(upbeat music) - Hello, little learners.

Welcome back to our TK classroom.

I hope that you're smiling really wide today because we have so much learning to do.

My name is Ms. Lara, and I'm gonna be your teacher today.

Hello.

I would love for you to introduce yourself now.

So wherever you are, make sure, nice and loud, you tell me what your name is.

Ready?

Oh, I heard some of your names.

I'm so glad and happy you're here.

I'm gonna try to catch one of your special letters.

And don't worry if it's not yours this time, you know I do this all the time so it's gonna be yours sometime soon.

So for today's special letter, I'm going to need a big line.

So there it goes, big line.

And then one more piece, a little line at the top.

And then there's a little line, big line.

That makes what letter?

A T. That's right.

And the T makes a special sound.

♪ The T says (makes sound T) ♪ ♪ The T says (makes sound T) ♪ ♪ Every letter makes the sound the T says (makes sound T) ♪ All right.

So today, which is another T word, we're learning all about gardens.

And we've been sharing stories that involve fruits and vegetables and critters you might find in a garden.

And today our story is about vegetables too.

So we're gonna continue the learning.

Don't forget to add our magnet.

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

Let's see two magnets on top, two on the bottom, and two and two together, make?

Four.

That's right.

So let's do our song and then I'll unveil our words that we're going to need for our story.

Do you remember this song?

It's an action song.

So where I am, I'm sitting down, but where you are you can be standing up and doing the movements.

So when it tells you to curl up like a tiny seed, curl up like this.

And when it tells you to start growing, rise up from the ground.

And when you're a blooming flower, spread your arms out like this to become a flower.

You ready for our song?

It's to the tune of muffin man.

Here it goes.

♪ Curl up like a tiny seed ♪ ♪ A tiny seed ♪ ♪ A tiny seed ♪ ♪ Curl up like a tiny seed ♪ ♪ Warm sun is what you need.

♪ And where I am, there's not a lot of warm sun, but I'm wishing some for you.

Now we're going to start to grow.

Ready?

♪ Now you can start growing ♪ ♪ Start growing, start growing ♪ ♪ Now you can start growing ♪ ♪ Drink the rain and start to rise ♪ So rise up because you're going to bloom, that's the next step.

♪ Stretch up tall ♪ ♪ Arms open wide ♪ ♪ Arms open wide ♪ ♪ Arms open wide ♪ ♪ Stretch up tall, arms open wide ♪ ♪ Now a flower's starting to bloom ♪ What kind of flower are you?

I think I'm going to be a sunflower, like the one on my head.

Hey, so now it's time to look for the words that we're going to need for our story.

And the words also give us clues about what our story's about and they're behind the door.

So let's unveil them.

Here we go.

Right.

Here we are.

Our first word is a word.

It's special letter is F. And you might have heard this word before because you might have been this before, and it's fussy.

It means to get upset really easily and to get irritated really easily.

Sometimes you might hear parents say, "The baby is really fussy."

That means the baby's getting mad too easily.

Fussy.

The second word that we're going to need is nibble, special letter N. Nibble.

Nibble means you take small little tiny bites out of something.

Have you ever nibbled on something?

Usually you might nibble on corn, you just take little tiny bites.

And the third word is rare, special letter R. Rare is like you.

It means it doesn't happen very often.

It's one of a kind.

And there's not another you in this world, so you are rare.

So be on the lookout for those words in our story.

I'm about to show you what that story is.

Now, I love this story because it's one that uses your imagination.

And there's a little girl in here that does not like things that come from a garden.

It's by Lauren Child, and the story is called, "I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato".

So let's see what's inside.

Okay.

Now in this story there are two characters we'll need to learn about.

There's a little girl and a little boy, and they're brother and sister.

And it's based off an actual little boy, he's right here.

His name is Soren and he's crazy about tomatoes, but he'd never ever eat beans.

So as we're reading the story we'll be watching our characters.

Here we go.

The boy says, "I have this little sister, Lola."

That's Lola right there.

"She is small and very funny.

Sometimes I have to keep my eye on her.

Sometimes mom and dad ask me to give Lola her dinner.

This is difficult because she is a very fussy eater."

Remember that means she doesn't like everything, she gets mad at the thing she has to eat easily.

So he's being responsible, giving her dinner.

And Lola says, "No, thank you.

Lola won't eat carrots."

