[no audio] [no audio] - [Mallory] Good morning, everybody.

- [Attendees] Good morning!

- Good morning everybody!

- [Attendees] Good morning!

- I'm sorry, I don't do quiet really good.

[attendees laughing] My name is Mallory Mbalia, and I am the brand sparkling new director of Learning and Education at Fred Rogers Productions.

Good morning.

[claps] And my colleague right here, go ahead.

- Oh, I introduce myself.

- Yes.

- I need a mic.

So my name is Olubunmi Mia Olufemi, and I'm the supervising producer of "Alma's Way," and I'm so excited to be talking to y'all this morning.

Thank you.

[attendees clapping] [laughs] So just to introduce you to the series, "Alma's Way" is a bright, funny, upbeat show all about Alma as she finds her way and thinks things through through her Bronx neighborhood.

This show was created by Sonia Manzano, who you know as Maria on "Sesame Street."

I grew up with her.

It's produced by Fred Rogers Productions in association with Pipeline Animation Studios, our friends in Canada.

It's designed for kids age four to six, and we work closely with child development experts and other advisors to develop all of our shows and make sure that the stories are relatable to and helpful for those young children.

We premiered in October of 2021, and we have 40 half-hour episodes, the newest one just dropped June 5th.

It is a Puerto Rico special, so Alma gets to go to Loiza, where her father's from, figure out a mystery about who does this Bomba skirt belong to, and she also celebrates her Bisabuela's 100th birthday, bisabuela means great-grandmother.

So season two, we have 25 episodes coming in fall.

There are so many fun episodes, you guys.

I can't tell you when it's gonna air and I can't tell you everything, but there's so many special guests and so much music, there's even gonna be a musical episode.

So if you were dancing today, you will be dancing later.

The TV series, website, and games are all available in English and in Spanish, and season one episodes are also available with ASL interpretation, and that is available via The Described and Captioned Media Program, DCMP, website.

There is a handout in the books that you received, and we'll talk a little bit more about that later.

So when Sonia first talked about the show, her vision in 2016 was, "I want kids to know that they have a mind and that they can use it."

She saw that kids were getting turned off by bad testing scores to school, and she wanted them to know that your mind is powerful, it is a refuge, it's a safe space, but that also you can use it to solve problems, you can use your imagination to build anything that you want.

And so we have taken that philosophy and extended it across everything that we create.

"Alma's Way" is not just a television show, we also have books, which you also have, we've got digital games, we've got a website, we've got educational engagement activities and more.

Our curriculum is focused on key concepts related to critical thinking, specifically the areas of responsible decision-making, self-awareness, and social awareness.

So if you've seen the show, in every episode, Alma will come up, again, some sort of dilemma, either one she just encounters or one she comes up with herself or makes herself.

And in that moment, she pauses, as does the world around her, and a little bubble comes up, and she reflects on what's happening or what might happen if she takes one course of action or another.

So for example, what if she went with her Abuelo to the Sweat Sox game instead of honoring her commitment to dance in her Uncle Nestor's Bomba show?

Or how can she help her friend Lucas get over his stage fright in order to perform in a community talent show?

And so nonverbal communication is super important with our animation.

Our characters are very, very expressive.

They are designed to emote, to think, to raise an eyebrow because it takes time to have ideas, and we really wanna model for kids that it's helpful to pause and think when you're trying to think something through.

And Mallory's gonna go a little bit more over the think throughs in a little bit.

So as you know, Alma is Puerto Rican-New Yorker, so wepa, all that singing, Puerto Rican flags everywhere in the show.

And so her culture is an important part of the show and so are the diverse cultures of her friends and family, some of whom you see here.

And the beauty of setting the show in a real world setting, 'cause it is set in the Bronx, is that we get to reflect out to kids the reality of what it means to live in a multicultural neighborhood in New York City.

So next, I'll introduce you to some of our main cast.

First and foremost is Alma Rivera.

She is six years old, Bronx-born and Puerto Rican proud.

She's impulsive but trying to be more thoughtful.

And when she doesn't know what to do, she thinks it through, and that's Alma's way.

So in every episode, Alma breaks the fourth wall to talk to the viewer directly, sometimes just to give them a look.

The viewer is her confidant and friend, and she shares her feelings and her challenges and adds colorful commentary to her life's moments, big and small.

So building this genuine connection engages children at home and prompts them to want to know more about the people they're watching, and it's also inviting children in to think along with Alma.

She lives in a duplex home with her Mami, who's a music teacher who likes to improvise operas while doing household tasks.

Papi is a veterinarian who's Bronx-famous, he was born on the island of Puerto Rico.

Junior, her little brother, is inquisitive, meticulously organized, and an aspiring breakdancer.

We've got a episode coming up about that.

And Abuelo is a Sweat Sox superfan who's always chasing after Chacho, the dog who loves to steal his lucky socks.

[attendees chuckling] And on the other side of the duplex is my homegirl and your super sister, Tia Gloria.

She's an ultimate helper, master fixer, and a conductor on the subway, Her primo-amigo, or cousin-friend, Eddie Mambo.

