Three interactive books I ADORE reading with my toddler:

My favorite part of my whole day is when I pick my two-year-old up from daycare and he juke moves around all classroom obstacles to leap into my arms with gleeful cheers of, "Mommy!  Mommy!"

Grayden reading A Good Day to his doggie

The second favorite part of my day is when this same feisty, silly, free-spirited toddler settles into bed and reads with me.  I am loving picture books in a whole new way and can't fill our library bag up enough as far as I'm (and he's) concerned, but there are three books that I ADORE reading with him these days:

A Good Day by Kevin Henkes. Squirrel drops her acorn, bird loses his favorite feather, fox can't find his mama, and dog gets tangled.  Simple, large, colorful illustrations accompany gentle, comprehensible text.

Why I love this book:There is nothing sweeter than watching your toddler empathetically declare, "Oh noo," after hearing about these scenarios and then clap happily when each is resolved. 

 

A Kiss Like This by Mary Murphy.  Elephant kisses are long, fish kisses are bubbly, and bee kisses are buzzy.  The split-page format leads to lots of surprises!

Why I love this book:  Simple answer: As soon as I pull it out of the library bag, my toddler plants a kiss right on my cheek.  We then share all sorts of giggly animal kisses as we read.  He just started trumpeting his arm around like an elephant's before planting his "kiss".

 

What Will Fat Cat Sit On? by Jan Thomas.  A group of animals expresses their desire to not be sat on by Fat Cat.

 

Why I love this book:  It's hilarious to see a toddler answer, "Nooo", with an incredulous little smirk when you ask, "Will Fat Cat sit on the pig (chicken, cow, dog, etc.)?" 

 

 

 

Pre-K Worms

We are still "digging into reading" this summer so we did a worm theme today in storytime.  After a month off, the group came back quite a bit smaller than it usually is but the kids were great!!

Don't forget:  If you are unable to make it to a morning storytime, I do family storytime on Thursdays at 6pm too!

Memory Box:  A lemon from Ned's New Home

Books: 

Ned's New Home by Kevin Tseng.  A worm tries out a variety of new homes when his current apple home begins to rot. 

Worms for Lunch by Leonid Gore.  Various creatures share what they like to eat for lunch.  Don't worry - the worms get away safely!

Worms by Sian Smith.  This book uses simple rhymes and engaging images to teach young readers about worms.

 

Music:  "Walter the Waltzing Worm" by Hap Palmer

I taught the kids how to waltz first and they really caught on!  Then I handed out scarves and let them waltz with their own "Walters" and follow the cues to have him move all over their bodies.

Cube Roll:  I got some nifty (non-hand made!) cubes to roll and added my own pictures. Today it landed on the yoga picture so we took elephant breaths.

Letter of the Day: Ww for worm

We identified another "W" word - wagon - and sounded it out:

Flannel: 
Thank you, Storytime ABC's for the idea!  Thank you, Steff, for the rhyme:

I found an apple on the ground

It looked delicious, red and round

I picked it up and took a nibble

Oh my goodness!  There was a worm in the middle!

 

 

Thankfully, a neighboring branch owns a die cut machine and cut lots of paper apples for me so each child could get one.  I punched a hole in each so the kids could do the rhyme with me and put their fingers through like worms.

 

Thank you, Greg, for punching all those apples for me!

 

 

Baby Time

Today was a smaller group, but I got to meet some new babies and see some "old" friends which was really nice!  I chose to do rhymes and songs most of us know so that the babies could ease back into the routine after a month "off".

Check out this cute baby playing with our Teen Volunteer, Lucia, during social time:

Of course Mr. Bear and Roly Poly Beetle sang their signature songs:

Roly Poly
Roly poly roly poly up up up (roll baby's hands)
Roly poly roly poly down down down
Roly poly roly poly out out out
Roly poly roly poly in in in
Roly poly roly poly clap clap clap
Roly poly roly poly lap lap lap

Bouncing / Lapsit Rhymes

Popcorn
Popcorn, popcorn put in in the pot (bounce)
Shake it, shake it (gently wiggle baby)
Pop! Pop! POP! (lift baby up)

Rain is Falling Down
Rain is falling down (wiggle fingers downward)
Rain is falling down
Pitter patter, pitter patter (clap softly)
Rain is falling down
Splaassh! (clap hands together and up for a big splash!)

