Sesame Workshop and V-me co-produce Plaza Sésamo Content.

For the first time ever, Sesame Workshop and V-me have co-produced original Spanish content for Plaza Sésamo in the U.S., which will debut on July 19 when V-me premieres a new season of the award-winning children’s series. Plaza Sésamo is the original Spanish language production of Sesame Street .

The new content includes ten live action films designed to reflect the diversity of the Hispanic community in the U.S., as well as reinforce “healthy habits” — fun ways to exercise and stay active outdoors, eat nutritional foods, maintain important hygiene habits, and build relationships with family and friends to promote a healthy social-emotional lifestyle. The films are set in a variety of locations such as in the home, at the beach and the Everglades.

Production of the Plaza Sésamo original content for V-me was made possible in part by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Through another feature of the new season of Plaza Sésamo, viewers will see their beloved friends Pancho and Lola on their first international journey to Colombia as they search for exotic fruits while learning how to keep their hearts and bodies healthy. These unique segments are supplemented with a series of live action films and animations produced in Colombia, that highlight the healthy heart curriculum driven by Sesame Workshop’s partnership with Mt. Sinai Hospital and the World Heart Federation. In addition, short films from Bolivia and Paraguay feature young children taking part in daily and cultural activities.

The new content created is currently airing exclusively on V-me, where Plaza Sésamo is featured daily in the preschool block V-me Niños, now available in over 60 million US TV homes, including 72% of all Hispanic TV homes.

The new Plaza Sésamo content is the latest in a series of collaborations between Sesame Workshop and V-me since V-me’s launch in 2007. These include Spanish-language co-productions of When Parents are Deployed 1 & 2 (Cuando el servicio llama: Vivencias de Familias Militares and Cambios: Vivencias de Familias Militares ), the US Hispanic premiere of Panwapa, and as of May 2010 the availability of select Plaza Sesamo DVD’s – Lola’s Adventures (Lola Aventuras) and Welcome Spring (Bienvenida la primavera) online at VmeTV.com/Shop