He's an amazing dancer who can teach himself how to play any instrument.

And also Uncle Nestor, who's a very dramatic, [chuckles] very dramatic director of a local theater company.

We mean that in the best of ways.

Her close friends include Lucas Reed, who's a White American boy who loves to sing as much as he loves his hair, Rafia Huda, a sporty Bangladeshi American girl whose family owns the local bodega, and she thinks she's the world's greatest everything, and Andre King, who's an artsy African American boy who loves making funky chalk murals of space hippos and flying chinchillas.

Next, I'm just gonna talk a little bit about the world.

So welcome to the boogie down Bronx.

This is Alma's street.

She lives in the Orange two-family house in the middle, and some of her friends and neighbors live in the apartment buildings around.

Sometimes they live over shops, sometimes they're in buildings, and sometimes they're in houses.

So when we designed the show, we went to the Bronx, and we took our animation company to the Bronx because it was really important that Alma's neighborhood really reflected the reality of New York.

And even though it's fictional, how we brought Alma into it is it's bright and colorful, it's orange, there's lots of saturation, and that reflects how Alma looks at her neighborhood because she loves it so much.

And it's also a nod to her Caribbean roots with the beautiful oranges and the turquoise that you often see when you go to, like, Old San Juan and you see the beautiful doors and all throughout the island.

Sesame, there we go.

All right.

And as you know, subway trains are a big part of city life, so we had to add the 6 Train.

Sonia has beautiful memories of leaning out her window and watching the 6 Train go by.

There's even a whole song about it, many songs dedicated to the 6, and you'll see it in every single episode.

I kinda like to think of it as like our version of trolley, a little FRP, you know, little "Mister Rogers" nod.

And we also have a deal with the MTA, so you will actually hear the recordings that you'll hear on the subway.

So, "Stand clear of the closing doors, please," that's what they play on the trains, you'll hear it in our show.

Next are the characters.

So main characters are great, and we've done a beautiful job and Pipeline has done a beautiful job of designing them, but it's also important to pay visual attention to the background characters in the show.

And so setting the show in the Bronx allows us to bring not just the diversity to the screen but also, like, that quirky weirdness about New York.

If you've ever been there, there's some weird, wonderful stuff and weird, wonderful people inhabiting that city.

So you'll see people who pop up like that gentleman and his pet chicken or the guy with the fish head.

And that was actually based on a man that Ellen, our executive producer, saw.

That's the real photo inspiration there.

And then viewers will also see people in their neighborhoods that you don't usually see on TV.

People that I didn't grow up seeing on TV, like two mothers and their adorable baby, a Cuban-Puerto Rican boy with cerebral palsy who loves to dance, or a Muslim Bangladeshi American family.

New York is like that, so our show is like that.

Music is also a huge part of our storytelling.

The Bronx is the birthplace of hip hop, and we have episodes about beatboxing, sneaker culture, and Uncle Nestor and Tia Gloria's favorite song, which is a 1990s-inspired Latin pop hit, which is way over the top, lots of runs.

And our music team does a really great job, especially with mixing traditional and contemporary Puerto Rican and Latin music with the score of the show.

And last, I just wanna talk a little bit about the different ways in which we try to reach families in their communities.

So the animated show is available via broadcast and streaming on all PBS KIDS websites and the Video app, YouTube and Amazon in English and in Spanish.

Our captions and descriptive video is available in both languages as well.

In addition to digital games, which are also in English and Spanish, we've launched activities for parents and educators via PBS Parents and PBS LearningMedia, we'll talk more about that later.

And we also work with a number of PBS member stations throughout the country to bring "Alma's Way" into their communities in ways that are useful to and relevant to the populations that they serve.

So one of those examples is in August of 2022, we partnered with WNET Thirteen and the MTA to host the Alma Train Party.

And that was at Grand Central Terminal, and it was a free event for kids and families to stop by, play the new Alma Train Party game, and learn more about local Bronx organizations who were also there.

So like the Bronx Children's Museum, the Bronx Zoo.

And they also got information on how they could use public transportation services to get to those organizations.

And they also got to meet Latina subway conductors who talked about their experiences working with the MTA.

And they got to take a Bomba class with Bombazo Dance Co.

So next, I'll cede the floor to Mallory, who will take us through some think throughs.

And I'll even change the slide for you because I'm nice.

- Oh, boy!

- And I have long arms.

- You are so kind.

[attendees chuckling] I love Mia.

All right, y'all.

So I'ma try real hard to read this tiny little screen because I couldn't pull it up on my phone.

So I'ma look at it like this, but I got my good glasses on, but I'm being real honest, this glare right here is making it, like, a little challenging, so we're really gon' think about this.

So, the think throughs, the think throughs.

If you have seen "Alma's Way," and as Mia was saying, critical thinking through line, right?

But what does that look like for children?

When we go tell children, "I need you to go think critically," does that mean anything to them?

[laughs] Like, what does that even mean?

