Bugs!

Two weeks ago, I did my afternoon storytime for 3-7 year olds. I really love this storytime, but in particular this week was amazing. The amazing theme of bugs was a gigantic thumbs-up across the board.

Started off storytime with “Little Bea” by Daniel Roode.

As promised, I used this one again for bugs storytime. This one was a great way to open up storytime and my favorite part this time was the knock-knock joke page because my 1st graders cracked up. After the story was done, I brought out our bee puppet to do this rhyme:

Puppet Rhyme: “Bumble Bee”
Bumblebee, bumblebee, landing on my nose.
Bumblebee, bumblebee, now he’s on my toes.
On my arms, on my legs, on my elbows.
Bumblebee, bumblebee he lands and then he goes.
Credit: Mrs. Jones – Insects

I did the rhyme with the bee, and I asked the kids to pretend they had bees too. Bee buzzed away after the rhyme and then, I picked up “I Love Bugs!” by Emma Dodd.

Dodd’s book are just perfect storytime gems. And I love reading them! This is the second time I’ve been able to read “I Love Bugs!” this year, and it just gets better each time I use it.

Time for my favorite bug though — butterflies!

I started off with my “Very Hungry Caterpillar” flannelboard. This is the third time I’ve used the flannel since making it last April and every time it is a HUGE hit with parents and kids. Kids who know the story love seeing it come to life on my “magic” board. (One of my little boys calls it the magic board. I love that.)

Then it was on to a song:

Song & Puppet: “Flutter, Flutter”
Flutter, flutter butterfly, floating in the spring sky
Floating by for all to see, floating by so merrily
Flutter, flutter butterfly, floating in the spring sky
Credit: Best Kids Book Site

I used the song and puppet in my Orange Storytime this spring, and have this memorized as one of my go-to activities if I have more wiggling than listening. It was an easy fit into this theme!

Next, I read “Butterfly, Butterfly” by Petr Horacek.

This was such a great book. It had great cut-outs and a lovely pop-up spread at the end of the book, and doesn’t just focus on butterflies. Since it’s not as well-known as some other books I love sharing it with a new audience if only for the delighted gasps when Lucy finally finds her butterfly again.

But it was time to get up and move! So, I did “The Ants Go Marching.”

Song: “The Ants Go Marching”
The ants go marching one by one, hurrah! Hurrah!
The ants go marching one by one, hurrah! Hurrah!
The ants go marching one by one,
The little one stops to suck his thumb,
And they all go marching down, to the ground, to get out of the rain.
(two, tie his shoe; three, climb a tree; four, shut the door; five, take a dive)
Credit: Childhood

While I know all the verses to ten, I only went to five so that no one got bored with the song. Three of my little boys stopped marching in place and started marching in a circle on the rug. It was absolutely precious.

My next book was a choice recommended by Sarah and Kelly, “Can You Make a Scary Face?” by Jan Thomas.

Talk about an instant hit! This book had every single person in the room laughing and playing along. I’m so glad that I added it to the storytime this week! It was on to a quick song to settle the crowd back down:

Song: “Insects All Around”
Lady bugs and butterflies
Buzzing bees up in the sky
Teeny, tiny little ants
Crawling up and down the plants
Many insects can be found
In the sky and on the ground
Credit: Preschool Rainbow

And then onto a book that I distinctly remember reading in 1st grade as a unit week, “The Very Busy Spider” by Eric Carle.

It was very hard choosing just one Eric Carle bug book, but since this one was the one from my childhood, I really wanted to share it with my storytime kids. And it has the bonus of having animal noises in it, which we all know is a clear storytime winner.

And what bug storytime would be complete without “Itsy Bitsy Spider?”

Once we were done sharing stories, the kids went on to the table to make our craft from Oriental Trading.

The best part of this craft was that it came with glowsticks for the kids to put inside their firefly jars to make them glow. Another great storytime day!

May 16, 2011 7 Comments Short URL, Family Storytime

ALSC: Olivia Storytime!

newalscblog

Wondering how to do a special storytime program around a favorite character? I posted over at the ALSC blog about doing just that for Olivia! Click on over to see the post.

