Wiggle Worms April 23, 2012

Mice sure are nice! 

Animal Song:  "If I Was a Bird".  I love this mellow action song (especially when I anticipate a little craziness like when we're in the Newsstand Room instead of the meeting room)

Letter of the Day:  Mm for mouse

Activity:  Mr. Bear's Color Game:  Instead of singing the alphabet every week, I'm trying to do other small activities in its place.  This week we played Mr. Bear's Color Game.  Mr. Bear goes fishing for colorful fish, which we name, and then the kids identify something on the poster that's the same color.  This week's color were pink, brown, and yellow.

Book:  Cat & Mouse by Ian Schoenherr.  A kiddo must have grabbed this book on Monday because it disappeared from my storytime set up when I left the Newsstand Room (this room has no doors), but fortunately it was returned to me in time to read for Tuesday's group. 

I love the oversized illustrations and the simple text of classic nursery rhymes.  We read "Eeny Meeny Miney Mo" and "Hickory Dickory Dock".

Then we pretended we were clocks and mice were running up and down us.

SURPRISE  I have lots of stuffed mice for acting out this song!  I find kids part with cute critters best after they've held them for while so I didn't rush them.  First we pet or mice, cuddled them, and then had them sit on our heads, shoulders, etc.

Music:  "Hickory Dickory Dock"  I download this song so long ago I'm not sure where I got it from, but it goes:

Tick tock tick tock goes the clock
Tick tock tick tock goes the clock
Hickory dickory dock
The mouse ran up the clock
The clock struck ONE
The mouse ran down
Hickory dickory dock

etc...

TWO....boo
THREE....wee
FOUR.....no more

Kids are so cute ticking like clocks while mice run up and down them!

Flannel:  (My most requested flannel for gifts): 

Little Mouse, Little Mouse
Are you in the color house?

Finger Play (kids love the anticipation):

Slowly, slowly, very slowly
creeps the garden snail
Slowly, slowly, very slowly
up the garden rail

Quickly, quickly very quickly
runs the little mouse
Quickly, quickly very quickly
round about the house

No Babytime today, but toys, books, and music are out

G is getting sent home from daycare because he's sick so I won't be able to do Babytime today.  Come socialize if you'd like.  Toys, shakers, bubbles, books, my favorite rhymes, and music are for you to enjoy in the meeting room.

Pre-K April 19, 2012 Dinosaurs!

We had 46 children in attendance and they were awesome!  They were throwing dinosaur facts and names at me that I didn't even know!

Books ( I didn't read the latter two, but they were close contestants):

Bones, Bones, Dinosaur Bones by Byron Barton.  A team of scientists look for, transport, and assemble bones for a museum. 

How Do Dinosaurs Say I Love You? by Jane Yolen. Dinosaurs, like children, misbehave but they love us and we love them!

Dancing with the Dinosaurs by Jane Clarke

Dinosaur Bonesby Bob Barner

Music:

"We are the Dinosaurs" by Laurie Berkner.  Dinosaurs march, eat, nap, and ROAR

"Dinosaurs in Cars". I was afraid this would be cheesy, but the kids got really into it.  You can download it for free from the linked site.

My Costco dino puppets danced with us:

Letter of the Day: Tt for T-Rex
(Imagine my surprise when I was also informed that Torosaurus and Pterodactyl start with a T...As I write this blog, I think I stand corrected on the spelling of these flying dinos)

Flannel: What Dinosaur is Missing?
These kids sure have good memories.  They were only momentarily stumped when Lesley secretly removed two dinosaurs.

Baby Time April 18, 2012

I had so much fun with my group today who picked storytime over this gorgeous weather!  ;-)

Did you notice I added an extra rhyme today?  It's a little opportunity to introduce you to more lapsit activities and a way mix it up a bit.

Animal Puppet Song:  Old MacDonald

I like to use flannels (or these days - now that I have a 9 month old and much less time on the weekends- clip art) to indicate what rhyme or activity we are about to do.  This serves as bit of a memory game for the babies as they make the connection to the image and the activity week to week.  More importantly, I don't have to say "Now we're doing this, now we're dong that" for the whole program; I just put the flannel up and we're on the same page.

Rhymes: 

Mr. Bullfrog
This is Mr. Bullfrog (fist)
sitting on a rock (fist on palm)
He jumps into the water.... (lift fist)
KERPLOP (clap loudly)

Jack is Quiet
Jack is quiet
in his box
Shhhh
Lift the lid and up he pops!

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

Robbie Rabbit:
Robbie Rabbit is so fat, fat, fat
His soft little paws go pat, pat, pat
His soft little ears go flop, flop, flop
And when Robbie runs he goes hop, hop, hop

Prop Rhyme:  This Little Piggy
(Today our piggy ate an apple and a carrot)

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Pre-K April 12, 2012 The Last of Eggs and Chickens for a while....