What I love about Alma is because the way she does her think throughs, she models what critical thinking can look like, what a piece of critical thinking can look like, what a component, what an area is.

There's all different types of critical thinking, but the kind that she models is really pausing, stopping, and then acting, right?

But it kinda goes beyond that.

I always look at media, and now I really get to look at it in this role, but I always look at media as an opportunity for kids to understand depth of story, just like my love, passion, passion for books, right?

And how books can offer that opportunity for kids to do all those different thinking skills through reading a a story.

Well, I like to think of shows that you can read a show, and "Alma's" one of those shows where you actually can read a show.

Think about the ways that you read a book, right?

How do we tell kids to read a book?

You can read the words, you can read the pictures, or you can recall and retell the story, right?

What do you see on this slide?

What is the first thing that you see on this slide with Alma?

Recall and retell.

What is one of the main things you're doing when you're watching Alma?

You're watching moving pictures.

You're having an opportunity when you really intentionally talk with children about media to really reinforce some literacy skills in an organic setting.

You know, more of media leans this way than others, and you know where I work, so I'ma talk about our stuff.

But really, you can read a show, you can bring in these concepts of literacy right where kids are, right with what they're viewing, and Alma is a really beautiful example of that.

Whenever you watch Alma, she is gonna have a pause.

She's gonna say, I need to think about this.

And when she's doing that, she recalls and retells three major things from that episode or from that day, from that experience, from, as Rodney says, that hero's journey that are relevant to help her get to her conclusion.

Now, you see the next thing on that bullet is sequence.

She don't always sequence, all right?

She doesn't always put it in sequence.

However, as our kids are viewing, and if we're co-viewing with them, you can have a conversation about sequencing.

And depending on which three parts she pulls back, you can even see sequence those thoughts with them.

So Alma might pull back three pieces of the day that were really pertinent to her, and they could be in sequence or not to help her get her conclusion.

However, when you're in the classroom, when she pulls those three things from the day, stop, have a conversation with them, and ask them, which one happened first?

Which one happened next?

Which one happened last?

And does that make a difference when she's trying to come to her next bullet of organizing, all right?

When we're having kids come through critical thinking skills and doing all that processing stuff that we want them to do to be great citizens in society, all that jazz, you know they have to go from that recall and retell, they have to do some kind of organization with that information, and sometimes it is sequencing.

And sometimes because the way Alma recalls and retells, and it's not always in sequence, it's just organizing her thoughts in a way to get to the next bullet point of making a responsible decision.

Responsible decision-making is a key component of every episode of "Alma's Way."

Flexible thinking, you know, going ahead and taking what I know, and not just what I know and just not what I feel, but actually stopping and thinking, pausing.

There's a lot of referencing to others in, just again, a very organic sense in this show.

Stopping and thinking of what other person went through, because it's not just my emotional response, I need to stop and think about these parts of the day, how other people are reacting to it, and why they reacted that way and what my true problem is so I can make a- [mic rumbles] Make a responsible decision about it.

[chortles] And then all of that leads to what is the big thing that kids always struggle with, that teachers are like on that little reading thing that they ain't got?

Comprehension skills.

Comprehension skills.

You can read it, you can flow through it, you can do the vocabulary, you can recall and retell it, but can you tell me why?

Can you tell me that you understood it?

Well, if they do all those steps, they're gonna actually be showing and modeling comprehension skills.

There's no second-guessing.

There's no second-guessing.

Because if they can recall and retell, organize that information, come up with a responsible decision, you don't think they comprehended what they just did?

Ooh!

[chuckles] [attendees chuckling] All right, next.

You can take the kindergarten teacher out the classroom, you can't take the classroom out the kindergarten teacher.

All right, so we have an example of this.

We're gonna play with a think through.

Actually, one of the handouts we gave you is brand new.

Now, because it's not laminated, and I know people like to, like, have fresh copies, I wouldn't suggest writing on it right now, but there is a think through sheet right there for you.

And as you'll notice on that sheet, because the way I talked about sequencing, are the thought bubbles numbered one, two, three?

No.

There are just three opportunities for kids to bring back important information that they thought was pertinent to help get to that responsible decision.

So we are gonna attempt to watch a clip, and this think through, I want you to think that, well, let me set it up.

It is the movie night, all right?

This is movie night, and Alma and her friends are at a park, and they're all excited 'cause it's movie night, it's community movie night, and all her friends are always really excited about community movie night.

And one of her friends in particular, Andre, is always usually pretty excited until he finds out what the movie is, and everything shifts within him, all right?

And so I'ma leave it there, and hopefully we can play this thing.

Lauren, you can be my backup if I don't play it right.

Will it play?

Oh, but there's no- - What just happened?

I helped Andre finish everything, but he still doesn't wanna go.

I gotta think about this.

[thought bubble whirring] - Yes!

This is gonna be the best summer movie night in history!

- Andre was really excited for movie night.

- Well, tonight's movie is "Invasion of the Blob Monster."

- Sweet!

- Yes, yes, yes!

But he looked less excited when he found out what movie was playing.