May 14, 2011 0 Comments Short URLALSC Post

Flannel Friday: Olivia

To read more about my Olivia program, head over to the ALSC blog where I’m posting today!

Anyway, I did this Olivia program for my 3-8 year olds this past month and I found up making a flannelboard to do with the program!

I got the templates for this one from Nick Jr. here. I didn’t really have a script for the flannel, but I read on Wikipedia about a short clip that they did on the television shoe where Olivia’s baby brother won’t stop crying and everyone brings him toys to calm him down. Naturally, all that William wants is the family’s cat and Olivia brings it to him to save the day.

It’s a quick flannelboard in terms of story, and I made little baby toys to go with it but didn’t have them pictured. Oh well, I think I made a rattle, blanket, duck, teddy bear, bottle, and ball.

The hardest part with this one is painting all the pig mouths!

May 13, 2011 4 Comments Short URLFlannels

Play and Pretend!

Last Thursday was my regular weekly storytime — and I had choosen to do my theme with play and pretend, choosing all different kinds of books.

First up, I read “Knuffle Bunny” by Mo Willems.

I don’t know if you know this about me, but I adore Mo Willems. Like practically worship at his feet. His most recent release “Amanda and Her Alligator” has made me reconsider my “no reptiles/alligator/crocodile storytimes EVER” stance. (I’m terrified of snakes and thus, don’t like the idea of devoting a storytime to them!)

Anyway, “Knuffle Bunny” was my first Willems book and will always remain my favorite. And it doesn’t hurt that the kids adored that title, too. After we had a brief talk about our favorite toys, I read “Joey and Jet” by James Yang.

This book was another book I found while shelf-reading our collection. It’s a great book about a dog who chases a ball, with lots of prepositions. The kids were very involved in this storytime, and I had one little boy who kept repeating what I read after me, quietly to himself. Such a great literacy moment!

Then, I told the kids my favorite outside toys was kites — perfect segue into the flannel:

Flannelboard: “Five Little Kites”
One little kite in the sky so blue,
Along came another, then there were two.
Two little kites flying high above me,
Along came another, then there were three.
Three little kits, just watch them soar,
Along came another, then there were four.
Four little kites, so high and alive,
Along came another, then there were five.
Five little kits dancing across the sky,
What a sight to see, way up so high!
Credit: Step By Step — Kite Theme

Afterwards, we discussed the kite colors, practiced counting in English and in Spanish, and waved goodbye to each kite before I pulled out “Not a Stick” by Antoinette Portis.

This is another author and series that I adore. I love that this is basically a build-in guessing game, and that the kids and I talked throughout the book about what the stick was going to be. I also love the “not a stick!” refrain that my kids naturally started shouting with me.

After this book, I had an epiphany to just let them pretend and bounce around in storytime. I called out different actions from the book, and the kids galloped around the room, etc. Then, we did a favorite of mine from library school:

Action Rhyme/Bounce: “The Noble Duke of York”
The noble Duke of York, he had ten thousand men
He marched them up to the top of the hill, and marched them down again.
And when you’re up, you’re up. And when you’re down, you’re down.
And when you’re only halfway up, you’re neither up nor down.

I always do this one several times, the last time super fast. This exhausts the kids and they are ready to sit back down for another book, which for this storytime was, “Higher, Higher” by Leslie Patricelli.

This is such a simple concept book: girl on swing, father pushes her, she keeps calling out “higher, higher.” The kids eagerly “read” this one out loud with me. It was really funny when she met her space alien friend who is also on a swing; the parents and kids were giggling pretty hard then. Then, I led the group in our session stretcher:

Fingerplay: “Itsy Bitsy Spider”

And on to the last book of the day, “Playground Day” by Jennifer J. Merz.

I’ve used this book before and it was a hit. This time, I had a cranky little boy call out that animals were stupid (Mom quickly took him out of the room) but that broke the spell for all the kids. No one wanted to guess the animals after that. Luckily, I skipped ahead a few pages and ended storytime by singing “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” I’m just glad the song went over well.

For our kite, we revisited the kites from earlier and made this kit from Oriental Trading:

Ta-da! (I really loved this craft.)

May 11, 2011 10 Comments Short URL, Family Storytime

Green!

