(bright acoustic guitar music) - Hello, little learners.

Welcome back to our Pre-K and TK classroom.

I hope that you're having a wonderful Tuesday.

Today is day two of the five days that we're going to be together this week.

We have so much to do, but let's get started with a song.

Are you ready?

Here we go.

I have Miss Sonya with me today.

Sonya the Snail.

Ta-da!

♪ 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 along ♪ ♪ Yes, come on, friends ♪ ♪ For some learning and some play ♪ All right, Miss Sonya, I think that we're going to see you today, aren't we?

We're going to travel around the world and eat lots of different foods.

So we'll wait to see you later.

For now, I'm gonna go over what our plan is for the day.

So, we're studying culture and food this week just like last week.

You'll remember that culture is what a group of people does or believes in, so we're going to do our letter that's gonna reveal our character for the week and the different books that we're going to be reading.

Then, we're going to work on our foundational skill, and today, I have a beginning sound song all about noodles.

After that, we're going to finish our craft that we started from the Philippines.

Remember, you're going to need straws, some tissue paper, and glue in order to craft along with me.

All right, boys and girls, I think I hear, (doorbell ringing) is that the mail?

Miss Maria dropped off the mail, so here we go.

Here is our letter!

And of course, it starts with dear Mrs. Lara and we always start on the left.

You at home, can you raise your left hand?

Now can you raise your right hand?

Do you know which is which?

Well in reading, we always start reading on the left and we slide to the right.

So here is our left and here's our right.

Let's sing our song.

♪ This is the left ♪ ♪ This is the right ♪ ♪ When we read ♪ ♪ We start at the left ♪ ♪ And slide to the right ♪ Here's what our letter says today.

Dear Mrs. Lara, why don't grown-ups trust kids to cook in the kitchen?

That's true.

Sometimes when grown-ups are in the kitchen, they say you can't do this, you can't do that, but did you know it's usually so you can stay safe?

There's lots of knives and hot things in the kitchen, but let's see what our letter says about it.

I want to help my mama cook pancit like my older brothers and sisters.

Pancit, like from our book yesterday "Cora Cooks Pancit".

Cooking pancit is part of my Filipino culture.

That's right, Cora was Filipino and she shared the traditions of her food and family fun with us through her book, and actually, I think that's what we have here, is our book "Cora Cooks Pancit".

Do you recognize Cora from our video story?

There she is.

This is the part where she gets to stir the pancit and she feels super grown-up.

Now this one is a little bit longer of a read, so grab your book buddy and we're gonna read it together.

Are you ready?

"Cora Cooks Pancit".

Here we go.

Cora loved the kitchen!

She loved to drink in the smells of mama's Filipino dishes.

Look, there's Cora.

And look, there's her little dog friend.

She even has a stuffed animal in her mouth, or his mouth.

I'm not sure.

Cora's older sisters and brothers often helped with the cooking.

They got the grown-up jobs like shredding the chicken or mixing noodles in the pot, they sliced vegetables and rolled lumpia into tiny egg roll shapes.

Cora was stuck with kid jobs like drawing pictures in the flour or licking spoons.

She longed to be a real cook.

Now, I want you to think about how Cora was feeling.

She wants to do the grown-up jobs, but can't.

She gets stuck doing the kid jobs.

How would you feel?

One day, Cora's three older sisters headed to the mall.

Now was her chance.

Cora popped her head around the corner, "What are we making today, mama?"

Mama wiped her hands on the front of her red apron.

She put her hand on her lips.

"What would you like to make today?"

So look it, there's the red apron and there's Cora peeking around the corner and her little puppy friend.

Cora was surprised mama was letting her decide.

She scrunched up her pug nose and began to think.

All her favorite Filipino foods danced in her head.

Lines of lumpia pranced in rows, adobo chicken legs be-bopped in time.

She saw a large bowl of pancit.

The thick noodles and vegetables curled and swirled in a dance party.

(Mrs. Lara humming) "Will you teach me to make pancit?"

she asked.

"Of course," said mama.

"Would you like to wear my red apron?"

How do you think Cora feels now?

She gets to wear the grown-up red apron.

Cora was a real cook now.

The apron was a little too big, but it would do.

Mama helped Cora tie the strings around her back and make a neat bow at her belly button.