She says, "Carrots are for rabbits."

Look it.

Right here, is a carrot and a rabbit, and there's Lola going, "No way am I putting that orange thing in my mouth."

So I say, "What about peas?"

Lola says, "Peas.

They're too small, and too green."

One day I played a good trick on her.

So she won't eat carrots and won't eat peas, all of things that come from a garden and are good for you.

Let's see what brother is gonna do to get her to eat peas and carrots.

Lola was sitting at the table waiting for her dinner, and she said, "I do not eat peas or carrots or potatoes or mushrooms or spaghetti or eggs or sausages.

I do not eat cauliflower or cabbage or baked beans or bananas or oranges.

And I am not fond of apples or rice or cheese or fish sticks.

And I absolutely never, ever, ever will never ever eat a tomato."

"My sister hates tomatoes."

Now you might have some foods that you might not like to eat either.

And some of those foods might be vegetables that come from a garden.

So here's a trick for getting you to try them, to like them.

So brother says, "That is lucky because we're not having any of those things.

We're not going to eat peas or carrots or potatoes or mushrooms or spaghetti or eggs or sausages.

There will be no cauliflower or cabbage or baked beans or bananas or oranges.

We don't have any apples or rice or cheese or fish sticks, and certainly no tomatoes."

Is he trying to trick her?

Lola looked at the table, "Then why are those carrots there, Charlie?

I don't ever eat carrots."

Remember, Lola said carrots are for rabbits.

And I said, "Oh, you think these are carrots?"

These are not carrots, these are orange twiglets from Jupiter."

"They look just like carrots to me," said Lola.

"But how can they be carrots?"

I said.

"Carrots don't grow on Jupiter."

"That's true," said Lola.

"Well, I might just try one if they're all the way from Jupiter.

Not bad," she said as she took another bite.

So she won't eat carrots, but she'll eat twiglets from Jupiter.

Then Lola saw some peas.

"I don't eat peas," said Lola.

I said, "Good thing these are not peas.

Of course they're not, these are green drops from Greenland.

They're made out of green and fall from the sky."

"But I don't eat green things," said Lola.

Do you eat green things at home, like peas and celery?

"Oh, goody," I said, I'll have your share.

Green drops are so incredibly rare."

That means they're not there all the time, right?

One of a kind.

"well," said Lola, "Maybe I'll nibble just one or two.

Oh," said Lola, "They are actually quite tasty."

So she won't eat peas, but she'll eat green droplets from Greenland.

Next Lola saw, what's this guy?

Potato.

She said, "No way.

I will not eat a potato.

Don't even try to get me to eat it.

I won't even eat it if it's mashed."

"Oh, this isn't a mashed potato.

People often think so but it's not.

It's cloud fluff from the pointiest peak of Mount Fuji."

"Oh," said Lola, "In that case, a large helping for me.

I'd love to eat cloud."

"Charlie," she said, "Those look like fish sticks to me and I would never, ever eat fish sticks."

What do you think Charlie's gonna call them?

What do they look like to you?

(flips page) "I know that.

These are not fish sticks, these are ocean niblets from the supermarket under the sea.

Mermaids eat them all the time."

"Oh, I wanna go to that supermarket."

Charlie said, "Oh, I went to that supermarket one time with mom."

"Yes.

I know the ones.

I think I've had them before," Lola said gobbling them down.

"Are there any more?"

(flips page) And then she said, "Charlie, will you pass me one of those?"

And I said, "Wait, one of those?"

Now I want you to think back what food was it that Lola hated to eat above all other foods?

It's red and round.

It was a tomato.

Look.

Right there.

Charlie's holding them.

Lola said, "Yes, Charlie.

one of those."

And I couldn't believe my eyes because guess what she was pointing at.

The tomatoes.

And I said, "Are you sure?

Really?

One of these?"

(flips page) And she said, "Yes.

Of course.

Moon squirters are my favorite."

So they're not tomatoes to her, they're moon squirters.

"You didn't think they were tomatoes, did you, Charlie?"

The end.

So I hope you like this book by Lauren Child.

It's so interesting to see how you can make eating vegetables fun.

I know that's really hard when you're four or five years old, but they're delicious and good for you.

So I hope you enjoyed this book.

And now you're gonna help me again, because guess what?

We have another recipe using things from our garden.

We're gonna play with our food today.

