It was another large group for Step Into Storytime this morning! Again, the group skewed toward the younger end of the age range (2-3 years, with siblings welcome), and we had a mix of new families and regulars, including a couple older regulars who were very helpful during Not A Box.

• Welcome and announcements: Keep the doorways clear, feel free to come and go (wiggliness, noise, bathroom, snack breaks), calendar of events available at desk and on website, etc.)
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL (Jbrary)
• Stretch: a seated stretch toward the ceiling, to toes, to ceiling, to toes
• Chu’s Day by Neil Gaiman and Adam Rex, with enormous panda bear and fake sneezes.
• Song cube: “I Had A Little Turtle” (seemed unfamiliar to most) and “If You’re Happy and You Know It” (familiar to everyone!)
• I’m the Biggest Thing in the Ocean by Kevin Sherry: this giant squid knows how to make the best of things.
• Passed out shaker eggs, tested them to make sure they worked (they did), instructed them to shake them every time they heard the word “glitter” in Just Add Glitter by Angela DiTerlizzi and Samantha Cotterill. (One of my favorite storytime tips is to recognize that little kids are going to make noise – so get them making the same noise at the same time.). Collected eggs.
• Yoga cube: Downward dog is a little crowded when the storytime room is that full, but some kids made it work!
• Some Bugs by Angela DiTerlizzi and Brendan Wenzel
• “The Kookaburra Song”
• Not A Box by Antoinette Portis (we read Not A Stick last week): This is where my older kids came in handy, especially because one of them was already familiar with the book. If it’s not a box, what is it?
• Songs/rhymes: “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes” and “Where is Thumbkin?” (twice, replacing “sir” with “friend”)
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, with flannel board: I always have volunteers to help put the different fruits on the board.
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL (Jbrary)
• Clean up mats, invite questions (and someone did ask about chapter books with pictures for her 3-year-old!), tape down paper and put out crayons for coloring.

It’s a new season of Step Into Storytime, our library’s twice-weekly storytime for two- and three-year-olds (and siblings of various ages). I run our Monday storytime, and I’m excited to get back into a weekly rhythm!

Room setup:

• Step Into Storytime laminated poster and early literacy tips (Talk, Sing, Read, Write, Play) on the board with magnets
• Colored mats in a stack
• Storytime box (contains magnets, posters, bubbles, scissors, tape, scarves, shaker eggs, stickers, ipod with music, etc.)
• Additional props (flannel board and shapes, puppets or stuffed animals)
• Song cube(s) and yoga cube(s)
• Books! (Usually 4-6 I plan to read, plus several alternates in case the crowd skews younger, older, wiggly, etc.)

Storytime:

• Welcome everyone and announcements (keep the doorways clear, location of bathrooms and where to have snacks, upcoming program info)
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL (Jbrary)
• Name song (“____ is here today”) and early literacy tip: we do a lot of singing in storytime, in addition to reading, because the rhythm of songs helps with language development and lays the groundwork for reading and writing later on.
• Hello Hello by Brendan Wenzel: This is one of my all-time favorite openers. There’s not a lot of text, but there are so many opportunities for interaction (who’s wearing dots/stripes? Can you move like an octopus? Show/touch your tongue, ears, hands, and nose, etc.). In today’s group, we had a few returning families but plenty of new kids and they were a little younger than last spring’s group. Storytime for younger groups is always going to be noisy and wiggly, so if you can get them making the same sounds/movements as each other, that’s a win.
• Want to Play Trucks? by Ann Stott and Bob Graham: Even with a younger crowd, I like to have at least a couple books with some kind of narrative arc or story, and this one is perfectly simple, in a familiar scenario for most kids – a playground, toys, ice cream.
• Song cube: “I’m A Little Teapot” and “ABCs”
• Not A Stick by Antoinette Portis: An off-page voice asks the little piglet about its stick – but it’s not not not a stick! This is a brilliant representation of the way grown-ups misunderstand kids’ imaginative play, or simply don’t see the same things. (I’m planning to read Not A Box next week.)
• Handed out scarves for Huff and Puff by Claudia Rueda. “Does anyone know the story of the three little pigs? Okay, this is different!” The scarves are fun in themselves, give the kids something to do with their hands, and help illustrate the wind created by the wolf’s huffing and puffing.
• Yoga cube (“Yoga is a way of moving our bodies”): Warrior poses and chair pose (“Everyone pull up an invisible chair…and sit in it!”)
• Fall Is Not Easy by Marty Kelley: Change is hard. Even young kids are familiar with the changing of seasons, and they can tell that there’s something funny about this tree’s fall leaves.
• The Wonky Donkey by Craig Smith and Katz Cowley, with donkey puppet. This one is funny, repetitive, and not as much of a tongue twister as it seems.
• Flannel board: elephants
• A Parade of Elephants by Kevin Henkes: Like Hello Hello, this one has so many opportunities for interaction and engagement: We identified the colors of the elephants, counted them, marched, stretched, yawned, and trumpeted.
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL (Jbrary)
• Clean up mats
• Music (“Watch Petunia Dance” by Caspar Babypants) and bubbles (and no one got trampled or threw up!)

