ P Q R you gonna miss me.

♪ ♪ S T U are my best friend.

♪ ♪ V W, ♪ ♪ X Y and Z.

♪ Ooh we got through all the letters.

I'll 'z' you next time.

Don't forget if you want to follow along with the project with me tomorrow, you're gonna wanna bring your colored paper, some scissors and some glue, and maybe a black marker.

We're gonna finish up our project and read more about the case of bad stripes.

So until then, Mrs. Lara sends you a big smooch.

(lip smacking) And a big squeeze, and reminds you to read and to play and to use your imagination every day.

Goodbye!

(lively music)