Virtual Storytime: Emotions

For information on how virtual storytimes work at my library, please visit this post.

Materials

Books

Hooray for Hat! by Brian Won*
I Feel Teal by Lauren Rille
I’m Worried by Michael Ian Black
The Rabbit Listened by Cori Doerrfeld*

Extension Activities

Flannelboard: Go Away Big Green Monster

Flannelboard: Pete the Cat & His Four Groovy Buttons*

Prop Sticks: If You’re Happy and You Know It*

Props: Song Cube*

Planning

This was my first virtual storytime, back in June of 2020. I definitely wanted to kick off virtual storytimes with a discussion about emotions and feelings. I wanted to support the kids and their caregivers during this time of upheaval, and to hopefully give caregivers ways to continue to talk openly about emotions and feelings.

I also chose to use The Rabbit Listened because it features a non-gendered child. It was important to me that every child could see themselves in Taylor.

How It Went

Have I ever mentioned that Hooray for Hat! is one of my favorite books? I probably have and it should come as no surprise that it was a great hit over Zoom. I really loved seeing my friends’ GRUMPY faces, as well as their hands raised as we said “Hooray for hat!” I had some children turn their cameras on especially so I could see their GRUMPY faces.

For our first flannelboard, I did Pete the Cat and asked the kids to roll their hands along with me and to clap for the “POP!” portion. This was a great way to monitor if everyone was following along with me. I don’t know if they sang Pete’s buttons song since our Zooms are muted, but they definitely rolled and popped along!

During The Rabbit Listened, I took the time to ask a lot of questions and brought the book close to the webcam so the kids could really see what Taylor’s face looked like and the kids could talk about how they thought Taylor was feeling. I invited them to participate in several ways: they could tell the grown-up in the room with them, they could type the name of the emotion, or they could make the face.

Lastly, we finished up with “If You’re Happy and You Know It”, with more emotion face-making encouragement and a flannelboard telling of Go Away Big Green Monster which I asked the kids to use their arms when we repeated “GO AWAY!”

Since this was my first, I planned a lot of different ways for the kids to interact with the materials and with me — I had NO IDEA how they would adapt to storytime on a screen. I’m very pleased to say that they were engaged and attentive and that we really had a meaningful storytime together. I definitely had to cry out my emotions — both sad and happy — after we had closed the Zoom room for that day.