♪ Blob Monster's blobbin' around ♪ ♪ Blob, blob, blobbity, blob ♪ - Whoa, I didn't notice it before, but Andre looked kind of scared when Frankie and I blobbed around.

Hmm... Is that why he doesn't wanna go to movie night?

Aha!

I know what to do.

- So what did you guys notice there?

Please shout it out.

What did Alma recall?

- [Attendee] Her friends.

- Which one?

- [Attendee] She observed her friends.

- She observed her friends, what else?

Okay, this is one of my favorite questions I like to ask people.

What are you thinking right now that you're not saying?

[laughs] - [Attendee] She recalled emotional responses.

- She recalled emotional responses, what else?

What else was pertinent in her brain?

- [Attendee] She recalled the change in his demeanor once the movie was told.

- The change in his demeanor.

All right, and it says, ooh, that question.

What character trait do you think was emphasized here?

Empathy.

What else?

Anything else?

Imagine that you are four or five or six, and you asked them, you might not say, "What character trait was emphasized?"

That's probably not the most appropriate thing to ask a four year old, but you could say, "How did Alma act?"

"What did she do for her friends?"

You can ask those kinda questions, because the thing is she did just that.

This one, she did kinda recall and retell in a little bit of a sequence, so you can kinda do that.

But for the thought bubbles, the kids could draw what they saw in those three thought bubbles, and then we're gonna pause the think through right here, and I wouldn't show them what she did next.

Why?

- [Attendee] See what they think.

- Bingo, see what they think.

Again, reading a show.

This is the great part in the show to pause right there and let the kids predict.

Go ahead and chart those predictions, let them draw their predictions, let them be the narrators, let them be the storytellers of how Alma solves the show in their mind, and then you watch it.

And then guess what?

It's not about if they were wrong or right.

It's about they get to compare and contrast different ways that things the story could go.

Everybody's a storyteller.

Everyone has a story to tell.

Our kids are brilliantly creative.

Again, to Rodney's point, they have no idea what they're gonna be yet, which is the beauty of their brains, they haven't been filtered yet.

So let them go ahead and write whatever they think, and you're gonna have such depth of conversation and such depth of comprehension modeling skills that you won't even know what's happening.

They won't, but you'll be like, check, check, check on their evaluation.

[chortles] All right, next one.

Bomba or Baseball.

So this is a different kind of responsible decision-making here, okay?

So the last example, Alma was really had to figure out why her friend was acting some kind of way and then had to figure that out.

She also has to do models in the show, responsible decision-making that happens to kids every day about making decisions and dilemmas, about kinda just do the right thing.

So let's set up Bomba or Baseball.

And Mia, actually, you've talked about it a little bit.

So same premise.

Alma has this opportunity basically to do two things, all right?

There's this really great baseball game, the Sweat Sox are playing, and it's her favorite team.

You know, Papi's favorite team, all this stuff.

And at first, she didn't know she was gonna get to go, so her Uncle Nestor was like, "Okay, I need dancers, Bomba dancers," And she commits to this, right?

As well as her cousin commits to being a drummer.

But then there's a ticket, and she has an opportunity to go to this game, and she has to decide what to do.

All right?

So, as we watch this one, what would you do?

- The baseball game and the Bomba show are both on Saturday.

I can't go to both.

What should I do?

Bomba or baseball?

Baseball or Bomba?

I gotta think about this.

[thought bubble whirring] Okay, what if I went to the baseball game with Abuelo?

Go, go, go, Sweat Sox!

- Woo-hoo!

Go, Sweat Sox!

- Ooh, that would be so much fun!

But if I go to the game, [thought bubble whirring] then I'd miss Uncle Nestor's Bomba show, and I promised I'd help him.

I'll dance in your show, Uncle Nestor.

You can count on me!

I made a commitment.

Okay, I know what to do.

- All right, so this is a great place to what?

Pause and ask the kids, "What would you do?"

But don't just tell me what you do, tell me why.

♪ Tell me why ♪ I had to sing at least once, all right?

Otherwise it wouldn't be a Mallory presentation.

Anyway, [chortles] you gotta tell me why.

All right, so go ahead.

All right, responsible adults who've already processed life, what would you do?

[chortles] Somebody shout it out.

- [Attendee] Bomba.

- Bomba.

- [Attendee] She said she would do it.

- Why?

Because she said she would do it.

All right, all your kids ain't gon' say that.

Be very honest with you right now.

[laughs] And they're gonna come up with some really good reasons why baseball is the right answer, all right?

If they're really good, they're not just gonna make it look like a selfish act.

They're gon' go, "But Abuela asked me to go, and I'm gonna be with my Abuela!"

"Don't you care about family and, like, responsibility and, like, being with the family?"

And, "Somebody gives you a gift, you don't say no," and all this other stuff.

[chuckles] All right?

So you gotta be ready for that.

And the Bomba, yes, the adult responsible decision is like, yeah, we do it because we made a commitment, but they might say, "Well, I picked Bomba 'cause I just like dancing better than baseball."

