Another Tale of Hansel and Gretel

🎯 Educator Guide: “The Chocolate House”

💭 What is this story about?

Jacinta and Ulises build a cardboard house so they can act out Hansel and Gretel with their grandma. They have fun painting candy on it, but when it’s time to pick roles, both of them want to be the one who saves the other, and neither one wants to be stuck waiting. While they argue, the first raindrops start falling on the set they made together.

🧠 What will children learn?

• Cooperation can be enjoyed while creating something together, before any difficulty comes up.
• Expressing preferences lets each person share which part of a game matters to them.
• Listening becomes visible when a request leads us to change what we’re doing.
• Problem-solving includes noticing what’s happening and adjusting an action together with someone else.
• Caring for what we share can grow out of affection for something several people have made together.

🤝 How can you keep this conversation going?

• “What would you like to build with someone, and which part would you want to do?”
• “What ideas can you come up with when two people want the same role in a game?”
• “What have you made with someone else that you wanted to take care of or keep afterward?”
• “How would you like to ask for help if something you’re doing gets tricky?”

🎯 Educational approach

The story makes room both for the joy of creating together and for the wish to be the star of a game. It places cooperation in everyday actions: saying what you’d prefer, responding to a request, and adjusting what you’re doing when a concrete problem comes up. Reading together makes it possible to explore those choices and children’s own experiences, with an adult who is right there to guide the conversation without looking for one right answer or treating disagreement as misbehavior.