But I have the ingredients here and all the beginning sounds are missing so I need you to help me write them.

Can you help me?

All right.

Let's go for it.

Hey, so let me get my red pen.

We're gonna be making vegetable faces today.

So that's a fun way, just like Charlie and Lola did to make eating vegetables exciting.

So we need some ingredients.

We need a tortilla, some cream cheese, broccoli, a tomato or a moon squirter like Lola called it, and some cucumbers.

But see all the beginning sounds are gone, so let's see if we can figure out the first one.

(makes sound T) tortilla (makes sound T) Do you remember what letter makes the (makes sound T) sound?

Yes.

It's T. So let me write that.

We're gonna do a big line down and a little line across.

All right.

Our next ingredient is cream cheese.

Have you ever had that?

It's not really like cheese at all.

It's kind of spready and wide and delicious and you might have it on bagels.

So let's listen for that beginning sound (makes letter sound) Yap.

You're right.

It could be a K or a C but I know it's a C because I have been reading and learning for a long time.

And that's one big curve.

What's the next thing?

Broccoli.

(makes sound B) What letter makes a (makes sound B) sound?

That's right.

It's a B.

And that's big line down, little curve and little curve.

B for broccoli.

We have two more.

So this is a tomato.

Listen for the sound (makes sound T) Yes.

It's the same as tortilla (makes sound T) T for tomato.

So big line down, little line across.

And our last one is cucumber (makes sound C) Now remember there's two letters that make that sound (makes sound) but we want the one that's a big curve.

Which one is that one?

A C. That's right.

So here we go.

C. So here are ingredients for our vegetable faces which we'll make in our project place in just a bit.

A tortilla, cream cheese, broccoli, tomatoes, and cucumbers.

So let's walk over there and we'll make it together.

Hey, let's walk over to the project place where I have my ingredients waiting for us.

Hey, so let's start our funny face with vegetables.

The first thing we're gonna need actually is to gather our vegetables.

Now the really cool thing about this recipe is you can use whatever vegetables you have in your refrigerator and you can actually name them anything you want like Lola and Charlie.

So I'm going to use some tomatoes.

Well, I almost forgot.

Always start with clean hands.

I can't wash my hands because I'm here in the studio but I have some hand sanitizer.

You would need to wash your hands.

And then these are called cherry tomatoes.

They're smaller than regular tomatoes but I thought they would make really good eyes and maybe a mouth.

So I'm gonna take a few, maybe five of them.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and I'm gonna cut them in half.

So using my butter knife, I'm just gonna cut them right in half.

And you can see they have tiny little seeds in them.

So here, I'm cutting them in half.

I think these will make good eyes and good lips.

So we'll keep going.

Here we go.

So now we have our tomatoes.

Now bonus question for you, if I had five tomatoes and I cut them in half, which means two parts, how many pieces of tomato will I have?

This is super advanced.

Let me know if you get that one.

The next thing I have here is some broccoli and I love eating broccoli.

Doesn't it look like a little tree.

You can kind of sleep under or lay under.

So I like eating broccoli with just a little bit of lemon and I put it in a pan.

So if you get broccoli, and this is actually called a head of broccoli.

Do you have a head?

Well, this is a broccoli head here and I'm just gonna take each piece of broccoli like this and cut it off.

And then I'm going to use my knife again.

You might wanna ask a parent for help and cut the little pieces off like this.

I thought the broccoli would make really good ears or maybe some hair for our funny face when we start to make it.

Oh, that's gonna be exciting.

Have you ever eaten anything with green hair or green ears?

I don't think I have.

Okay.

There's our broccoli.

Now when my daughter was little she did not like to eat anything green.

She said, "Nope.

If it's green, not gonna happen."

Until she discovered green jello (makes sound to indicate yummy) and green pudding.

And then she was a little more open.

And now she'll try the vegetables, which is very brave of her.

And I hope you're brave at home too.

And try different vegetables like this one, a cucumber, something green.

I'm gonna cut up little slices of cucumber.

These can also be eyes or a nose, cucumber nose.

Be very careful as you're cutting.

Here we go.

Some people like to peel their cucumbers.

I eat them both ways.

Where I'm from, we actually take cucumbers and we put lemon and chili powder on them to make a delicious snack.

The last vegetable I'm gonna use for my face is some carrots.

