I miss doing storytimes! And my kiddo misses her friends. So, we planned a Saturday morning virtual storytime with four of her buddies. We used Google Hangouts to “meet.” I used my usual storytime format, with fewer books, assuming that it might be harder to hold their attention, even though they’re older (4.5 years) than my usual group (2- and 3-year-olds). And yeah, I have a song cube at home.

• “Hello Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• “Where Is Thumbkin?”
• Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen: A long lead-off book, but one or two of them were already familiar with it, and it seemed to hold their attention pretty well.
• Song cube: “If You’re Happy and You Know It, Clap Your Hands”
• Only A Tree Knows How to Be A Tree by Mary Murphy: I planned yoga poses to go along with this, which my kiddo was happy to demonstrate as I read the words to the story and showed the pictures. (Yoga poses: Tree, cat, dog, fish, mountain.)
• Song cube: “I Had A Little Turtle” and “I’m A Little Teapot”
• A Rainbow of My Own by Don Freeman: We got this book from a friend relatively recently, and it struck me right away as perfect for storytime. I had been planning to read Bark, George! by Jules Feiffer as the third book today, but swapped it for this one. (I also had The Book With No Pictures by B.J. Novak as a backup, but there are already great videos of the author himself reading it online.)
• “Shake Your Sillies Out” (I had told the parents ahead of time that the kids could each “bring” a musical instrument, so we had shakers, a harmonica, and a tambourine as accompaniment.)
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary

I hope everyone is staying safe and doing okay in this strange time. Wash your hands, stay inside (and go for walks in non-crowded places), connect virtually, and hang in there.

We had low turnout at storytime today – just three kids at the beginning, with two more joining them in the first few minutes – which could be due to coronavirus fears, but could also be chalked up to the gorgeous weather. Anyway, the show must go on…

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” with ASL (Jbrary)
• Hand-washing song discussion
• Song cube: “I’m A Little Teapot”
• Name song (“___ is here today”)
• How to Cheer Up Dad by Fred Koehler
• Stretch: up, down, sideways
• Shake A Leg, Egg by Kurt Cyrus
• Song cube: “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes” (regular speed, fast, slow)
• I brought two books about dogs named George; I showed them at the same time and said we’d read both, and gave the kids a chance to vote for which one they wanted first, by raising their hands. Only one kid voted. And that’s democracy.
• Bark, George! by Jules Feiffer: This one’s a hit. It’s got animal sounds and surprises; at this age, kids like discovering and pointing out things that aren’t right, e.g. when a dog says meow instead of arf!
• Oh No, George! by Chris Haughton: It’s always interesting to hear their predictions about the ambiguous ending.
• Mouse house game
• Monkey and Me by Emily Gravett
• Explanation of traffic light game and variation
• “Goodbye Friends” with ASL (Jbrary)
• Traffic light game #1: Essentially Red Light, Green Light, starting at one end of the room and getting to the other. Traffic light game #2: Unusual colors! Blue = clap, orange = hop, pink = twirl, purple = touch toes, and red = stop.

All of today’s books were relatively short, which meant more time for open-ended questions while we read them (e.g. “What did Little Jumbo do when he didn’t want to wear his overalls?” and “What do you think George did?” and “What is the weather like outside today?”).

When I walked into the children’s room at the library this morning, two staff were already talking about recent infectious disease news. I decided to address the issue of how sickness spreads at the beginning of my storytime by sharing two tips: (1) Wash your hands frequently with soap and water for the time it takes to sing “Happy Birthday” twice, and (2) when you sneeze or cough, bring your elbow up to your face, instead of coughing into your hand or whatever else happens to be in front of you. Fortunately, I had made a birthday cake felt board a while ago, so we counted out three candles (because March is the third month, and no one had a birthday today – I asked) and sang the happy birthday song while pretending to wash our hands.

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL
• “Happy Birthday” song, miming hand-washing, with felt board cake and candles
• Book! by Kristine O’Connell George and Maggie Smith
• Stretch: hands up, hands down, hands to the left, hands to the right, repeat (faster)
• A Fox Found A Box by Ged Adamson: How do you listen to music? (Most kids today wouldn’t recognize a radio as drawn in this book, so we talked about that first.)
• Song cube: “Zoom, Zoom, Zoom, We’re Going to the Moon” and “ABCs”
• “Bees” by Aileen Fisher, from The Beeman by Laurie Krebs, illustrated by Valeria Cis: I decided this book might be a little long, even as a lead-off book, but I shared the poem from the beginning.
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, with felt board fruit, caterpillar, and butterfly: I hand out the felt fruit first, and there’s always enough for every kid to have at least one piece. They come up and stick their fruit to the board when we get to that page in the book.
• Song cube: “I Had A Little Turtle” (make a turtle with your hands by holding four fingers together, thumbs out, one hand on top of the other)
• Pete’s A Pizza by William Steig: This is one of my Top Ten storytime books. It’s just the right length, it’s funny, and there are plenty of opportunities for motion/action (kneading dough, sprinkling cheese, etc.).
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL
• Craft: Decorate a pizza together (butcher paper, pre-drawn pizza, yellow and red paper circles, glue sticks, crayons)

Stay safe and healthy, everyone. Happy reading!