Bonus: Lots of high fives and hugs at the end, plus a huge hug from a kiddo who’s been coming for at least a year with her older brother! The storytime love was strong today.

 

Again, I didn’t plan around a theme, but as I looked at the books I’d chosen, a theme emerged: inclusion and acceptance. Whether it’s solving world hunger through pizza, allowing every kind of pet into the pet club, or trying on new identities (penguin, mermaid), the kind thing to do is always to accept those who look or act differently.

• “Hello Friends” with ASL (Jbrary)
• World Pizza by Cece Meng
• Stretching, “Head Shoulders Knees and Toes”
• Strictly No Elephants by Lisa Mantchev
• Julian Is A Mermaid by Jessica Love
• “Shake Your Sillies Out” (Raffi music, scarves to shake)
• I Am Actually A Penguin by Sean Taylor
• Song cube: “If You’re Happy and You Know It,” “I Had A Tiny Turtle”
• Pete’s A Pizza by William Steig
• “Goodbye Friends” w/ ASL (Jbrary)
• Decorate a pizza slice

Most of the kids seemed engaged throughout, and the pizza slice decoration was a hit. I told them they could take their slice home or add it to our pizza on the wall, and almost everyone chose to add theirs, so we made a whole pizza (with lots of interesting toppings).

I’ve gotten out of the habit of checking the blogs I follow via Feedly (and I can’t blame it all on the demise of Google Reader, either), but I dipped in recently to see what I’d missed and found these great posts:

• From Tiny Tips for Library Fun, an examination of the Diversity in Children’s Books infographic, comparing 2015 to 2018. We have made a little progress but still have a ways to go – especially since the percentage of books featuring white characters dropped, but the percentage of books featuring non-human characters went up.
• From Story Time Secrets, a new storytime complete with books, songs, and activities. The Giant Jumperee is one of my favorites to read aloud for toddlers, and I might use her “Story time is starting, clap your hands”/”Story time is over, clap your hands” sometime, although I really like “Hello Friends” and “Goodbye Friends.” I also think the “elevator” movement could work as a variation on “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes” while standing up.
• Betsy Bird’s Newbery/Cadecott 2020: Summer Prediction Edition. My reading list just got so much longer, but fortunately, lots of the titles are picture books. I’m looking forward to new Brendan Wenzel and a Bob Shea/Zachariah Ohora collaboration, and I’ve already enjoyed Antoinette Portis’ Hey, Water! I love middle grade too: New Kid and Other Words For Home were amazing, and I can’t wait for Corey Haydu’s newest, Eventown. Queen of the Sea looks interesting too.

I have missed my weekly storytimes and was so happy to return to the storytime room this morning for an all-ages summer storytime! I chose some of my favorite summery (or anytime) books, and there’s definitely a theme about facing new situations with courage, though I didn’t set out with that intention. Sometimes it just works out!

• “Hello Friends” song with ASL, via Jbrary
• The Angry Little Puffin by Timothy Young
• Jabari Jumps by Gaia Cornwall
• Song cube: “Zoom Zoom Zoom, We’re Going to the Moon” and “I’m A Little Teapot”
• There Might Be Lobsters by Carolyn Crimi and Laurel Molk, with stuffed lobster (every time I held it up, the kids shouted “lobsters!” along with the word in the story)
• Roller Coaster by Marla Frazee
• Song cube: “ABCs,” “If You’re Happy and You Know It”
• The Little Taco Truck by Tanya Valentine and Jorge Martin
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL, via Jbrary
• Clean up mats
• Activity: Use crayons to color on a food truck on butcher paper

Favorite interactive moments:

• Before Jabari Jumps, asking who’s been swimming, who’s jumped off the side into a pool, who’s jumped off a diving board (two had!)
• Before Roller Coaster, asking if anyone has been on a roller coaster before (yes, and it was blue!)
• A younger kid about halfway through said “I’m done” and started toddling out. It’s good to know when to call it!
• Asking for suggestions during “If You’re Happy and You Know It,” one kid raised their hand but then didn’t have a suggestion, so we sang, “If you’re happy and you know it, raise your hand.”

