Read-Along Story Time, 2/7/13

 Read-Along Story Time, 2/7/13

Well, last week was great, and this week.... was chaos. One specific child, who is a known behavior problem, came to the story time today and through the course of the 20 minutes we were reading, he stomped on the wooden steps, ran laps, pushed the kid sitting next to him, cackled loudly for no reason, and smacked me on the rear end (several times.) I didn't feel right leaving a room full of kids in order to take him to his grown-up, who was sitting outside with his younger sibling, but I did tell her what happened when story time was over. She didn't do much, and the kid cried and said he didn't do anything, so I'm not sure what will happen next time. But I was hugely disappointed that the entire story time was basically ruined. We also had some moms with toddlers who insisted on coming into the story time even though it was boring for the kids. I can't really force them not to come in, but it was basically not successful for the target age group because of one child's behavior and  the restlessness of two fussy toddlers. 

Opening Rhyme
Last week, starting with an opening rhyme was great. This week, it didn't work. We did "My Hands Upon My Head I Place" - and some of the kids were with me, but I didn't have it memorized that well, and it didn't have the same flow as last week's rhyme.

Welcome Message 
Today, I wrote my message with chalk on black poster board to sort of model what our activity would be. It got cut off in the image above, so here is the text again:

Dear Friends, 

Welcome to story time! Today we will read a book together called I Can Write. Then I will read you a story. We will also learn the Banana Dance! 

From, 

Miss Katie 

Read-Along
We did another choral reading of a story I wrote. Between the boy who was fooling around - and by this point, encouraging others to do the same - and good readers who skipped ahead, this was pretty out of control, and I got these looks from the moms of the toddlers who seemed confused as to why we were all reading at once. But this is the point of the story time. I don't think it needs to be 100% perfect or in control, if the kids are having fun. We do plenty of other activities at this story time that if the read-along portion is a little bit wild and crazy sometimes, then so be it.

Since our theme was writing, this is the book I wrote for us to read. It can be downloaded here. 

Picture Book Read-Aloud 
I read Arthur Writes a Story by Marc Brown. The kids were not into it, and they did not want to discuss it afterward.

Banana Dance
This is a Dr. Jean song that I first learned this past summer. Some of the kids giggled a little bit, but they were not nearly as enthusiastic about this song as they are about Hat, Coat, Pants, and Shoes. Go figure.


Writing with Chalk 
I gave each child a piece of black posterboard and put out bowls of sidewalk chalk. They got really into drawing with the chalk- and I saw everything from a "cereal monster who is all wet" to Valentine hearts to stars with letters inside them. Everyone got to take their masterpiece home, and most of the kids were eager to tell me about their pictures. This was a great ending to an otherwise stressful program.