- We are opening our own pizza restaurant.

We will write a menu together, and then practice being a service worker by taking orders and taking care of the customers in the Read, Write, ROAR!

Pizzeria.

Let's go.

Read, Write, ROAR!

- [Narrator] This program is made possible in part by the W.K.

Kellogg Foundation, Elaine Stern Foundation, the Max M. & Marjorie S. Fisher Foundation, Donald and Mary Kosch, Lauren and Phillip Fisher, the state of Michigan, and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

(playful music) (lion roars) - Hi, children, welcome to Read, Write, ROAR!

Can you all try that with me?

- [All] Read, Write, ROAR!

- Today, we are going to do something exciting that involves food that I know some of you like to eat.

Pizza.

- [Child] Is that just a paper?

- It's just a paper pizza right now, but we're gonna sing a song about pizza, and it goes like this.

♪ Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, pizza man ♪ ♪ Bake me a pizza as fast as you can ♪ ♪ Roll it, toss it, sprinkle it with cheese ♪ ♪ Put it in the oven for my friends and me ♪ Now let's do it quietly.

♪ Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, pizza man ♪ ♪ Bake me a pizza as fast as you can ♪ ♪ Roll it, toss it, sprinkle it with cheese ♪ ♪ Put it in the oven for my friends and me ♪ - Now one more time, louder, get ready.

♪ Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, pizza man ♪ ♪ Bake me a pizza as fast as you can ♪ ♪ Roll it, toss it, sprinkle it with cheese ♪ ♪ Put it in the oven for my friends and me ♪ (mellow music) - Hello.

Guess what we're gonna do today?

We are going to make a pizzeria.

It's gonna be the Read, Write, ROAR!

Pizzeria.

Have you ever been to a pizza shop before?

- Yeah!

- Yeah?

What do you like to get on your pizza?

- Sauce and cheese.

That's all I like.

- [Ms. Colon] You just like sauce and cheese.

What about you, Aurora?

- Sauce, cheese, and pepperoni.

- [Ms. Colon] And pepperoni.

Layla, what do you like on your pizza?

- Pepperoni and sauce.

- And sauce.

I like to have vegetables on my pizza.

And it sounds like we all like something different, so we have to create a menu for our pizzeria.

And a menu will be able to tell people what they can get to use, or what ingredients they can order for their pizza.

So I'm gonna give you all a menu, and at the top there's a space for you to write your name so that we know that this is gonna be your menu.

So, go ahead and write your name right at the top so that it says- - I'm gonna write mine up here.

- You write yours up here, and I have one up here.

I'm gonna write my name, for Ms. Colon.

- That's what I made.

- That's what you made, all right.

So now, do you see these little boxes or squares?

This is where we're gonna put an image or an illustration, a picture of what people might be able to order, and the first thing that I would like to use is pepper.

Have you ever had peppers on your pizza?

- No.

- No.

- No, I never like peppers.

- [Ms. Colon] You never like peppers?

- I don't like peppers.

- [Ms. Colon] You don't like peppers?

- They're spicy.

- They could be a little spicy, but I'm gonna give each of you a pepper because you might not like it, but if we ask somebody else, like if I order off your menu, I'm gonna want a pepper.

Then I'll give you pepperoni.

So, put your pepper in the box and then we have to write the word pepper.

What do you think pepper starts with?

Let's listen to this sound, P. - P, P, P!

- P, so let's make a P. A P has a straight line down, and then it has a curve at the top.

- I already know to make all letters.

- Oh, you do?

Oh, well this is gonna be easy for you.

Well, what's the next sound you hear then?

P, eh, eh.

- A.

- A.

- [Ms. Colon] A?

- A.

- You hear A?

Great, let's make an A.

- Uh, uh, uh.

- Uh.

- Uh, O.

- [Ms. Colon] O?

- Yeah.

- Ta, ta, ta, ta.

- [Ms. Colon] Well, listen, let's say the word pepper.

Er, what sound do you hear at the end?

- R!

- R, so this is pepper.

So, when you read this, you'll know that we're selling peppers as part of our pizza topping.

What else should we add to it?

What's another topping?

You said you liked?

- Pepperoni.

- [Ms. Colon] Pepperoni.

- With cheese and sauce.

- Pepperoni with cheese and sauce, so let's- - And I want sauce, too.

- All right, so if we drew a pepperoni, what shape would a pepperoni be?

- Me too, I would like sauce.

- Circle.

- Circle, all right, and then we'll put sauce on there, so let's draw a circle for our pepperoni.

And then let's say pepperoni, what sound do we hear again?

- Pepper.

- Pepperoni.

- P, P, P. - P, P, P. - P, another P, so that's gonna be a straight line, so a long line.

Yep, go all the way down, make it touch this line right here.

- P, P, pepperoni.

- And then a curve.

All right, Brent, what sound do you hear next?

If you say P, eh.

- Ah, A.

- Eh.

- A.

- [Ms. Colon] You hear A?

Okay, let's- - I hear A, too.

- You hear A, too, so let's make an A.

Now, pep, P. - Yeah, it's right here.

- Yeah, you have a P at the beginning, and then let's see if you hear another sound.

P, pep, P. - P!

- P!

- Yeah, there's another P. This time, I'm gonna make a lowercase P, and that's a straight line down, and then it has a curve.

- I did it.

- Pepper, rah.

- Another P for pepperoni.

- Another P, and then do you hear another sound?

Pepper, rah.

- Vah, V. - [Ms. Colon] What makes a rah?

- V!

