Baby/Toddler Story Time, 5/24

Story time continues to be displaced as our room is repainted. The meeting room is nice in terms of having space to run around in, but it will be nice to be back in our own little corner on the first floor next week.


Opening Song: Hello, How Are You?

Book: What Do Wheels Do All Day? by April Jones Prince, illustrated by Giles Laroche (2006)
This book shows us the many functions of wheels - from pedaling, racing, towing to whirring, whizzing, and spinning. My favorite page is the ferris wheel near the end of the book.

Song: The Wheels on the Bus

Song: Bumpin' Up and Down in My Little Red Wagon (adapted from Raffi's version)

 

Book (session 1): Stella, Princess of the Sky by Marie-Louise Gay (2004)
This book was a lot shorter in my memory than it was in actuality. It has some really cute brother/sister exchanges and philosophical comments from a child's perspective, but it would have been better suited to a preschool group. I didn't repeat it for the second session.  

Book (session 2): The House in the Night by Susan Marie Swanson, illustrated by Beth Krommes (2008)
A simple litany of things found in a house at night - a key, a light, a bed, and a book. I especially like the contrast between the blacks and grays of the night and the bright golden yellow of the moon and stars. This book has the perfect number of words for this age group. 

Song: Moon Moon Moon

Song: ABCD Medley

Book: Rain by Robert Kalan, illustrated by Donald Crews (1978)
We had some rain this morning, and I had already planned to sing Laurie Berkner's Boots song, so I thought it was a good opportunity to read a rain story as well. Donald Crews's illustrations are always very appealing for my toddlers, and today was no exception. The concrete poetry is also neat - I pointed out in the first session that the rain actually spells out the word rain, and in the second session, a little girl actually pointed it out for me! (She attended both sessions, but that was still pretty good.)

Song: Boots
This is our new favorite! The twos and threes especially love to stomp. 

Song: I'm a Little Teapot

Song: Monkeys on the Bed

Goodbye Song: Skinnamarink

Family Story Time, 5/23

This week, facilities is repainting our story time room to make it more child-friendly, based on suggestions and requests from the community, so story time is being temporarily relocated to our second floor meeting room, up in the adult department. For me, this means negotiating chairs and tables that I typically don't use, and running back and forth between the two floors reminding people that we have moved for a few days. (A sign right in front of the door was not enough - I had to get the word of mouth going.)

It also means we didn't have a lot of traffic moving in and out of the room, and more importantly, our usual school-aged party crashers didn't come to find us! (The story time is open to them, but the group I have in mind tends to misbehave and try my patience.) So, here is what we did.

Song: The Wheels on the Bus
Whenever I feel nervous, I start with this song, because it's four minutes long, and everyone knows it so well. By the time it's over, I'm usually ready to tackle the rest of the session. Today, I did it mostly to kill time so people could find the room we were in.

Book: I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato by Lauren Child (2000)
I've never really gotten into the Charlie and Lola phenomenon, but I know they're popular, and I was looking specifically for a book that would be recognized and enjoyed by a variety of ages. As it turned out, this week's audience was mainly toddlers, with a couple of fours and fives, and this book was just the ticket! In this adventure, Charlie tricks Lola into eating her veggies by pretending they are magical concoctions from other worlds.


Song: Monkeys on the Bed

Flannel Board Rhyme: Elephants in the Bathtub
I originally saw this rhyme at SurLaLune Storytime, then adapted it for the flannel board using clip art. I used this elephant and this bathtub.


Flannel Board Song: The Farmer in the Dell
I used felt pieces from kizclub.com and sang these verses:

The farmer in the dell, 

The farmer in the dell,

heigh-ho, the derry oh, 

the farmer in the dell.

The farmer takes a wife...

The wife takes a child...

The child takes a nurse...

The nurse takes a dog...

The dog takes a cat...

The cat takes the rat...

The rat takes the cheese...

The cheese stands alone...

This song prompted one preschool boy to ask me, "Why does the cheese stand alone?" Why, indeed.

Book: What's Going On In There? by Geoffrey Grahn
This book is very visual, which was tough for today, since folks refused to sit on the floor and sat way far away from me just so they could have chairs. But each page shows a shadow on an apartment window. It looks like people are doing everyday, ordinary things, but  upon closer inspection, they're actually building dinosaurs, launching space ships, and making arctic expeditions. It's a bit longer than I would have liked, but it kept everyone's attention through the ending.