Eight kids and their caregivers came to storytime today. We read five books, sang some songs, did some stretches and wiggles, and used glue sticks.

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL (Jbrary)
• Name song (“___ is here today”)
• Stretch
• Jump! by Tatsuhide Matsuaka: This board book opens vertically instead of horizontally, which is pretty unusual – but it has a good reason!
• Bear Came Along by Richard T. Morris, illustrated by LeUyen Pham: A newly-minted Caldecott Honor book that I’ve read at home, but this was my first time reading it aloud at storytime.
• Song cube: “ABCs”
• “The Kookaburra Song”
• Roly Poly Pangolin by Anna Dewdney: Many people are familiar with Llama Llama, but I love Dewdney’s shy pangolin just as much. We practiced rolling up into a ball by hugging our knees and tucking our heads down.
• Perfect Square by Michael Hall: Thanks to Megan Dowd Lambert’s Whole Book Approach webinar, I took some time to examine the cover of this book with the kids: What shape is it? A perfect square, of course! One of the kids knew the book already and noticed little details throughout, like the kite in the park.
• Song cube: “Zoom Zoom Zoom, We’re Going to the Moon”
• Yoga: mountain pose, forward fold, crossing the midline by touching opposite toes. Some of today’s kids were closer to 2 than 3, so I also have the option of touching the opposite elbow.
• A Parade of Elephants by Kevin Henkes: One of my favorite storytime books. I brought along my felt elephants, and the kids identified their colors, and we counted together. We also did plenty of marching, stretching, yawning, and trumpeting.
• “Goodbye Friends” with ASL (Jbrary)
• Craft: gluing paper elephants and paper stars to butcher paper.

I did a quick time check after our last round of yoga, and decided to skip Don’t Push the Button! and the Mouse House Game.

The same kid who participated during Perfect Square was also the only one to say her own name during the name song – and, this was the first time she’d used a glue stick (another point in favor of continuing crafts after storytime – not every kid is familiar with crayons, markers, glue, scissors, etc.). Her mom came up to me afterward and said how unusual this was for her; she’d been going to our storytime for birth-2 and always sat quietly without talking or singing at all. I love to hear that kids are coming out of their shells and feeling comfortable in the library!

There was a big group for storytime this morning, about 15 kids plus their adults, and many of them were at the younger end of our age group. I put out some extra colored sitting mats because I could tell not everyone would fit on the rug. Fortunately, most of my books today were relatively short and simple, and/or had an interactive component, and most of the group stayed through till the craft at the end.

• Welcome and announcements (library is closed next Monday for Presidents’ Day)
• “Hello Friends” with ASL
• “The More We Get Together” with ASL
• Mr. Scruff by Simon James: I adore this new book, which reminds me of Let’s Get A Pup, Said Kate by Bob Graham, but is much shorter and therefore perfect for two- and three-year-olds. There are person-and-dog rhyming pairs (e.g. Molly and Polly), and then there’s Mr. Scruff and Jim…who make a perfect pair, even though their names don’t rhyme.
• Quick wiggle: Wiggle fingers up to the sky, down by our toes, out to the sides (if you can without hitting a neighbor), repeat.
• Grumpy Pants by Claire Messer: One of my all-time favorite books to read at storytime. Everyone can identify with the grumpy penguin who washes away his mood by taking a nice cold bath.
• Song cube: “ABCs” and “Itsy-Bitsy Spider.” The latter we sang three times: regular, slow, fast. This is a simple way to change it up and the kids are usually into it – it’s like a game.
• My Heart Is Like A Zoo by Michael Hall: I explained that all of the animals in the book were made with heart shapes, and asked if anyone knew what holiday was coming up on Friday (Valentine’s Day). I pulled my felt animals out and the kids identified them (except the clam, which is a tricky one); once they were on the felt board, I asked them to point to them when we got to that animal in the book (clam, crab, owl, penguin, frog). They did great!
• Tickle Monster by Edouard Manceau: There are a lot of pieces to this felt creation, so I asked the kids for help to put it together. I propped up the book cover so they could see what Tickle Monster was supposed to look like, then pulled the felt pieces out one by one and they told me what each one was and where to put it.
• Yoga cube: Warrior one, forward fold, half lift, chair pose (with our invisible chairs, of course). Then some bilateral, cross-the-midline movement: touching right hand to left foot and left hand to right foot.
• The Button Book by Sally Nicholls and Bethan Woollvin: This is a new book that invites the reader to take part in the story by pushing different colored buttons and making sounds or doing actions (beep, thbbbt, tickle, hug, bounce, sing, etc.). It includes two songs (“Wheels on the Bus” and “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”) and is just generally fun and delightful – recommended for groups who like Don’t Push the Button! by Bill Cotter, Tap the Magic Tree by Christie Matheson, There’s A Monster in Your Book by Tom Fletcher, Bunny Slopes by Claudia Rueda, etc.
• “Goodbye Friends” with ASL
• Clean up mats
• Craft: color and glue paper hearts to butcher paper on the floor (or color hearts and take them home to give as valentines)