I've been enjoying eggs and chickens these past few weeks and finally got to use this theme for Pre-K.  But Spring as sprung and Easter has passed, so it's time to move on...

Memory Box:  A cube (imagine my surprise when some of the kids identified it as such) from The Most Wonderful Egg in the World.

Game:  Egg or No Egg?  The children helped us decide which category to put the animals in.  Some were a little tricky (like snakes, because most snakes lay eggs, but not all....) but these kids know their stuff!

Books:

The Most Wonderful Egg in the World by Helme Heine.  I adapt this story quite a bit.

I totally copied Abby the Librarian's flannel for this book.  She kindly gave me permission to post though.  She has a great blog and also came up with the Memory Box idea that we all love so much.

Abby's blog post

Roly-Poly Egg by Kali Stileman. I love this lively, colorful story about Splotch and her roly poly little egg which is returned safely to her in time to hatch.

Charlie Chick:  We read this short pop-up book just for fun!  We then found Charlie with this rhyme "Six Little Chicks"

Music:

"The Chicken Dance"

"I Know a Chicken".  This song is a little long, but I still love it.  We shook eggs with hen puppets and danced like chickens.

Wiggle Worms April 9, 2012

Since I couldn't do all my favorite chick/egg stuff in one week, it carried over into this week's Wiggle Worms.

Today we:

Animal Puppet Song:  "If Animals Could Dance" (sorry not in our collection).
If animals could dance they'd look so funny
A cat would dance and look like this
And sound like this
(cow, dog, duck, elephant)

Letter of the Day:  Ll for lion

Book: Charlie Chick by Nick Denchfield

Music:

We danced with a big lion puppet  and scarves to Laurie Berkner's The Lion Sleeps Tonight.

We tried out "The Chicken Dance" again this week with much greater success!!

Flannel:  Six Little Chicks
This is a flannel I came up with a few months ago and have used it a couple of different ways.  Today we looked for Charlie Chick (a yellow chick). 

Six little eggs getting ready to hatch (6 fingers)
Peck, peck, peck..... (peck hand)
Crack!! (Clap while removing the top part of the egg)

Finger Play:  Two Little Blackbirds
Katie Crow (a blackbird) squawked until we did her favorite rhyme.  Here she is hanging out with one of our lovely staff members.

Wiggle Worms April 3, 2012

To celebrate spring, we did some chick activities in toddler storytime.

Animal Puppet Song:  Raffi's version of Grandpa's Farm.  We practiced our farm animals signs with this song.

Letter of the Day:  Ee for egg

Book:  Hurry! Hurry! by Eve Bunting. All the animals on the farm hurry to meet the newest baby; a chick who hatches from an egg.  Instead of "hatching" a chick puppet from a prop egg like I usually do, I tried something new.

All the parents were handed an egg to hold with their child while we read the story.  They were instructed not to OPEN the egg (I spelled "OPEN" so the kids wouldn't fixate on the word) and to hold the egg and keep it warm while we read the story.  I also forewarned the kids they would have to give the eggs back (which they're good at because we use shakers, scarves, bells, balls, sock puppets, etc. each week that they hand back).  I also showed them a bucket of colorful eggs filled with surprises so they knew they would leave with an egg when storytime was over.

Once we got to the part where the chick hatches, they all opened their eggs to find chicks inside!

Two or three kids had a hard time returning their chicks on Monday, so for Tuesday's group I gave them a little more time to bond with their chicks and pet them.  Then we played Bibbity Boppity Boo (A chick sat on my shoe) and moved the chicks around our bodies.  They were much more willing to part with their chicks since they got to hang out for a few minutes.

Music:  We danced to my favorite version of "Shake Your Sillies Out" again.  We also get to kick our kickers out, jump our jumpers out, hug our huggers out, etc.

Flannel:  10 Fluffy Chicks
http://sunflowerstorytime.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/10-fluffy-chicks2.pdf

5 eggs and 5 eggs (hold up five fingers and five fingers)
That makes ten
Sitting on top is mother hen (sign for hen like we do in "Grandpa's Farm"
Crack Crack Crack (clap, clap, clap for cracking eggs)
What do I see?
Ten fluffy chicks as yellow as can be

(The chicks are on the other sides of the eggs, so we flip the eggs around when they hatch)

 

Finger Play:  "Mama Duck" with puppet props

Here comes the Mama Duck - Quack
Here comes the Mama Duck - Quack
Here comes the Mama Duck with one little duckling - Quack

Here comes the Mama Duck - Quack, Quack
Here comes the Mama Duck - Quack, Quack
Here comes the Mama Duck with two little ducklings - Quack, Quack

etc...

Movement: "Chicken Dance"