There were about fifteen kids at today’s storytime. I have one more summer storytime in August, and then in the fall our weekly storytimes will start up again. What are your favorite read-alouds for summer?

 

This morning was the last Monday Step Into Storytime for the spring; our summer schedule is different, and I’ll only have a couple of all-ages storytimes until the regular schedule starts again in the fall. I will miss seeing these kiddos for storytime every week!

For our last storytime, I requested enough copies of the book Tap the Magic Tree by Christie Matheson so that every adult/child pair could have one. It’s an interactive book (tap, pat, swish, tilt, shake, etc.) so I wanted all the kids to have a chance to be involved throughout. (I borrowed this idea from Miss Lauren, who did it with her 3- to 5-year-old storytime group.) There are plenty of other interactive titles, too, if this is something you’d like to try in your storytime, or if this is a type of book your kid likes; see list below.

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Hello Hello by Brendan Wenzel: This is a storytime favorite because it allows for a lot of interaction, like checking clothing for spots and stripes, and saying hello to friends and neighbors sitting nearby.
• Tap the Magic Tree by Christie Matheson: Copies for everyone. This got loud (which is fine!) as kids and their grown-ups explored each page.
• 88 Instruments by Chris Barton: Because we were pretty loud already, I handed out instruments (shaker eggs and jingle bells on sticks) for this musical story. (Storytime tip: if the group is loud, getting everyone to make the same noise makes things more manageable.)
• Song: “Shake Your Sillies Out” (then collect instruments)
• Pete’s A Pizza by William Steig: We did this one just a couple weeks ago, but it works so well. Kids can do a movement to go along with each page of the story: kneading and stretching dough, tossing it, spreading oil, sprinkling cheese, etc.
• Song cube: “ABCs”
• A Parade of Elephants by Kevin Henkes: Five of the kids got to put an elephant on the felt board, and those who didn’t got to come up and give the elephants pats to make sure they were stuck up there firmly. Then we marched round and round, trumpeted, yawned, and stretched.
• The Wonky Donkey by Craig Smith: Kids could come up and say hello to the donkey puppet before and after the story. (Note: some kids like being nibbled on, and SOME DON’T. Keep it to “hee haw” and ear wiggling!)
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Clean up mats, put out butcher paper and crayons, hand out surveys* to adults, remind everyone about summer schedule.

*Surveys: I’ve been wanting to do a brief survey for this group for a while, to see if there was anything I could tweak to improve the program. I based my four-question survey largely on Jbrary’s Sample Evaluation Forms. LibraryAware also has a long post about feedback on programs.

Seven adults filled out and returned the survey; two of the seven said that the books/songs/movement/crafts were “not engaging enough”; the other five respondents felt that the books/songs/movement/crafts were “just right” for their children. I may try to do fewer, longer stories in the fall (three or four books instead of five or six), still with plenty of songs and movement. Then again, it could be a different group in the fall. We’ll see!

A few other interactive picture books:

• Tap the Magic Tree by Christie Matheson
• Press Here and Mix It Up by Herve Tullet
• Don’t Push the Button by Bill Cotter
• Bunny Slopes and Hungry Bunny by Claudia Rueda
• Tickle Monster by Edouard Manceau

Happy April! Today was a super fun storytime. We had a great group of about 14 kids and their grown-ups, and I was excited for our activity/craft to go with A Parade of Elephants. Initially I was planning to read The Rabbit Listened, but ended up swapping it out for Z Is for Moose.

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Hello Hello by Brendan Wenzel: I’m tempted to lead off with this book every time. It always elicits engagement from the kids and provides so many opportunities for moving and thinking.
• Wolfie the Bunny by Amy Dyckman and Zachariah Ohora: This was a little long, but funny, and it doesn’t go where you think it’s going to go. The kids stuck with it (one of them took one look at the cover and observed, “That doesn’t look like a bunny!” Correct, kiddo.)
• Yoga flow: mountain pose and forward fold, feet apart and gentle twist
• I Am Josephine by Jan Thornhill and Jacqui Lee: In general I like to stick to books that have some kind of story (and forward momentum), but this one has questions and animals, which worked out pretty well. It’s also a good one-on-one book to discuss the different categories: living thing, animal, mammal, human being.
• Song cube: “Itsy-bitsy Spider” and “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes”
• Goose Goes to the Zoo by Laura Wall: The last goose book until she writes a new one. The best part of this one was the page with all the honking: one kid yelled “It’s a car horn!” (It’s not. It’s geese.)
• Yoga flow: tree/flamingo pose (there were flamingos in Goose Goes to the Zoo), Warrior 1 and 2
• “ABC” song to get ready for…
• Z Is for Moose by Kelly Bingham and Paul O. Zelinsky: If you’ve never read this aloud before, give it a few run-throughs first, to decide how you’re going to do the interruptions by Moose and Zebra. So funny, and a sweet ending.
• Song cube: “I Had A Little Turtle”
• Clean up mats
• A Parade of Elephants by Kevin Henkes: We cleaned up the mats first because I wanted clear space for marching and parading. I also turned the flannel board around so everyone could see the flannel elephants, and lots of kids came up to touch them, take them off, and put them back on. Then we read the book and marched!
• “Goodbye friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Craft: using glue sticks to glue paper elephants and stars to butcher paper on the wall. I drew a path for them to use if they wanted but we ended up with beautiful chaos, of course. The kids spent a long time doing this – gluing is always a fun activity.