Song: Moon Moon Moon by the Laurie Berkner Band (from Victor Vito)
I am trying not to play all Laurie Berkner all the time, but I had to include at least one. And this was a big hit. Two little boys - probably the oldest of the bunch - decided the music sounded like ballet and they turned pirouettes throughout the whole second verse, which was very funny.

Song: Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes (from Where is Thumbkin?)
I played this specifically for the aforementioned ballerinos - and it worked like a charm. This version repeats the entire song four times, and by the end, they were worn out and ready to hear one more book. 

Book: The Boy Who Cried Wolf by B.G. Hennessey, illustrated by Boris Kulikov
This is a really upbeat and contemporary-sounding version of this book with great dialogue and sound effects. The wolves look scary on only one page, and they don't actually eat the sheep, they just scare them up a tree. The moral isn't explicitly stated, which I actually didn't mind, because it lets kids draw their own conclusions and makes it seem more like a story and less like a lesson. I also love the illustrations - they are really vibrant and interesting to look at. 

Song: Where is Thumbkin?

Song: Skinnamarink

Baby Lap Time, 5/20

Baby Lap Time is catching on with the babies, finally. A great audience today, and I think the average age was about eight months, instead of the usual 18 months. Hooray!

Opening Song: Clap Along With Me

Book: Let's Say Hi to Friends Who Fly! by Mo Willems (2010)
Simple books like this are perfect for babies. Animals, animal sounds, onomatopoeia, and bright, easy to see illustrations. I know they're intended for beginning readers, but I love them for my babies and toddlers. In this one, I especially enjoy the cheerful and positive tone Cat the Cat uses to encourage her flying friends. There is something really satisfying about saying, "Go, bee the bee!"

Song: Did You Ever See? (to the tune of Did You Ever See a Lassie? / The More We Get Together)
I originally found this idea on Mel's Desk, and then adapted it to suit my flying animal puppets. I have a bat, a bee, a ladybug, an owl, and a butterfly.

Did you ever see a [bat], a [bat], a [bat]?

Did you ever see a [bat] fly this way and that?

Fly this way and that way and this way and that way.

Did you ever see a [bat] fly this way and that?

I love introducing new songs that use familiar tunes because the parents and nannies learn them so quickly, and are much less reluctant to sing along. This was a great sing-along, and the babies loved watching the puppets move back and forth in the air.

Flannel Board Rhyme:  Five Little Birds
The link is to my Flannel Friday post, complete with photos!

Book: Meeow and the Pots and Pans by Sebastien Braun (2010)
This book is similar in many ways to the Cat the Cat series. The cat's name is Meeow, the sheep is named Baa, the cow is named Moo, etc. etc. Each animal chooses a pot and a utensil - what are they for? To join a marching band! Very simple story, neat vocabulary words like colander, and painted illustrations that look like a child may have done them (in a good way.)

Song: I'm a Little Teapot

Song: Head and Shoulders, Knees and Toes


Song: Oleanna by The Laurie Berkner Band (from Victor Vito)
This song has a simple refrain, and a ton of nursery rhymes. I thought it would be easy to incorporate a flannel board into this, so I got some nursery rhyme sets from DLTK and covered them with contact paper and everything, only to have fumble about with them like I'd never seen a flannel board before! So I'm still debating how best to handle this next time. I think practicing the timing might be all it takes. I hope so, because it's such a lovely song.

But here are the rhymes included in the song, with links to the flannel board cut-outs:

• Hickory Dickory Dock (I already had this one from last time.)
• Jack and Jill
• Hey Diddle Diddle
• Diddle Diddle Dumpling (no flannel board for this one!)
• Humpty Dumpty

Song: The Itsy Bitsy Spider (a cappella sing-along)

Song: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (a cappella sing-along)

Book: Round Balls, Round Balls (board book) by Begin Smart Books (2010)
I love the way the babies' eyes just follow a book like this. The round shapes and bold colors just pull them right in. There's not much substance from an adult standpoint, but lots of good stuff for introducing little ones to words and sounds. It's also got a fuzzy front cover, which is fun if you're reading this one on one.