And another catch-up for storytime posts — this time it’s my daycare series on colors. (Previously, we’ve already done Red, Orange, and Yellow.)

I opened up storytime with a crowd-pleaser, “Where is the Green Sheep?” by Mem Fox.

This book was seriously made for storytime. With great rhymes, a driving task (find the green sheep), and a wonderful refrain for the children to say with you — it’s always a perfect fit!

[Side story: my three-year-old twin cousins came to my sheep storytime this winter and one of the girls, when I saw them next, looked at me and said, “We read stories about sheep. Where is the green sheep?” AWESOME. Storytime retention!]

After the kids found the green sheep, I went ahead with a modified version of “Baa Baa Black Sheep” that Abby suggested a long time ago, using different sheep colors. And somehow…I wound up finding Mel’s pop stick puppets and made my own to go with the song.

Next up, I asked the kids to name a bunch of green things, and one of the first things named was grass — direct segue into “In the Tall, Tall Grass” by Denise Fleming.

I love the bright green grass, and the many different kinds of bugs in this book! The kids enjoyed naming the different bugs, and I flipped back a few times through the book to rename some bugs. Then, we talked about things growing and that they’re green which led us to vegetables…and some peas:

Fingerplay: “Five Green Peas”
Five green peas in a peapod, pressed (make fist)
One grew, two grew, and so did all the rest (raise fingers one at a time)
They grew and grew and they did not stop (stretch fingers wide)
Till one day that peapod just had to go…POP! (clap)
Credit: Harris County Library

Followed by the adorable, “Little Pea” by Amy Krouse Rosenthal.

This book is always a big hit, and it remained so at this reading. It’s always a surprise for the kids to find out that Little Pea hates candy and loves his vegetables. This leads to a lot of laughs. My only sadness with this book is that it’s such a small book — someone please adapt it to a big book size so that it’s better equipped for storytime, please!

Now it was time for some green monsters to show up. I did my version of “Go Away Big Green Monster” by Ed Emberley on the flannelboard. This is a great participation story and I love doing it on the flannelboard so that the kids can shout away that scary old big green monster. Then, a little activity to get them settled back down:

Action Rhyme: “Monster, Monster”
Monster, monster, turn around
Monster, monster, touch the ground
Monster, monster, reach up high
Monster, monster, touch the sky
Monster, monster, touch your nose
Monster, monster, grab your toes
Monster, monster, touch your knees
Monster, monster, sit down please
(Which as we all know is just “Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear.”)

And then it was on to “Lizette’s Green Sock” by Catharina Valckx.

This was a very sweet story about a little duck who finds a green sock while walking one day and sets off to find its match. My kids are always very concerned where there is something missing in a story, and they pay close attention until the end to make sure that everything turns out all right.

Then it was time to shift gears to our last green animal of the day — frogs!

Started off with a flannel version of “Five Green and Speckled Frogs.” And then a brief little puppet show:

Poem & Puppets: “The Frog on the Log”
There once was a green little frog, frog, frog
Who played in the wood on a log, log, log
A screech owl sitting in a tree, tree, tree
Came after the frog with a scree, scree, scree
When the frog heard the owl in a flash, flash, flash
He leaped in a pond with a splash, splash, splash!
Credit: Preschool Education

And then our last book for the day, “One Frog Sang” by Shirley Parentau.

The kids joined me in making all the different frog sounds in this book, and it was definitely a big hit. And then it was time for our flannel game, “Can We Find?” followed by our goodbye song, and then our craft!

Craft was from Busy Bee Kids Crafts. Everything was pre-cut; kids assembled using Glue Dots.

May 9, 2011 5 Comments Short URL, Outreach Storytime

Flannel Friday: 5 Clean and Dirty Pigs

So, I did a felt version of Mel’s Clean and Dirty Pigs for this Flannel Friday! Her clip art file is here, and the blog post for “Messy and Clean” storytime is here. A big thanks to Mel for such adorable ideas to work with!

(Tune: “Five Green and Speckled Frogs)
Five pigs so squeaky clean
Cleanest you’ve ever seen
Wanted to go outside and play
Oink! Oink!
One jumped into the mud
Landed with a big THUD
Then there were four clean squeaky pigs.

The back of my pigs all have sweet adorable clean pigs, but the dirty pigs were my favorite part.