 

It was a beautiful day and a BIG group in our little storytime room today – about 18 kids plus a baby or two and accompanying grownups. It was a correspondingly loud storytime, so when possible, I used techniques to harness and direct the noise: CAW-ing like a crow in Harold and His Woolly Hat, HONK-ing with Goose Goes to School, lots of songs from the song cube.

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Harold Loves His Woolly Hat by Vern Kousky: I got a little brown bear out of our stuffed animal/puppet closet and let the kids pet it after the story. Hat tip to Lauren at the Robbins Library for reading Harold at her storytime a few months ago.
• Yoga: forward fold to touch toes, stretch to touch ceiling
• Goose Goes to School by Laura Wall: Again, Goose was a hit. I don’t know if it’s the bright colors or the text-to-illustration ratio or what, but it’s magic.
• Song cube: Itsy-bitsy Spider, I Had A Little Turtle
• Alfie Is Not Afraid by Patricia Carlin: Nearly all of the humor in this book comes from the juxtaposition between the pictures and the text, so I mentioned that upfront as something to look out for.
• Yoga: Seated forward fold, stretch toward the ceiling, stretch to either side
• When Spring Comes by Kevin Henkes: An informal poll shows that EVERYONE likes jumping in puddles.
• “Shake Your Sillies Out” with shaker eggs (and scarves, because I ran out of eggs)
• The Giant Jumperee by Julia Donaldson
• Song cube: Zoom Zoom Zoom, We’re Going to the Moon; I’m A Little Teapot; Where Is Thumbkin?
• Just Add Glitter by Angela DiTerlizzi and Samantha Cotterill: This has textured pages, which I let the kids feel after the story.
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Clean up mats, get coloring sheets (I drew two different types of hat and made copies), color with crayons, come choose a colored pom pom and get a dot of glue.

I’ve missed two weeks of storytime – there was a snow day on March 4 and last week I was on vacation – and it felt like ages! It was good to be back today and see some familiar faces and some new ones. Today’s books were mostly on the shorter, simpler side, so we managed seven(!), as well as lots of songs and yoga.

• Hello, welcome, announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary (skipped the name song because we had a big group – about 15)
• Hello Hello by Brendan Wenzel: Still one of the best lead-off books I know of – so many opportunities for getting kids engaged (“Who’s wearing stripes? Who’s wearing spots? Can you wiggle like an octopus?”)
• Yoga flow: resting pose, mountain pose, forward fold, tree
• Goose by Laura Wall: This went over splendidly. It has the perfect amount of text on each page for this group, and the simple illustrations on brightly-colored backgrounds work really well for a group.
• Song cube: “If you’re happy and you know it,” “I had a little turtle”
• Shh! We Have A Plan by Chris Haughton: I’ve done Oh No, George! several times in storytime but this was the first time I did Shh! and it was excellent! There is “shh”ing of course, which keeps things quiet, but also counting, and also pointing (“Where’s the bird? Did they catch it?”), and it’s funny.
• Yoga flow
• Carrot and Pea by Morag Hood
• One Little Blueberry by Tammi Salzano, illustrated by Kat Whelan
• Song cube: “Itsy-bitsy Spider,” “I’m a little teapot,” “Zoom zoom zoom, we’re going to the moon”
• Oh No, George! by Chris Haughton: We were running ahead of schedule and I had a little extra time, so I used this one from my pile of backup books. Always a favorite. What WILL George do?
• My Spring Robin by Anne and Lizzy Rockwell
• “Goodbye friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Clean up mats
• Coloring sheet: I traced the robin from the last page of My Spring Robin, enlarged it by 20%, and made copies for kids to color with crayons. (One kid didn’t want the robin so I gave him a leftover Wonky Donkey. Leftovers never go to waste!)