The Alligator

It's no secret this is one of my favorites (courtesy of Miss Trish at Sunset Branch, Chandler).  You can crawl after mobile babies and catch them or let them crawl after you!

The alligator's jaws go snap, snap, snap
The alligator's tail goes thwack, thwack, thwack
Gotchya! (big hug!)

"The Itsy Bitsy Spider" by Hap Palmer.  My not so itsy bitsy spider helped.

Book:

Lunch by Denise Fleming.  I love this hungry little mouse.  Lucia helped mouse (my puppet) devour all his favorite fruits and veggies (flannel board pieces) as I read.

 

Prop Rhyme:

 

The babies helped me say goodbye in some fun ways with these animals:

 

 

See you later, alligator

Bye bye, butterfly

Give a hug, lady bug

Take care, brown bear

See you soon, racoon

 

 

 

Wiggle Worms

It's been a great couple of days back to weekly programs after focusing on school-age children last month. 

Our toddlers welcomed back their old friends:  Mr. Bear and Roly Poly Beetle:

Animal Song with Puppets:  "Pig on Her Head" (Alternate version)

I shared a new song with the toddler groups and I think they loved it!!  I've had this song in my collection all along, but it took Thrive After Three to demonstrate how fun it is.  I just used my hand puppets and had a teen volunteer bounce around with me and let animals sit momentarily on the heads of some kids who welcomed the visitors.

P.S. Teen Volunteers rock!

The song ends with a full on nose-nuzzle which I think is adorable!

The full crew:

 

Yours truly with a pig on her head

Book: Brown Bear by Bill Martin.  I have never ever read this book in storytime before this week because I feel kind of Brown-Beared out, but I thought it would be nice to share a book most kids know after a month "off" from storytime

Cube Song:  Look at my new official cube!  Yesterday it landed on "Here is the Beehive" and today it landed on "There Was a Little Turtle"

Letter of the Day:  Pp for pig (like the ones on our heads) and popcorn (like the song we popped to!)

Movement / Music:

"Popcorn"  - we made lots of it!
"Fingerplay" - after lots of pointing and tapping, we pointed to someone we love!  Aww

Flannel:  "See You Later, Alligator"

The kids and their caregivers helped me say goodbye in some very fun ways!

See you later, alligator
Give a hug, ladybug
Take care, brown bear
Bye bye, butterfly
See you soon, raccoon

See you all next week! 

Email me any pictures you take in storytime and don't mind sharing.  I'd love to post them!

TaraChmielowski@mcldaz.org

 

Swat that Fly Right Out of Sight!

Flannel Friday:

After getting my hands on a few dozen of these cute bugs, I went looking for a song to use them with and found this little gem.  The song is titled "Five Little Flies" by Johnette Downing.

Five little flies flying all around
Bugging the tail of an old Moo Cow
Swat to the left
Swat to the right
Swat that fly right out of sight!

Mr. Bear and Grayden

Sometime in the middle of the night last night, Mr. Bear and Grayden found their way into our bed.  I bet you thought Mr. Bear just slept in my storytime cart.  :-)

It's actually a different Mr. Bear.  ;-)

 My toddler has his own Mr. Bear at home.  But they are kind of one and the same....

Rock Pets

Even though our Summer Reading Program is only about half way through (ends July 27th), I just wrapped up our last school-age event before resuming weekly programs next week.

We started with a retelling of Stone Soup where each child got a prop to contribute to the story (pot, ladle, vegetables, salt, pepper, pasta, etc.)

Stone Soup

 

 

 

 

 

Now... On to Rock Pets

 

Some supplies

 

Our teen volunteer, Jackson, helping out. Thank you!

 

 

 

Some of our masterpieces:

 





The Awards:

 

Jackson, the official award presenter

Owen's Rock "Rocky" received: Biggest Smile

 

Noah's rock "Rocky" received: Best Teeth

 

Best Polka Dots

 

Cutest Ears

 

 

"Bluebell" received: Best feathers

 

 

 

 

Best Whiskers

 

 

 

 

Rock Book Display for Check Out

 

 

Lesley Marshall, thank you for taking great pictures for us and for helping the kids with their rocks!