Awww, precious messy piggy!

May 6, 2011 28 Comments Short URLFlannels

Garden!

Last week, my storytime theme was flowers and the garden!

I started off storytime with a great book, “My Garden” by Kevin Henkes.

This is a great book that would work for a lot of different themes — imagination is definitely one to remember for this book — but I did choose to use it for a bit of whimsy in this storytime. The kids really responded to the idea of this story, and once we were finished, I let them talk about what would happen in their gardens. One kid said he would grow monster trucks and dump trucks.

Next, I read “Up, Down, and Around” by Katherine Ayres.

This book has a great end refrain for repeating (first plant is up; second is down; third is around), and the kids jumped on it at first, but as they repeated it they got louder and louder until I’m pretty sure the book had no meaning for them anymore. Oh, well. Afterwards, I had to get their energy out, so I did this:

Action Rhyme: “Dig a Little Hole”
Dig a little hole (dig)
Plant a little seed (drop seed)
Pour a little water (pour)
Pull a little weed (pull up and throw away)
Chase a little bug (chasing motion)
Heigh-ho, there he goes! (shade eyes)
Give a little sunshine (make sun)
Grow a little rose (smell flower, eyes closed)
Credit: SurLaLune Storytime

And then, it was on to our next book, “Planting a Rainbow” by Lois Ehlert.

I did not get Lois Ehlert’s books as guaranteed hits, but let me tell you — the kids were CRAZY excited about this book. (And my daycare set LOVED “Waiting for Wings.”) I have now been properly schooled by the preschoolers. The kids and I alternated reading this one. I read the text on the page, and then they were allowed to call out a color. After that, I told them what flower name was next to that color. It worked out so well, I know that I had a great time reading it with them.

And then, after a brief introduction on how bees help flowers, I did our flannelboard: Six Little Bumblebees. (Text for the flannel can be found on my Yellow storytime plan.)

And then an awesome little fingerplay:

Fingerplay: “Watch It Bloom”
Here is a green leaf (hold out one palm)
And here is a green leaf (hold out other palm)
That, you see, makes two (hold up two fingers)
Here is a bud (cup hand together)
That makes it a flower (slowly open hands)
Watch it bloom for you (slowly open hands)
Credit: Perry Public Library

And my second to last book, “Zinnia’s Flower Garden” by Monica Wellington.

With this book, I got to talk a little bit about the names of flowers again since Zinnia is both the main character and the name of a flower. During this book (and after several choruses from the whole storytime about waiting for flowers), a little girl sighed and said, “Flower waiting is so hard.” Awww.

Afterwards, I did a puppet rhyme and guessing game, “There’s Something in My Garden,” that I got from SurLaLune Storytime and used at Bunny storytime earlier this spring. Everyone enjoyed themselves greatly during this activity!

And then, I got to whip out the song “Green Grass Grows All Around.” I sing and do motions to a version I learned during childhood, but you can find lots of versions on the Internet. Then it was on to the last book of the day, “Peek-A-Bloom” by Marie Torres Cimarusti.

The kids fell a little bit apart during this storytime, and I did wind up skipping the last page where readers can find all the animals (and daisy which is why I did it during garden storytime!) all over again. I just kind of said, “Hooray, you did it! The end!” and closed the book. After our goodbye song, it was on to the craft:

Flower rows! This was modified from CraftScope’s post. All I did for the kids was pre-glue (with Tacky Glue) the popsicle sticks down. Oh, and the leaves were a Martha Stewart craft punch from Michaels. Kids glued the cupcake liners and leaves with gluesticks and for the buttons, they used Glue Dots. Easy peasy, and the moms LOVED this one!

May 4, 2011 20 Comments Short URL, Family Storytime

Bunny Storytime!

Two weeks ago was “Snapshot Day” in Illinois libraries. It’s an advocacy campaign designed to show daily usage in a library. Participants are able to complete surveys about their library. For our part, Youth Services put together four activities that day. And of course, one was storytime. Because it was on a different day than my normal storytime hour, I had a smaller crowd of seven kids and our theme was bunnies.

Started off storytime with “Max’s Chocolate Chicken” by Rosemary Wells.