Now, do you have an apron at home that you can wear while you cook, even if it's a little big?

You can ask a family member to borrow one.

"This apron belonged to lolo, your grandpa," said mama.

"He wore it when he first came to California.

He was a cook for the Filipino farm workers who picked strawberries and grapes in the fields."

And look, there's pictures of lolo.

"Did lolo teach you how to cook?"

Cora wanted to know.

"He did," said mama.

"I followed him each day to the big kitchen.

He created all kinds of dishes to fill the hungry workers' tummies.

When he cooked, he told stories about the Philippines where he was born."

Cora nodded as she listened.

Cora stuffed her hands deep in the apron pockets.

She imagined mama and lolo cooking together.

She saw lolo as a boy, unwrapping the banana leaves and scooping the sweet rice from inside.

Cora knew the rules in mama's kitchen.

She scrubbed her hands with soap while mama dug in the cupboards and refrigerator for ingredients.

She listed what they needed for the pancit, chicken, celery, carrots, mushrooms, onions, baby corn, cabbage, ginger, garlic, soy sauce.

"Don't forget the noodles," said Cora.

"Oh yes, the noodles," said mama.

"Let's get started," mama told Cora.

"Open the package of rice noodles and put them in the bowl of water.

Do you know why we soak them?"

"So they get soft," answered Cora.

"You've been paying attention," said mama with a wink.

Cora opened the package, she plopped the big clump of noodles into the bowl.

There she is.

Now of course, yesterday, we found out what happened to the rice noodles in the bowl.

Do you remember what happened?

Cora was asked to come back and check on them.

Let's see if you remember correctly.

So mama took out some chicken she had cooked earlier.

This was mama's special stash.

She used chicken for all kinds of Filipino dishes, chicken curry, lumpia.

"Wanna help me shred?"

asked mama.

Cora's eyes grew wide.

That was a grown-up job and she got to do it.

Of course, after she was done shredding the chicken, she snuck a little for herself.

Do you ever do that in the kitchen?

"I'll chop," said mama.

And Cora arranged the vegetables in neat rows.

Mama chopped celery stalks, carrots, cabbage and onions and when mama started slicing onions, tears rolled down Cora's cheeks.

She looked up and saw mama's watery eyes.

"Onions make us cry," said mama, and they both laughed.

And that's true.

If you've ever chopped onions, you get tears that roll down your face.

Mama took out her huge pancit pan and she added oil and vegetables to the pan and made it sizzle.

"Can you check on the noodles, Cora?"

asked mama.

So Cora scratched her head.

She tried to remember what her sister Sara did when she checked on the noodles.

Cora thought she should sniff the noodles, but she picked up the bowl too quickly.

Water sloshed onto the floor.

"Are you making a mess?"

asked mama with pointy eyebrows.

"Silly Cora.

You just need to touch the noodles with two fingers to see if they're soft."

She didn't know.

She's learning.

Is it okay to make mistakes as long as you learn?

Yes.

Let's keep going.

"Now for the fun part," said mama.

"Let's add noodles to the pancit pan."

Cora got to stir, another grown-up job.

There she is stirring the pancit noodle and a couple of mushrooms fell out.

That night, mama brought the food to the table.

She set out a platter of adobo chicken, two plates of her special lumpia, and of course, the pancit, which she set in the middle of the table.

Now you would think Cora was very happy, but instead, she was worried.

"Would people like my pancit?

Would they know that I spilled some water from the bowl?"

Lucky for Cora, everybody loved it.

And she felt full of pride.

She even did a bow with her red apron.

There she is.

The end.

So what did you think of that story about Cora and the pancit?

If you check out this book from the library, there's actually a recipe for pancit in the back.

Now right now, we're gonna take a trip around the world with Sonya the Snail.

We're not gonna get a chance to read books from all the cultures that are available, but Sonya's gonna visit a few of them.

I think she gets dizzy in the end.

So let's watch that video together.

(upbeat bell music) - [Narrator] "Exploring Feelings" with Sonya the Snail.

(triumphant music) Hi Sonya.

Are you enjoying your carrot?

Did you know that food can be a great way to learn about different cultures?

Remember, culture is a word that means how groups of people do things.

