A family blessed with both a toddler and an HBO subscription will milk the tube to rock the tot with “Sesame Street,” now in its forty-eighth season. Two years ago, as it entered its forty-sixth season, the show changed its distribution model so that new episodes play on pay cable for nine months before flowing to local public broadcasting. Appearing on Saturdays at 9 A.M., the new episodes have the brassy splendor of “The Bugs Bunny Show” and the institutional dignity of a secular Sabbath school. The move to HBO has not harmed the institution, liberal guilt about the “gentrification” of the block notwithstanding. That said, new parents are advised that recent episodes run a peppy half-hour, in contrast to the sixty-minute servings of yore.

“Sesame Street” perpetually evolves as guided by trending theories of education: when the game-show host Guy Smiley ambushes Bert into a round of “Estimation Crustacean,” which is a math quiz contested by a shellfish, the scene reflects current thinking on teaching arithmetic. Also, this noble program tailors its tone and content for its audience as elastically as the most craven network talk show. Because fewer adults actually pay attention to “Sesame Street” these days, the series has turned down the dial on pop-culture parodies, such as one spoofing “Mad Men,” from 2009, with an advertising executive thanking his staff for making him happy. (“Good work, sycophants,” the Muppet Don Draper says.) And “Sesame Street” responds to media technology at a deliberate pace. Last year saw the début of Smartie, an animated yellow phone, as a new sidekick for Elmo. “Look it up” is her catchphrase. Elmo, of course, converses with Smartie in his distinctive falsetto, a voice that, with practice, an adult can train himself not to really hear. Smartie, too, is slightly annoying. But I would trust her to babysit.

The most recent renovation of the Sesame Street courtyard, which is properly called the Arbor, involves one bold reconfiguration of the landscape. There now exists a view of a bridge. The shape of its tower suggests the Verrazano-Narrows, but its color apes the “international orange” of the Golden Gate Bridge, and it angles into the background as if Hooper’s Store is selling milkshakes in Dumbo. I find the bridge slightly disconcerting, and I can point to textual evidence that Oscar the Grouch shares my concerns. And yet it opens up a hospitable space. The bridge reaches out to expand the sense of place and extend a generous welcome. This land is your land, to the New York Island.

The big thing right now on “Sesame Street” is a curriculum to teach children kindness, which is excellent, because the world is in dire need of more kindness, and those little bastards need to shape up. The Season 48 début is a Thanksgiving episode. Julia, a Muppet girl with autism, sets the table while saying, “Set table, set table.” Leon Bridges and Elmo sing about being thankful for friends. Prairie Dawn, who has always been uptight, expands her horizons as Rosita brought her abuela’s tamales and frijoles to the meal. We learn to respect tradition, and diversities, and the diversity of traditions. “My tradition just happens to be birdseed cake. Or anything with birdseed,” Big Bird says.

Plus, Cookie Monster bakes an apple pie with an elegant lattice top. This season also brings a new franchise, titled “Cookie Monster’s Foodie Truck,” where the charismatic blue glutton acquaints himself with the farm-to-table scene. Each five-minute segment finds Cookie Monster operating out of a charming mobile restaurant, assisted by a new Muppet scene partner named Gonger, who is fuchsia, with whiskers like friendly muttonchops. Gonger has an unusual accent and a background in hospitality, having originated on “The Furchester Hotel,” a “Sesame Street” co-production with BBC’s preschool network. Gonger owns a gong. Gonger’s gong is by no means as exciting as Gonzo’s, but it rings well enough when he bangs it at chow time.

In each segment, a human child places a food-delivery order via video chat, beaming in on a tablet computer. For instance, Cookie and Gonger receive an order from two girls, identical twins, who politely request a pizza with mushrooms on one half and pineapple on the other. (“Even though we look the same, we like different things” is the message.) The monsters, seeing that the pantry is bare, visit a farm (also through the magic of video chat). They get the pineapple and make the pizza and deliver it by catapult. This happens again and again. The pantry is always bare because Cookie is always eating, forever confessing. “Me may have eaten pineapple.” “Me ate cranberry muffin.” “Me used last of oatmeal to make oatmeal cookies.” Me have eaten the plums that were in the under-counter refrigerator.

About ten years ago, as “Sesame Street” began to place a new emphasis on healthy eating habits, Cookie Monster hit the talk-show circuit to stress his moderate approach to cookies as “a sometimes food.” Just last season, he was working hard “on his self-regulation skills,” as press materials phrased it; in a recurring segment titled “Smart Cookies,” Cookie Monster fought crime alongside a team of sentient baked goods without ever nibbling at them. On “Foodie Truck,” though his diet is round, his appetite is unleashed. Thus far, he has received tours of an apple orchard, a grape vineyard, an oatmeal factory, and a cranberry bog, in addition to the pineapple farm. The segment is next due to cover avocados, and I am rooting for Cookie to binge not only on Muppet avocado toast but also on actual millennials.