[chortles] Be ready for all of those answers and be ready for some really rich conversation.

And then again, be ready for them to write their own endings.

Again, use those recall and retell sheets so that they can pull out their information.

Hey, how fun would this be if they pulled out information and different thoughts that Alma did to back up their reasons for making their decision?

[chortles] They could change it.

And then, again, that leads to great conversation.

And at the end, you can show what happened.

I'll give it away, she went to do the Bomba dance.

There's more to it, but yeah, she did.

[chuckles] But then, show what happened, and then they can be like, "Oh, I thought that right," but what the culture you wanna evoke is not "I got it right, and you didn't," you wanna evoke the culture of "Oh, you got that answer too, well, I really thought this way, and I can see why that went that way," and thus the conversation to keep going, all right?

So that's that.

And then so what, again, was the underlining thing highlighted here in this one?

We talked about empathy in the last one.

What do you think the big, like... Responsibility, mm-hmm.

- [Attendee] Follow your commitments.

- Commitments, yeah.

Following commitments and having a conversation about what a commitment is and why it's important to honor those.

Really great conversation, mm-hmm.

All right, next.

Oh, yay, I get to talk about this.

[laughs] So it's about where can you access this stuff, right?

Where can you find Alma?

All right, well, one of those wonderful places is PBS LearningMedia!

So, one more song.

♪ Back in the day when I was young ♪ ♪ I'm not a kid anymore ♪ ♪ Some days ♪ [attendee chuckles] I worked with PBS LearningMedia for a really, really long time, and I have loved how this resource has continued to be what it is and what it's intended to be for educators.

Free, vetted, aligned, ready to deliver, ready to use.

And you can definitely find "Alma's Way" on PBS LearningMedia.

Again, what I love about PBS LearningMedia is you're gonna find the "Alma's Way," kinda the clips, most of the media selections on PBS LearningMedia can be in that two- to seven-minute range, which is great for teachers 'cause then they can take that pertinent piece of content, that pertinent piece of media that they need in the lesson or they can watch the whole episode.

But also on there are gonna be lesson plans and all kinds of activities and printables and all kinds of stuff.

That sheet that you have right now is not on there yet, it's coveted.

I told you, just for today.

It just came out today.

But I'm sure it will be up there soon so that other teachers can print it out and use it.

And I would tell you what I would do with it, I would laminate it, double laminate it so they could use it as a dry erase, just saying.

And use it again and again, but it's right there on PBS LearningMedia.

If you have not checked out PBS LearningMedia, I highly encourage you to do so and create a free account, get all kinds of stuff on there.

And again, if I put on my assistant principal hat, if I was walking around and doing teacher evaluations, what I love about this is it tells you what standard everything is aligned to for your state, and you can't get dinged, you just get blinged, all right?

So just do it.

[laughs] All right?

There you go.

All right, next.

This was me or you?

- This is you.

- Me?

- We're gonna follow the- - We're gonna follow the thing.

It's still me.

- It's KIDS for Parents.

- Okay, making sure I can talk about it.

PBS KIDS for Parents.

If you kind of heard this, in fact, Sara DeWitt from PBS, you know, big PBS KIDS, she kinda talked about PBS for Parents.

Great website.

So as learning media is to teachers, PBS for Parents is for parents.

Although I mix the two, I have told parents about [laughs] PBS LearningMedia, and I always tell teachers about PBS KIDS for Parents.

So PBS KIDS for Parents is another place you can find Alma, and then here you can also find things like birthday party ideas as well as, of course, the media and more, like, child development tips on how to use her and all kinds of different printables and access to her that way as well.

So if you haven't checked that out, put that on your to-do list.

Say yes.

- Yes.

- Huh?

- [Attendees] Yes!

- Thank you.

[chortles] All right.

And this is Mia.

[chuckles] - Thank you, Mallory.

[chuckles] So also available to parents and teachers is the "Alma's Way" pbskids.org website.

So that's pbs.org/alma.

This is a fully bilingual site, and it includes full episodes, clips, activities, digital games.

Kids can play on their own or they can co-play with other students, with their parents, or with teachers.

And in these games, kids can practice the skills that they learn in the episode.

So like Mallory just talked about, they can practice empathy, they can practice responsible decision-making.

This really cool gif opens up into a party game called Party at Alma's.

And in this game, players are responsible for making sure that their guests have everything they need, and they have to balance all of those decisions and make sure that everybody's happy throughout the party and everybody has fun.

So games are also available via the PBS KIDS Games app.

And again, these are fully bilingual, in English and in Spanish.

And next is FRP has partnered with DCMP, and that is one of the handouts in the book that we gave you.

They are a nonprofit funded by the U.S. Department of Education, and they make educational media accessible and available to students with sensory disabilities in the U.S. And so we have produced ASL interpretations for seasons one and two.

Season one is currently available on dcmp.org, that is totally free.

You do have to have a login and a username, but it is totally free for you to access in your classrooms.

And they were really wonderful to work with and found us this wonderful interpreter who is Puerto Rican and from the Bronx who has brought a lot of her inspiration into interpreting Alma and made up name signs for us, which was really cool.

