Baby Storytime

Baby storytime came as a complete and utter surprise to me. A week before the storytime session started (and two weeks after I had arrived at my new library), a co-worker had to pass baby storytime off to me for both the spring and summer session. For the spring session, I went off of her plan since I didn’t have a lot of time. For the summer session, I grew more comfortable figuring things out. I relied heavily on Brooke’s blog and Kendra’s blog and Jbrary to learn songs that I didn’t know or to substitute songs/activities I was more comfortable with. If I changed something from spring to summer session, I will note it in the write-up.

Opening

Welcome & Guidelines
Hi everyone! My name is Miss Katie and I’ll be leading the baby storytime class this session. I’d like to go over some guidelines with you before we begin. Because I’m used to working with small people, I understand that accidents happen — I have tissue, wipes, and paper towels on both sides of the room in case of accidents. Bathrooms are located on either side of the storytime room, please feel free to use the bathrooms and supplies as needed.

We all want storytime to be a positive experience. If your child isn’t feeling up to storytime, please take them outside of the storytime room. You can always come back in after they’ve calmed down or you can always try storytime on another day. I’m okay with movement, but I would like to point out two areas that I need you to keep your child clear of: the area by the door and the area right in front of me. They don’t have to sit down, but they do have to leave these spaces.

Since this is a lapsit program, babies may not be able to fully participate in the motions and fingerplays during songs. I’ll provide modifications, but please do what is most comfortable for you and your child. Lastly, I use Baby Kate to model for you how to interact. Baby Kate weighs next to nothing so my gestures will be much larger than yours need to be. Again, do what is comfortable for you and your child.

Name Fingerplay
I learned this from the co-worker I took over for at baby time. I loved it so much that I also brought it to toddler storytime!

Everyone introduces themselves one at a time. Together, we hold up our hands and trace our fingers as the group says each child’s name five times. Parents can run their finger around each of their child’s finger or tap each finger or touch each finger — whatever the child is comfortable with. Before we say the child’s name for the fifth time, we say “OOPS!” and on the “OOPS!”, I flick my finger up before going back to trace the last finger. (At “OOPS”, some parents give their child a tickle.) So it sounds like this: parent/child says “Hi, my name is Barb and this is Katie” and the group says “Katie (thumb), Katie (pointer), Katie (middle), Katie (ring), OOPS!, Katie (pinky).”

This gives each child a chance to clap for themselves. It’s a great way for the whole group to learn names together and it doesn’t take too long with my classes capped at twenty baby/parent pairs.

You can watch me demo the fingerplay in this video:

Opening Song
I used “Hands Are Clapping” which is to the tune of “Skip to My Lou”:
Hands are clapping, clap, clap, clap
Hands are clapping, clap, clap, clap
Hands are clapping, clap, clap, clap
Clap your hands, my darling!
Toes are tapping, fingers are wiggling, eyes are hiding “peek-a-boo”

Program

Typically, my library’s has a lot of extension activities planned, as well as 3-4 board books to work with a theme. We are lucky enough to have multiple board book sets, with 25 copies to pass out. My co-worker had planned to use different flannelboards, but for me it didn’t work in baby storytime. The only flannelboard I used is “The Shape Game” to introduce the theme.

Closing

Rhyme
I used Melissa‘s “This Is Big, Big, Big” as the beginning of my closing routine. I also use it in toddler time!

Song
Our closing song is also from my co-worker’s plan: “With My Little Hands”
With my little hands I go clap, clap, clap
With my little feet I go tap, tap, tap
With my little arms I wave bye, bye, bye
With my little legs I kick high, high, high
With my little eyes I play peek-a-boo
With my little mouth I say “I love you”

Bubbles
Young babies are fascinated with bubbles and older babies are using great muscles to reach bubbles and pop bubbles. It’s such a joy to watch them grow up and change how they interact with bubbles.

And that’s the bones of every baby program. I had a wonderful set of plans to ease into babytime and I felt very thankful to be taken care of so thoroughly.

In my write-ups, I’ll talk about what I actually used and what worked/didn’t. I’ll also likely talk about why I didn’t use some materials. As always, if I did a theme multiple times, I’ll write about all the sessions in the same post. Look for a weekly baby storytime update starting next week!