(dreamy music) (descending whistling) Oh no, you dropped your carrot.

Do you wanna go explore the world with me, looking for other things to eat?

Oh, I'm so excited.

Let's go explore different cultures through their food.

Our first stop is Italy.

If you look on a map, Italy is the country that looks like a high-heeled boot.

There are over 60 million people that live in Italy.

They all have different foods and traditions.

My favorite thing to eat in Italy, though, is pasta.

Would you like to try some?

Save some room because it's time to go to our next stop.

(upbeat orchestra music) Now we're in a far away place called New Zealand, home to over 50 volcanoes.

The people of New Zealand have lots of different food traditions that they share with the world, but my favorite thing to eat while I'm there is pavlova, an egg white meringue dessert.

I see you're already enjoying it.

Time for our next stop.

We have to keep moving because now we have to try my favorite food in Spain, or Espana in Espanol.

Paella is one of the traditional foods of Spain.

It's a delicious rice dish.

I hope you're still hungry because now we're in Japan, the place made up of over 6,000 islands.

It's no surprise that my favorite dish here is sushi.

Give sushi a try, Sonya, before we move on.

(bright piano music) What happened, Sonya?

You wanted to come home?

We still have to try Nigerian pepper soup in Africa, pozole from Mexico, stroganoff in Russia.

Oh no, Sonya, you don't look so good.

Was that too many foods all at once?

You better get some medicine.

I don't want you to be sick.

We'll go exploring again some other time.

(bright piano music) - Poor Sonya!

I think that trip around the world left her a little dizzy, but exploring food is a great way to learn about other people's culture.

Now, in our story "Cora Cooks Pancit", there was a line in the book that talked about the noodles dancing around and that inspired me to create a noodle song that'll help us learn our beginning sounds.

So the noodle song goes like this.

It goes... ♪ I like to eat noodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat noodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat noodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ Good for me and good for you ♪ Now, we're gonna change the beginning sound of noodles, so it's not gonna be nnn, it's gonna be whatever sound the letter I hold up makes.

Okay, here's the first one, even if it's silly.

It's gonna be wuh, wuh.

Let's see if we can make it.

♪ I like to eat woodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat woodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat woodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ Good for me and good for you ♪ Let's try another one.

How about, what letter is this?

It's a T. This is Tiggy Tiger.

We're gonna replace the beginning sound of noodles with a tuh sound, so it's toodles.

Toodles, we're eating some weird things.

Let's sing our song.

♪ I like to eat toodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat toodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat toodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ Good for me and good for you ♪ Let's try, I don't have my favorite one.

How about the letter P?

What sound does that make?

Puh, puh, puh.

That's poodles.

That's a dog!

Do we like to eat poodles?

Let's sing it.

Ready?

♪ I like to eat poodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat poodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat poodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ Good for me and good for you ♪ Strange, strange eating.

Last one.

We're gonna do Reggie Rooster, makes the ruh, ruh sound, so instead of noodles, it's roodles.

Let's sing our song.

♪ I like to eat roodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat roodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ I like to eat roodles ♪ ♪ Yes I do ♪ ♪ Good for me and good for you ♪ So I hope that you practice more of these beginning sounds using silly songs.

Right now, we're gonna move over to our Project Place where we're gonna finish off our parol from the Philippines, so let's walk over there.

Now you'll remember that a parol is a special lantern that's usually put out around the holidays.

Yesterday, we made a parol with straws.

In the traditional way of making it, you would use wood and it would actually have form.

You would uses pieces of wood kind of like this put together and they would put a little light inside so it's lit from within.

We're kind of making a simple version that you can put on your window and it'll have the same effect.

So we stopped at the part where we were putting tissue paper on the star, so that's where we're going to continue today.

So, you can actually use different pieces of tissue paper like this and some glue, any color that you'd like, and you can glue it on the star.

Now, this is a great way to use recycled materials.

You can save them from going to the landfill and use them to make something beautiful you can hang up instead.

And you're learning about different cultures and the traditions in different places.

So here's the star.

You'll notice I'm putting some glue on there and then I'm going to put some pink tissue paper.

Now, this is where the scissors really come in handy.

I'm gonna cut a little bit off here, or what the fancy word is, excess, or extra, leftover.