[attendee giggles] Okay, darn.

Questions.

[Mallory laughs] Questions.

I overshot.

Thank you so much.

But I guess now is an opportunity to open up for questions.

I think that there's supposed to be a mic that is passing around, but feel free to just shout it at us 'cause, you know, it's a small group.

Any questions?

- [Mallory] Or ideas.

- Or ideas or thoughts?

Let me move so I can share this with Mallory.

- [Attendee] What age range is "Alma's Way"- - [Mallory] Intended for?

- [Attendee] Intended for.

- [chuckles] It's kids ages four to six, but I love watching it.

New York Times actually said that we are one show that parents will enjoy watching with their kids.

There are several kids shows that you as parents and teachers have probably been like, "I hate this," so you will enjoy this as adults, and teens and whoever, all ages.

Any other questions?

- What are you thinking that you're not saying?

[attendees chuckling] - Yes.

[chuckles] Yes.

Understand, I need a mic too.

[chuckles] - So, my question.

[hand taps] Okay, anyway, my question is, how do you make sure this gets out?

So I'm a school counselor in a public school setting.

How do you make sure information like this gets out into the public schools?

Because this is something, in my mind, I'm thinking that, you know, teachers, anytime there's something that's free and something they can use to educate students, how do you make sure it gets out to public schools?

[feet tapping] [Mia laughs] Mm, mm, pause, pause.

- Partners!

[Mia laughs] It takes partnership, because I can stand up here or any one of you can stand up in your community and in your school and say, "I got this thing."

But by working together and creating more opportunities for people to put it out there, that's one.

Also, getting it in front of the people who make the decisions.

So getting it in front of, I love to think of school counselors, who I love, and especially media specialists as your great mass disseminators of information because they're trusted in the buildings.

And so you might not be able to talk to every teacher, but they can in some kind of capacity.

And if they're equipped with these resources and in the language that you want it to be talked about, they can disseminate it to their peers in a way that works for them.

What I've learned about our people, 'cause I will forever be a kindergarten teacher, don't ever tell me I'm not one.

[attendees laughing] What I have learned about our people is it really is important to hear from trusted resources about things that they can use, and guess who those trusted resources are?

Each other, all right?

So we can share it, and we're gonna continue to share it in terms of presentations like this, conferences, but if you think that there's something really positive, get it in front of the people who have the ears that have that organic ripple effect and spread.

Yes, this will always be out there, and PBS KIDS is gonna continue to promote PBS LearningMedia in the media, we're gonna continue to promote it from where we can as a production company.

But again, getting it in front of the disseminators, your education people at your local PBS station.

Know Lauren McDowell's name, [chuckles] she can help you, as well as her team.

And they will make sure that you can get it in your schools in a way that makes sense for your schools and your state, all right?

Or whatever you're doing.

Also, share it, share it, share it at places, again, where the teachers are convening.

You have to do that.

I wish there was a magic little glitter thing I could push, and then the glitter of wonderful resources of making sense it's free and it's great goes across the world and lands on every teacher's desk and pops up and smiles in their face and says, "Use this," but that doesn't exist yet.

Yet.

[chortles] [Mia chuckles] So until then, we're gonna continue to go ahead and spread it, but don't just let the people who create it spread it.

If you're inspired by it, you go tell its story to your neighbor, to your people, and then continue to share it with your leadership.

Oh, I've got a whole plan in my mind.

Just wait.

- [Attendee] Okay, so then, go ahead.

- Keep going, keep going.

- Second part.

So then I hear what you're saying, and because I'm on the ground, so then my question would be, in your big umbrella, would you have someone that would reach out to, let's say a county, the board of education of that county, a school, that principal, you know, because a lot of people don't know.

- Exactly.

- So, and then a lot of people can't spread it.

So I'm saying, from the top, 'cause you would be the top, would you have a way of reaching out to each school or each principal or each county to say, "Look, this is what we have."

- So Denise, to your answer.

- Yes.

- This has been a shift that I've had to take being at wherever I am now.

When I was at the station level as the director of education, I was the one with my team reaching out to teachers and principals from that capacity.

So now in this space, my charge, I'm getting this recorded?

Oh dear.

My boss is gon' see this, hi.

Is to get in front of stations, in front of the station education people because they're the ones who have the direct contact with teachers.

Now, there is another organization in terms of direct to teacher from Fred Rogers, which is Fred Rogers Institute, which does child development lessons and they do a lot of connection to Fred himself.

But in terms of the production company, in terms of what we're producing now, our disseminators are really the local stations.

And we do have station advisory groups, we do have different ways we work with stations, and then coming to places like this directly is when we get to talk to teachers.

So that's kind of from this angle.

But also from the angle of serving in the community, from getting to principals as to your big question and your big challenge, that is a challenge because what I have, and I'm just gonna say what I have noticed in terms of dissemination from the station aspect, you have to go ahead and go out and build those individual relationships, because sometimes, when I talked about the guidance counselors and the media specialists being disseminators, the higher up you go, they may or may not share it.