It really was good to be back. And here’s one more new resource I heard about through one of my book groups: Diverse BookFinder. If you’re looking for picture books featuring people of color or indigenous people of color, this is a tremendous resource, including books from 2002 to the present. The design is clean and clear and easy to navigate, and I’m looking forward to discovering new picture books using the Diverse BookFinder.

It was a full house this morning, with 16+ kids and their grown-ups, and a slightly wider age spread than usual – plenty of younger kids, but also some at the top of our 2-3 age range. It’s always helpful to have some older kids there, as they usually pay close attention to the pictures and are not shy about participating, which moves things along; during Do You Know Which Ones Will Grow? I had a chorus of two boys shouting “no!” after each thing that didn’t grow. Fun!

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL, from Jbrary
• Huff and Puff by Claudia Rueda, with scarves for huffing and puffing
• Yoga flow: Stretching tall with hands in the air, forward fold to touch toes, stretch tall again
• Winter Is Here by Kevin Henkes and Laura Dronzek: Luckily(?) we had a spurt of windy snow earlier this morning.
• Song cube: “If you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands”
• Solutions for Cold Feet by Carey Sookocheff: I’ve been wanting to read this Canadian author/illustrator’s book at storytime for several weeks, and it finally seemed like the right time.
• Here I switched up my original plan to read Goose by Laura Wall and read Chu’s Day by Neil Gaiman and Adam Rex, because a book with a huge sneeze in it is always, always a winner. Next week, Goose!
• Yoga flow: more mountain pose and touching toes, as well as chair pose and tree pose
• I’m My Own Dog by David Ezra Stein: This is one of those flip-the-script books and it’s got that humor going for it, but I’m not sure kids this age (or anyone, anymore) are familiar with dog behavior stereotypes that seem 1950s-ish (fetching slippers, etc.) Still, it’s a book about a dog, and it’s a just-right length for storytime.
• Song cube: “Itsy Bitsy Spider” and “I Had A Little Turtle”
• Do You Know Which Ones Will Grow? by Susan Shea: This seems like the perfect storytime book – stark, bright illustrations, fold-out flaps, rhyme – but the last time I read it there seemed to be no reaction whatsoever. This time it went great!
• “Shake Your Sillies Out” with music and shaker eggs
• “Goodbye Friends” song with ASL, from Jbrary
• Stack mats, more music, bring out giant blocks, fin.

 

We had another large bunch today, with fewer regulars than usual and some kids on the younger and older ends of the spectrum. While I don’t usually do a theme, we did one valentine book and one book with heart shapes (as well as a valentine craft), and talked a little about colors and shapes. I also tried clustering books and songs a little more than I usually do (i.e. two books and then two songs instead of book/song/book/song). Lots of kids were in a wiggly, singalong mood today.

• Welcome and announcements
• “Hello Friends” song with ASL from Jbrary
• Name song (we had about 11 kids at this point, more came throughout and some left before the end)
• Here Comes Valentine Cat by Deborah Underwood and Claudia Rueda: This one is a little long (lots of pages, not too many words), and the illustrations aren’t big and bright, but it’s such an unusual, funny book – not the usual Valentine’s fare – that I wanted to try it.
• Song cube: “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” and “Where Is Thumbkin?”
• Green Is A Chile Pepper by Roseanne Greenfield Thong and John Parra: This has one or two Spanish words incorporated into the text on each page, as well as a translation of the color. For each color, I asked if anyone was wearing that color or sitting on that color mat.
• Yoga cube: Instead of doing three static poses like usual, we did three and then cycled through them: mountain pose to forward fold and back to mountain pose, then tree pose. Some of the little ones have great balance! We always try standing on each leg – sometimes one side is steadier than the other.
• My Heart Is Like A Zoo by Michael Hall: I used the flannel board for this (I’ve made the penguin, owl, frog, crab, and clam), and said we would be making our own animals out of hearts as our craft at the end.
• Song cube: “Shake Your Sillies Out” (with egg shakers)
• The Steves by Morag Hood
• Perfect Square by Michael Hall
• Yoga (mountain pose, forward fold, tree pose, seated forward fold)
• Hooray for Hat by Brian Won
• The Wonky Donkey by Craig Smith and Katz Cowley
• Craft: Colored paper hearts, crayons, googly eye stickers. For two- and three-year-olds this is simple, but it could be scaled up for older kids: add glue sticks and hearts of different sizes, and they can make animals like in the book, or invent their own.