Rhyme: Elephants in the Bathtub
I originally saw this rhyme at SurLaLune Storytime, then adapted it for the flannel board using clip art. I used this elephant and this bathtub.

One elephant in the bathtub going for a swim.
Knock, Knock, (Clap twice)
Splash, Splash, (Slap knees twice)
Come on in! (Motion with both hands to come in)

Two elephants...

Three elephants...

Four elephants...

Five elephants elephants in the bathtub
Going for a swim.
Knock, Knock,
Splash, Splash,
They all fell in!

I ended every single rhyme and song I did today - at both story times - with the sentence, "And that's the end." I need to work on that.

Song: Monkeys on the Bed
I really don't recommend this for a baby story time. It's just not very baby-friendly, and it's loud and there's a joke at the end (Mommy jumps on the bed!) that only preschoolers really appreciate, but I had an adult tell me that the little boy she was with - he was around 10 months old or so - was making monkey sounds in anticipation of hearing it. So... I played it. And I've got to say, he had the time of his life, so it was worth it.

Song: Where is Thumbkin?

Goodbye Song: We Wave Goodbye Like This

Tales for Twos and Threes, 5/20

Opening Song: If You're Happy and You Know It

Book: Kitten's First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes (published 2004, 2005 Caldecott Medal)
I was supposed to have a bedtime story time on Wednesday night, but no one showed. So I was left with moon songs and no reason to sing them! I fixed that by reading this book, which was the definite favorite of this session, and which has such lovely, simple moon illustrations. (I especially love those endpapers!) Several kids were excited to see this one, and shouted out that they had it at home.

Song: Moon Moon Moon by The Laurie Berkner Band (from Victor Vito)
I am developing an obsession with Laurie Berkner's music, and I've been dying for something new in my repertoire, so I gave this one a shot. It's a little slow to get started, which is good, usually, for my baby/toddler bunch, but these kids got lost in the spaces between verses. It does have some nice hand gestures, though, provided by Laurie Berkner herself in the liner notes,  and it's a really pretty a cappella arrangement with beautiful harmonies. It would do better at bedtime, but I loved it anyway.


Flannel Board Song: Aikendrum by Raffi (from Singable Songs for the Very Young)
I loved this song when I was a kid, but I couldn't tell if these kids liked it or not. Playing upon a ladle is not an easy concept, apparently, and no matter how I try to explain it, even the parents look at me like I'm a bit touched in the head sometimes. But I like making his silly face with my flannel board pieces.

Book: Tony Baloney by Pam Munoz Ryan, illustrated by Edwin Fotheringham (January 2011)
This book arrived brand new at our library this week, and I fell immediately in love. I'm probably going to review it on my book blog eventually, but I'll just briefly say it's a silly story about a middle child forced to live with a bossy older sister and "exasperating" babies. His stuffed animal serves as his therapist and best friend, and though Tony doesn't like trouble, it often comes to find him anyway. It's absolutely adorable, and though there were some babies in the crowd who fussed through it, the preschool audience was glued to the book the entire time.

Song: The Wheels on the Bus

Song: Shake My Sillies Out

Book: Ollie the Stomper by Olivier Dunrea (2003)
I admit that I chose this book solely because it had boots in it. I wanted to do Laurie Berkner's awesome dancing song about boots, and wanted a book to go with it. But it is a funny little tale about three goslings - Gossie and Gertie, who have boots, and Ollie, who does not. Gossie and Gertie each give one boot to Ollie, and when he tires of them, all three ditch the boots and go for a swim. And who wouldn't want to be called a stomper?

Song: Boots by The Laurie Berkner Band (from Victor Vito)
Oh, how I love this song. And so did a lot of the little girls in my audience today. They were bopping around in their imaginary black boots, brown boots, frog boots, dancing boots,  and rain boots. I made some felt board boots to go over each one before we started, but managed to forget dancing boots, so we ended up doing a hokey-pokey like dance for that verse. I think I might try this again with fours and fives this summer, because it's so much fun.

Song: Turn Around by Hap Palmer (from Getting to Know Myself)
I always do this one when I have a lot of three year olds. They are good at following directions, and they like stomping loudly and softly. 

Song: Skinnamarink