So it's really about finding the right people in each community and each school.

Is it your assistant principal?

Is it the principal?

Is it the curriculum specialist in your county?

Is it anything like that?

So, you know, you're making sure that you're taking it to the place that makes sense for your community and your school.

That the answer that I can offer right now.

Any other questions?

- I got a question.

When you get that little sheet and you have the kids, I don't think it's... Do you have some advice about, I think it's great, pause it, have them draw.

I teach pre-K, so- - Yeah!

- They're sort of judgmental about kids' answers sometimes.

Do you have any suggestions about how to, when you draw it and then show the answer, to help them get past the "I got it right and you got it wrong."

- Yes!

- Just to get past that so that all the answers and all the ideas were accepted and not just the one that came up in the show.

- Right.

- Like, to match.

- Yeah, it's a beautiful question.

It's really about creating that kind of culture and that safe space among your students.

So before you even do this think through, it's all about how, again, we as leaders in that classroom frame it, right?

We have a think through.

She has a situation, she needs to solve a problem.

And how would you solve a problem?

Because yes, she's gonna come up with a solution to the problem, and you're gonna see her solution, but that might not be the solution that would work for everybody.

And because we're all different in this classroom, all of the ways that we approach things, that it's about what works best for each individual, because every individual has value, which means every bind and every idea has value.

And so yes, we can have an aha, but not a hooray, all right?

So when they find out the answer, it's aha!

Not hooray!

Does that make sense?

[chortles] - Yes.

[Mallory chuckles] - Come on, Stephanie.

- Oh, they're both, this one's better.

I'm sorry, I wanted to take yours, they forced me.

[attendees laughing] Mallory and Mia, I got a quick question.

Can you guys try to explain what the correlation is between Fred Rogers and local PBS stations?

When people say, 'cause they're not gonna come to Fred Rogers for this educational resource, right?

'Cause you guys are more like a production.

But if they go look for their local PBS station, can you kind of explain the difference between the two and how you guys work together?

- Oh, yeah, you wanna talk about that or you want me to?

- You can go ahead.

- Okay.

- You're doing such a great job.

- Oh, thank you.

[chuckles] All right, well, so again, the difference is we're a production company.

So the media that comes out is coming out of Fred Rogers Productions, and PBS KIDS is the one that, you know, airs?

Like, go ahead, say it.

- So, I got it.

So PBS technically does not typically produce content, although they have started to with the PBS KIDS talks about racism and jobs and whatnot that they do, but PBS is a broadcaster, and so they hire producers like FRP or WGBH or 9 Story to make these shows.

But our charge is that we are creating educational content, and all of our projects are transmedia projects so there's always a digital component.

We always do research.

So when we were starting "Alma," we did testing in New York schools with kids within our age range.

We work with educational advisors, we work with medical advisors, and we end up creating this whole plethora of activities, including these worksheets, including we work with the PBS educational team.

- Yep.

- To create all of the activities for parents and for educators.

And PBS helps us disseminate that out to stations who we work with to then see what works for you in your community.

Like, we're not going to go to communities and say, "You should use this, this is great, and, like, this is how you should use it."

Rather, we'd work with stations who know their communities and who can take that content and say, "This would be useful in X ways.

- X.

- You can do whatever you want with it, we want it to be useful to you, but we also understand it's important to go through the stations because they know their communities the best.

- [claps] Yes!

- And you can- - No, that's exactly it in terms of, thank you Mia for the pipeline, but it's really about...

So, like, if we're the producers, the stations are disseminators.

So PBS KIDS is the big disseminator, the stations are the local disseminators.

And again, what's important in different parts of the country, in different parts of the state is different.

The content, yes, is not gonna change, but how it's used should be able to depending on who it's serving.

Go ahead, Dr.

Bowman.

- Thank you so much for the hot off the press, this worksheet.

Alma is certainly popular in South Carolina.

And what I am wondering is if there are any products that are in the works for us to begin to share with families who want the T-shirts and the plushies and the puzzles and all of those things?

- [laughs] Yes, there are.

So PBS KIDS has a shop you can go on through their website.

They are Alma T-shirts and Alma caps and little doggy collars 'cause we love animals.

So you can buy all of that online now.

We are working to come up with other games, puzzles.

We really wanna do something with hair because we have such beautiful characters from all over, so maybe some dolls, but yes, you can buy Alma merch now, available through the PBS Shop.

- Yep!

- Yes.

- Don't you love the sheet?

[Mallory and Mia laughing] - Yes?

- Thank you.

- Oh, hold on, Denise.

Hi.

I was wondering, since we've been focusing on "Alma's Way," last year when the Fred Rogers panel was here, they talked about how they planned themes to kind of go across the board for different ages.

Can you tell us the ages and the shows?

I know, like, "Daniel Tiger" and "Donkey Hodie" and all that.

Can you just give us an idea of the ages that that is, I guess, appropriate?

You know, you can watch all of 'em, but what they focus on.

- Oh, the intended ages?