- Not vah, make a rah.

- W. - [Ms. Colon] Rah, for like river or- - R!

- R. Now, R is a straight line down with a little curve at the top.

- [Aurora] I already- - You did.

- I drawed a big R. - You did a uppercase R and mine was a lowercase R. Pepper-oh, what letter says oh?

- O.

- O, and that's a circle.

And then you said pepperoni.

N, what makes a N sound?

- Near.

- Yeah, for like nickel and nose.

- E. - [Ms. Colon] Nah, ah, N. - E, E. - N. - N. N is a straight line down, and then it curves.

Well then, the last sound pepperoni, E. - E. - E, can you make an E?

An E is a curve, and then it has a straight line.

Before we get to practice being servers, we should go over our menu one more time.

Let's read what we are serving.

- Pepper.

- Pepper.

- Pepper, and then- - Pepperoni.

- Pepperoni and?

- Pizza.

- Pizza.

- Pizza.

- All right, great writing, everybody.

(mellow music) I am so excited our pizzeria is finally open.

We made a menu and now we get to act out the roles of the people in a restaurant.

Brent is going to be the chef.

That means he will prepare the pizza that we order.

Aurora, you're gonna be the server, so you're gonna take our order.

And Layla, you and I are gonna be the customers.

So, let's look at the menu we had yesterday.

What do we want on our pizza?

- Pepperoni.

- Pepperoni.

- And mushrooms?

- Yeah.

- Ooh, and mushrooms.

So, Server Aurora, we would like pepperoni and mushrooms.

So, we'd like the pepperoni, you can put it right here.

- [Aurora] Okay.

I'll get pepperoni started.

- All right.

Oh, you need a P for pepperoni.

Yep, rah, then a rah.

Yep, make a R. O.

- [Aurora] Okay, I'm almost done.

- You're almost done.

N, what makes that N?

- [Aurora] N. - Yep, N. And an E, for pepperoni.

You turned it right into an E. All right, so we'll get a pepperoni, and then what's the next topping we'd like?

- [Aurora] Ma, ma, mushrooms, so I'll get E. - Mushroom.

Yes, 'cause she knows mushroom starts with a M. - And it starts with ma, ma, mushroom.

- Mushroom.

All right, we started the M for mushrooms, and you wanna put the mushroom right here?

- [Aurora] Okay.

- Okay, get a sticky.

All right, thank you for taking our order.

- You're welcome.

- All right, now she's gonna deliver it to the chef and Chef Brent will prepare our pizza.

- Okay, pepperoni and mushrooms.

- All right, he's gonna find the pepperonis and the mushrooms.

- Now, then you're gonna order next.

- Oh, what are we gonna order next?

Shall we have two slices?

- [Layla] Yeah.

- [Aurora] Or would you like one slice?

- [Layla] Two slices.

- [Ms. Colon] Two slices.

- [Aurora] So what would you order?

What topping?

- [Layla] Mushroom and pepperoni.

- [Aurora] Yeah, but there's nothing here.

- [Ms. Colon] Hmm, what other topping?

- [Aurora] There's no other mushroom or pepperoni or tomato?

- Oh, there's no, hmm.

Well, sometimes, we did, we added some additional toppings, 'cause you're right, when we made our menu, we only had peppers, pepperoni and pizza.

And then we talked about additional toppings that we might want, so we added additional toppings later.

- [Brent] There you go.

- Oh, thank you.

Oh, it's time to serve us.

Oh, she's gonna serve our pizza.

- Here's your pizza.

- All right, we have our pizza.

And what toppings did we get on there?

- Mushrooms and pepperoni.

- He was quite generous, count how many we have.

- Now here's some... - How many toppings?

- One, two, three.

- Now you guys can eat it up.

Cut it up with some delicious knife.

- Oh, thank you so much.

I tell you, the service here is top-notch.

All right, I'm gonna take a little bite.

Tell the chef it's delicious.

(mellow music) Daily opportunities for your child to write are important to their literacy development.

Dramatic play and make-believe time are perfect opportunities to practice literacy skills.

A pretend restaurant presents many opportunities to practice literacy skills with early learning.

Open a restaurant in your home.

Early readers and writers can start by making a menu of what will be served.

Then they can present the menu to members of the household.

As everyone selects their meal choices, the child can write them down.

This will give the child a purpose and an audience; two things that motivate children to write.

Sometimes, we worry that everything our children write needs to be spelled correctly, and that all letters need to be formed perfectly.

This is definitely not true.

It's fine if everything isn't spelled correctly and if the letters are not formed correctly.

You might see scribbles or even letter-like shapes.

What matters is that your child is putting ideas down on paper.

What are other ideas you might have for your child to practice writing every day?

Maybe your child has a few more ideas to add to the list.

(mellow music) What fun we had today at our pizzeria, we made pizzas.

Aurora, you were the?

Do you remember?

- Waitress.

- You were the waitress or the server.

And then what did you- - Or server.

- Brent, tell me about what you did.

- I was the- - Chef.

- The chef.

- You were the chef.

And Layla, you and I were customers.

What did you order on your pizza?

- Pepperoni and mushrooms.

- Pepperonis and mushrooms.

- [All] See you next time on Read, Write, ROAR!

- [Narrator] This program is made possible in part by the W.K.

Kellogg Foundation, Elaine Stern Foundation, the Max M. & Marjorie S. Fisher Foundation, Donald and Mary Kosch, Lauren and Phillip Fisher, the state of Michigan, and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

(upbeat music)