Step into Storytime, February 3

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” with ASL
• “The More We Get Together” with ASL
• Hello Hello by Brendan Wenzel
• The Giant Jumperee by Julia Donaldson and Helen Oxenbury: A classic, and they can help count to three with Mama Frog.
• Song cube: “ABCs” and “I’m A Little Teapot”
• Yoga: mountain pose, forward fold/seated forward fold
• Chicken Wants A Nap by Traci Marchini and Monique Felix
• Mouse House game: Usually I save this for toward the end when the kids are getting wiggly and chatty, but in this case I moved it up because they were so quiet and I wanted to get them more engaged. (I know it’s possible to be engaged and quiet while listening to a book, but I felt like shifting gears would be helpful.) Needless to say, they were super into it, they love this game.
• Please, Mr. Panda by Steve Antony
• Song cube: “Itsy-Bitsy Spider” and “Zoom Zoom Zoom, We’re Going to the Moon” (I had the lyrics for the kookaburra song up, but decided not to sing it)
• Lots of Dots by Craig Frazier: Our library copy was destroyed (every page scribbled on, some ripped), so I bought my own. It’s a simple but creative concept, nice and bright, and an easy tie-in craft.
• “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” with scarves. I handed out two each and we practiced waving them, throwing and catching them, then sang “Twinkle” in star pose, leaning or rocking back and forth.
• “Goodbye Friends” with ASL
• Craft: coloring with crayons and gluing “lots of dots” to butcher paper on the floor
  

  

Preschool Storytime, February 4

Due to the planned absence of another staff member, I got to do the preschool storytime this week! Attendance was lower than usual, just four preschool-age kids and one little sibling, and all five were boys. Two of them brought their own books that they looked through while I read the first two books, but all of them were responsive and engaged for songs and the mouse house game, and more interested in the last two books as well.

• Welcome, introduction, announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL (2x)
• The Very Last Castle by Travis Jonker and Mark Pett: I think at least two of the four were interested in this story, but it was hard to tell.
• “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes” and “Where Is Thumbkin?”
• World Pizza by Cece Meng and Ellen Shi: This one felt a little long, especially after The Very Last Castle (which is also longer than I would do with 2- and 3-year-olds), but it’s got a big sneeze and some interesting pizza toppings (seaweed, spicy pepper, chocolate cherry), so we got to talk about pizza toppings afterward. And I only teared up the tiniest bit at the line, “And in that moment the world was filled with kindness and love and no fighting.”
• Song cube: “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” “ABCs,” “Itsy-Bitsy Spider”
• Princess Bess Gets Dressed by Margery Cuyler and Heather Maoine: Proof that boys can be into princess books! Especially if the book ends with underwear. We talked about our favorite outfits (costumes and pajamas, mostly).
• The mouse house game: this has yet to fail. If you need a sure-thing felt board activity, this is it. (Hat tip to a children’s librarian in Belmont.)
• There’s a Monster in Your Book by Tom Fletcher and Greg Abbott: As close to a sure thing as there is in storytime. Everyone had fun chasing the monster out of the book, and then luring him back.
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL
• Clean up mats and put out craft: A big castle outlined in black on butcher paper, with crayons, markers, paper animal cutouts, and glue sticks.

The first Step into Storytime of 2020 was a great success! As usual, there were some familiar faces and a few new ones, and everyone was pretty close to the target age range (2- and 3-year-olds; some looked a little younger). The kid:adult ratio was 1:1 (except in one case where there were two adults for one kid), which helped make it a tamer affair than when there are more kids than adults. Of course, I also like to think that my book choices, songs, and felt board had something to do with their great listening today…

• Welcome and announcements (Happy new year!)
• “Hello Friends” with ASL (Jbrary)
• “The More We Get Together” with ASL (“more,” “together,” “happy,” “be,” “friends”)
• Book by Kristine O’Connell George and Maggie Smith
• Stretch arms from seated position, wiggle
• I Will Chomp You! by Jory John and Bob Shea: lots of engagement from the adults on this one.
• Song cube: “Zoom zoom zoom, we’re going to the moon” and “Itsy-Bitsy Spider” (the latter we did once at regular speed, once slowly, and once fast)
• Kitten’s First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes: This is the first time I’ve used this book at storytime and it is perfect for this age group!
• Yoga/music: “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” in star pose, rocking/swaying back and forth
• Hurray for Hat! by Brian Won: I always get the kids to show me their grumpiest faces, and they never disappoint.
• Hand out felt pieces for The Very Hungry Caterpillar: with fifteen pieces of fruit, there was enough to go around.
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle: As each fruit was mentioned, the kids holding that fruit came up and stuck it on the board. I added the caterpillar at the beginning and the butterfly at the end.
• “Goodbye Friends” with ASL (Jbrary)
• Coloring with crayons on butcher paper