Oh, it's my brand new thing, I got this.

All right!

♪ Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood ♪ ♪ A land of Make-Believe ♪ ♪ Is intended for ages two to four.

♪ ♪ Hee-haw, Donkey Hodie ♪ ♪ Hee-Haw, Donkey Hodie ♪ ♪ Is intended for ages three to five, ♪ ♪ Wepa ♪ ♪ Alma's Way is intended for ages four to six.

♪ ♪ Peg + Cat ♪ Is intended for ages three to five.

"Odd Squad" is intended for ages six to eight.

Math, again.

All of them, again, though I use the word intended, because intention does not close a door to other ages, intention does not close a door to other demographics, because you can be eight years old and really love Daniel, and that's okay.

You can be three years old and dance to Alma, and that's okay.

But those are the intended based off of child development and in terms of strategy, in terms of the writing, in terms of the advisors on those shows.

Oh, and "Through the Woods" as well, three to five.

Thank you.

Oh, and "Mister Rogers."

[laughs] - That's for all of us.

- For all of us!

[laughs] - [Attendee] I think somebody, did anybody else wanna- - Oh, we had Denise and then Carol.

- Okay, so.

So in the big umbrella, I'm just trying to, you know, 'cause this is how it'll go back to my state.

So in the big umbrella, what I'm hearing is that, so PBS, big umbrella, should have a coordinator for each state under education to reach out to the schools in order to enlighten them of all this information that can be given to them for free.

- You got it!

- Okay.

- So basically, Denise, PBS, big PBS has their education team, but every PBS, well, let me back up.

PBS stations have different departments that have different charges for doing different things.

Every PBS station is not exactly the same, but usually there is someone at every station that is over kids media that has some kind of approach in their job description to get out to the communities and to the schools.

That's my best way of answering that.

- [Assistant] And this will be our last question, right?

- Hey, hey, y'all.

Love everything that you're putting down I'm picking up.

A big question that's in my brain is, so we have precious Alma here, she's dancing Bomba, she has Abuelo, she has Abuela.

I'm really curious.

Representation matters, right?

- Yes.

- This feels so incredibly authentic.

It's not being, like, in your face, it's not being forced, it's just like, this is Alma, she has Puerto Rican descent, Boricua, she's in the Bronx.

So I'm just really curious, as a fly-on-the-wall-type deal, what did these meetings look like when you are thinking about the episodes not just from the educational perspective but also just being like, how do we incorporate this is Alma's day-to-day, she eats ropa vieja, she does this, she dances Bomba.

Like, how do those meetings look like?

- So they really come from the lives of all of us.

"Alma's Way," like, our production team, is incredibly diverse.

Much of this comes from Sonia's life.

So Sonia was born in the United States.

She, like Alma, didn't grow up speaking Spanish, she learned as she got older.

She didn't go to the island until she was about 10, and that's how she became, you know, reconnected to her heritage and experience.

And we see in the special that Alma goes to Puerto Rico and she's unable to communicate with her grandmother.

She has to go and get some help from her mom.

So she knows some Spanish, but she's still learning, and that's all lived history and experience.

Rodney, who is one of my favorite writers on the show, wrote a beautiful story called Junior's Story.

And Alma and Junior go to Andre's mother's bookstore, which is called Ogban Books because Andre's mother is Nigerian American, and I'm Nigerian American.

And her name is Nea Omenma, and she's Igbo, and I'm Yoruba.

But I was like, "Hey, we should have a Nigerian character," and we made it happen.

And there's a Haitian author at the bookstore, and she's Haitian because my mother is Haitian.

And Rodney came up with a beautiful book, and she says to Alma and Junior, "When I was younger, I didn't see kids who looked like me.

So when I grew up, I decided to write stories about things that I wanted to write stories about."

And that's literally what every one of us on the production team is doing in this show.

And we've created a safe space that has allowed all of us to put all of ourselves into this.

So it doesn't even matter necessarily who the characters are.

Junior with the tooth tickets, that's from our head writer Jorge Aguirre's sons making up tooth tickets when they lost their first tooth.

[attendee laughs] And they came, and they were like, "We're gonna have a tooth show!"

Gosh, there's so many, there's just so, oh Sonny Soto's episode.

He is a Latin pop musician who comes back to the Bronx, and Mami was his music teacher.

That story was taken from the fact that Sonia's cousin Eddie Gua Gua Rivera, whom Eddie Mambo is named after, was a famous salsa bassist, and he and Willie Colon came and played a concert in her living room where she says the end of the trombone was hitting one wall and the the slide was hitting the other end of the wall.

It was tiny, but it was during a New Year's Eve party, a parranda, which we also have an episode on Nochebuena.

All of that is taken from real life experience and all of us giving each other the space to say, "This is what we want kids to see because we didn't get a chance to see it."

So.

[attendees clapping] I could talk about this ad nauseam, find Rodney, he's been such a beautiful help with making these stories come to life.

But yeah, the representation is from us.

- [Carol] Well, thank y'all so much.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

[attendees clapping]