I'm gonna put that right there and put that down like this.

Just like that.

And then you could kind of fold it over using a bit more glue in the back here.

Let's do that.

And then just kind of glue it down just like that.

Let's keep going.

I was telling you yesterday that this reminds me of a pinata, which is something we make in my culture to celebrate really anything.

Birthdays, traditionally, but we have pinatas for about every occasion.

(Mrs. Lara laughing) Here goes more glue on the straw.

And we're gonna put some more tissue paper.

I think I'll use some blue tissue paper this time.

Green wanted to come out.

No, no.

Not your turn.

I'm gonna put it down like this.

Now, you can do it a different way where you actually cut a piece of tissue paper that's gonna fit.

I found that was a little bit harder.

I always ended up cutting it too big or way too small and that made it a little hard, so this method worked for me, but you're gonna find a method that works for you.

I'm gonna cover it all up like this.

Again, just cutting off, what was that fancy word I used?

The excess.

That's right, the extra.

Your family will be so impressed if you come up and tell them I think I'm going to cut off the excess, or I think you're eating an excess of chocolate.

No, don't say that.

(Mrs. Lara giggling) I don't think they'll be impressed by that.

And we just need to cover a bit more in tissue paper.

(Mrs. Lara giggling) That's what Mrs. Lara hears all the time.

You're eating an excess of chocolate, or cake.

I have such a sweet tooth.

We're gonna glue this down a little bit more.

It looks like we have a little bit more time here, so I can show you the decorations that I'm going to use.

Cutting, cutting, cutting.

Here we go.

Now of course, you're gonna take your time and really choose the colors that you would like to use for your parol.

And I don't have nearly enough time with you to be able to explain the history behind this beautiful tradition.

I encourage you to look it up, read books about it, maybe you know somebody in your life that's Filipino.

You can ask them.

Say hey, I was watching Mrs. Lara's class and they talked about this parol thing.

What can you tell me?

So we're just gonna cover it with a little more tissue paper here and then I'll show you how I'm gonna decorate it.

Looks like we're gonna have just enough time here.

A bit more tissue paper.

See, that's why I knew it was gonna take two days to finish this activity.

I said, it's gonna be a hard one to do in just the 10 minutes that we have.

Cutting.

Here we go.

Going around.

Tissue paper, and of course, gotta get messy.

The best part of everything is the mess that we make, huh?

I don't think that your family would agree with me, though.

(Mrs. Lara giggling) I'm just gonna cover this little piece right here with my parol.

It's gonna look like a patchwork.

I like that about it.

I never like things to be too perfect.

I like things exciting and different and that's just what my parol is.

So here's what it's looking like so far.

What do we think?

Of course, if you put this against a window, you're gonna see the light shining through it.

I think I'm gonna run out of time, but I wanted to show you how you might use some of the streamer to decorate your parol.

So what I did is I took streamer in three different colors, I'll use two just to show you here, and I'll cut some blue and some red, all primary colors, and then I put them on top of each other, stacked them, and then kind of rotate them on one end, curled them up, and you get a little streamer like this, like this one.

Then you can cut the ends and then just glue it down like this.

Let's see.

I'll decorate it and then show you the finished product.

Of course, you can add beads and whatever you'd like to your parol.

Where did you go?

Here you are.

Here we are.

Of course, you're gonna let that dry a little longer.

Here's what it looks like.

What do you think, boys and girls?

Would you display this in your house?

Just add a little piece of string to the top, let it dry, and then when someone asks you, you can say, I learned all about the Philippines because I'm learning about culture.

I hope that you enjoyed this activity.

Remember to check out books with other ideas for activities from other cultures.

Looks like it's time for us to say goodbye.

We won't have time for our alphabet song, but I'll tell you that we're gonna read lots of books from around the world this week, so I hope that you come back tomorrow to see what other part of the world we're in and what other yummy things we're going to be eating.

Until tomorrow, boys and girls, Mrs. Lara sends you a big squeeze and she sends you a big smooch, she reminds you to read and play, use your five senses to think like a scientist and observe the things around you every single day.

I hope that you come back tomorrow so we can read more stories and make our brain super, super strong.

All right, boys and girls, we'll see you then.

Goodbye.

(upbeat acoustic guitar music)