I grew up loving these books and still adore Rosemary Wells. This is a great one all about finding Easter eggs and getting candy and of course, Max being mischievous. I love how Ruby bosses him around, and so do the kids. (This was my one and only Easter book, and I asked parents before hand if they minded an Easter book being shared. I was ready to go with “Goodnight, Moon” instead if anyone had a problem.)

Next up, a new book by a favorite author — “What’s the Matter, Bunny Blue?” by Nicola Smee.

This is a great book for rhymes. Bunny Blue has lost her grandma, and she’s something of a mess. The kids laughed a lot when I was boo-hooing as Bunny Blue, but they kept insisting that we would find her grandma so I know that they weren’t worried. A great read-aloud book!

Then, we tried our own hands at locating a bunny. She was hiding under some Easter eggs. The kids got to practice naming colors, and since we were such a small crowd, I let everyone come up and take their own guesses off the board. (And I had the houses on stand-by for bunny to hide under if needed.)

Since the kids were a little wiggly after moving around, we did a quick rhyme to sit them back down:

Action Rhyme: “Little Rabbit”
I saw a little rabbit go hop, hop, hop
I told that little rabbit to stop, stop, stop
He wiggled his ears and crinkled his nose
And wiggled, wiggled, wiggled right down to his toes.
Credit: Modified from Preschool Education Music & Songs

Next up, I got to use a small board board because our crowd was smaller: “In My Meadow” by Sara Gillingham and Lorena Siminovich.

I actually bought this book to possibly make a flannelboard out of it. (I’ve loved this board book/puppet series since I first saw them in bookstores last year.) Well, time got away with me and it was still in my storytime drawer so I brought it down to use as a puppet moreso. The kids LOVED getting to pet bunny at the end of the book. And since it was so short, I read it twice!

Then, I did a little rhyme with puppets:

Puppets: “There’s Something In My Garden”
There’s something in my garden
Now what can it be?
There’s something in my garden
That I can’t really see.
Hear its funny sound…
RIBBIT RIBBIT RIBBIT
A frog is what I found!
RIBBIT RIBBIT RIBBT
(SQUEAK SQUEAK SQUEAK, A mouse is what I found! / CAW CAW CAW, A crow is what I found! / THUMP THUMP THUMP, A rabbit is what I found!)
Credit: SurLaLune Storytime

The kids were spot on with their guesses, but they were still very excited when I pulled out a puppet of the animal from behind my back. After, I read “What Does Bunny See?” by Linda Sue Park.

Another great guessing book, this time guessing what colors and flowers Bunny sees in her garden. Which brought us to our fingerplay:

Fingerplay: “Here is a Bunny”
Here is a bunny with ears so funny (hold up index and middle fingers for ears)
And here is his hole in the ground (make a circle with the other hand)
At the first sound he hears, he pricks up his ears (extend two fingers)
And hops in the hole in the ground (fingers jump into the hole)
Credit: Early Literature

And then our next book, “Bunny Fun” by Sarah Weeks.

This book was a fun deviation from a lot of the normal bunny books. This one was about a little bunny who was stuck inside on a rainy day and all the fun he came up with. My kids were very excited to see activities that they do (blocks, coloring, etc.). Super cute.

Fingerplay: “Little Bunny”
There was a little bunny who lived in the wood. (hold up two fingers)
He wiggled his ears as a good bunny should (wiggle on head)
He hopped by a squirrel. He hopped by a tree. (hop, hop)
He hopped by a duck. And he hopped by me. (hop, hop over fist)
He stared at the squirrel. He stared at the tree. (stare, stare)
He stared at the duck. But he made faces at me! (stare, make faces)
Credit: Texas State Library

That was a hysteric fingerplay. The kids could not stop laughing when we made funny faces. After a good laugh, I read our last book for the day, “Little White Rabbit” by Kevin Henkes.

It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of books by Kevin Henkes. So, it should come as no surprise that I love this newest one by him. It’s such a good calming, end-of-storytime read.

All that was left was our craft, which I had purchased from an Oriental Trading craft kit:

April 25, 2011 13 Comments Short URL, , , Family Storytime

Flannel Friday: Froggy Gets Dressed

This is a flannel all set to go for “Clothes” storytime towards the end of the month.