Now that wasn't in my recipe, but I saw them at the store and I thought, yap, I'm gonna use these carrots for some hair or maybe some eyelashes.

Just gonna have to get creative.

Now I have paper right here on my table so that I can scooch my vegetables down.

Of course you'll have a plate or something else that you use.

Now let's start making our funny face.

First thing I'm gonna need is a tortilla.

These are whole wheat tortillas.

I thought they add a nice bit of wholesome crunch to our funny face here.

When we eat them with all our vegetables they kind of pack it in.

And then I have my cream cheese here.

And I told you cream cheese, (sniffs cheese) it's not like cheese at all, is it?

At least the cheese that I put like on my sandwiches, this is spreadable.

So I'm gonna take a little bit of cream cheese.

You can also use something called hummus made with garbanzo beans.

That's very delicious with vegetables.

Or you can just leave your tortilla plain and put salsa or whatever it is that you decide you like with your vegetables.

So this is gonna be what makes our face.

It's almost like the paint.

All right.

So I'm gonna show you in just a minute, what it looks like.

Always put the lid back on.

Look.

See.

That's my... Now it's the fun part.

That's my face.

Now I'm gonna add some eyes.

Should I use my cucumbers?

Here we go.

I think those would be delicious eyes.

See what it's looking like.

Look it, with my eyes.

And then, should I put a nose on there?

Maybe I'll use a broccoli nose (laughs).

There.

That's what it's looking like so far, two eyes and a nose.

And then I think I'll add some eyelashes.

I can hear you screaming at me.

Ms. Lara, what about the mouth?

I'm coming.

I'm coming.

I just thought he needs eyelashes or she needs eyelashes first.

Okay.

Let's see.

Without a mouth you can't really taste these delicious things, right?

So here's some eyelashes.

(laughs) I think my person is looking quite delicious.

Next.

Okay.

I'll add a mouth.

I'm gonna use my grape tomatoes.

Should I make this funny face smile?

Okay.

I think I will.

I love a smiling face.

I don't know about where you are, but where I am people have just started taking off their mask so we can see their beautiful smile.

All right.

Here.

Let's do one more.

What do you think?

Delicious.

Oh, there you go.

What does it need?

Some ears?

Okay.

It has to be able to hear.

This is reminding me of a character that we use for handwriting in our preschool classrooms, matman.

And if you make matmam like this, you can then eat him, right?

What else should I put?

What is that thing inside of your eyes?

Your pupils.

Does it have a red, delicious eyes.

And there you go.

That is what my face is looking like, my delicious smiling face.

Now you can decide how you want to eat him.

Well, maybe I'll add some earrings.

Wait, I just can't let it go.

I must add earrings and hair.

I can't let him be bald, or her.

I have to add hair all over the place.

I was gonna leave without doing that, I was gonna be so upset with me.

There.

(laughs) Just a little bit extra, like Ms. Lara.

There we are.

There's our person.

now it's ready to eat.

So if I was eating this, I would put everything inside and then roll it up just like this and take a big bite like a delicious vegetable taco or a wrap.

So I hope that you try this at home.

Make a silly face to make your food fun to play with and fun to eat.

I'll put his hair back here so we can see him again.

All right.

It looks like we have just enough time for me to tell you what we're going to do tomorrow.

We're going to finish out our week by studying about a fruit or vegetable, or vegetable that grew very, very big.

It started off as a tiny seed and then it got sun and water and it grew in some thick soil and began to grow and grow and grow until it was gigantic.

And then a little old lady and a little old man had to find a way to pull it out of the ground because all of these vegetables that we're enjoying, they came from the ground and from a garden, didn't they?

So I hope that you come back tomorrow so that we can read the story of the gigantic turnip.

I'll finish out our gardening week.

All right, boys and girls, I'm going to start eating this.

But before I go, I wanna remind you to check out your local library.

There are so many books about gardening that we're not going to get to read this week.

Check out the SOW app because it's free for a lot of people, and there's so many books out there.

Until I see you again, Ms. Lara's gonna send you a big squeeze.

I'm gonna make it extra squeezy for you.

You'll have to pretend you're a delicate tomato so I don't squeeze you too hard.

And a big smooch, (makes smooching sound) nice and slobbery (makes yuck sound) and remind you to read and play and to use your imagination every single day.

We'll see you back here tomorrow.

Goodbye.

(upbeat music)