As with a ton of my flannels, I got this template from KizClub — Froggy template.

I love the way his jacket turned out even though I opted not to do the flannel striping. My co-worker really digs his socks. I am excited about using this one and I think the kids will really like Froggy. He’s just so cute!

April 22, 2011 6 Comments Short URLFlannels

Trucks!

A new storytime session, yay! I’m back for another six weeks of storytime fun. (Then another three week break, followed by my giant eight-week summer reading session. I’m looking at two to three storytimes a week…but I promise I’m only doing one theme.)

For this session, I switched up the welcome song. The kids liked “The More We Get Together” well enough, but it didn’t always serve to shake out their sillies before stories started. I’ve also added in an opening song to gently remind them of the storytime rules (sit down, hands to self). Hopefully they’ll take that to heart.

Welcome Song: Clap and Sing Hello!
We clap and sing hello.
We clap and sing hello.
With our friends at storytime,
We clap and sing hello.
(We wave and sing hello; we stomp and sing hello)
Credit: Storytime Songs

Opening Song: If You’re Ready…
If you’re ready for a story, take a seat
If you’re ready for a story, take a seat
Clap your hands and stomp your feet
Make your hands all nice and neat
If you’re ready for a story, take a seat
Credit: SJPL Hello & Goodbye Songs [Link no longer works]

And now, on to the actual theme of today’s storytime — TRUCKS. I’m going to be short on the summaries today, because basically the kids LOVED trucks and freaked out with JOY every time there was a new truck — eagerly shouting out the color of the truck, the name of the truck, where the truck was, that their mom/dad has a truck, if they wanted that truck, if that truck was smelly, etc. This was par for the course for the whole storytime and I see no need to keep rehashing it.

First up, “A Truck Goes Rattley-Bumpa” by Jonathan London.

Great book, love the noises and the variety of trucks in it. This is a good series, by the same author who does the Froggy books. Then, it was on to another variation of the Thumbkin fingerplay:

Fingerplay: “Where Are Trucks?” (Thumbkin)
Where is pick-up truck? Where is pick-up truck?
Here I am. Here I am.
How are you today, sir? Very well, I thank you.
Drive away. Drive away.
(Tow truck, dump truck, moving truck, firetruck)

For this one, I made little trucks flashcards (kind of) and popped them behind my back. The kids were really amused with this activity. I almost wish I had little toy trucks instead to really wow them.

Next up, “Trucks: Whizz! Zoom! Rumble!” by Patricia Hubbell.

We have all of Hubbell’s transportation books at the library and they go out all the time. A great series for kids obsessed with transportation.

Action Rhyme: Windshield Wiper
I’m a windshield wiper (bend arm at elbow and hold fingers up)
This is how I go (swing arm back and forth)
Back and forth, back and forth (continue motion)
In the rain and snow
Credit: Best Kids Book Site

This action rhyme was so much fun, we did it several times. One of my boys lamented that he missed the snow. I kind of failed on the flannelboard front this week — I hid cars behind our set of houses and we looked for truck’s best friend…red car! (Or orange car or yellow car…etc.)

Next, I read “Tip Tip Dig Dig” by Emma Garcia.

Another fabulous series that I adore. There’s also a car book and a tools book. The kids needed to get up and move, so we went ahead and did this action rhyme next:

Action Rhyme: “Open the Truck Door”
Open the truck door, climb inside
I get to help my mommy drive
Fasten the seat belt and shut the door
Start the engine, hear it roar
Turn the corner and step on the gas
If the road is clear, we may pass.
Credit: Librarian Lisa

The next book…”The Little Dump Truck” by Margery Cuyler.

I used this one, in particular, because it focused on one kind of a truck instead of just naming different trucks. A quick round of “Old McDonald Had a Truck” and then I moved on to my last book of the day, “I Love Trucks” by Philemon Sturges.

This is my favorite of all the books because it prominently features my favorite truck: ice cream truck! A great way to end storytime.

Our craft for today was a garbage truck that I lovingly stole from Sarah…again.

As always, some kids enjoyed gluing more than others while some focused on coloring. All had a really good time today!

April 21, 2011 24 Comments Short URL, Family Storytime

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