Transportation Storytime & Spring Displays

beep beep!

On Tuesday we did transportation story time with the babies.
I was inspired by the new picture book
by Kate Dopirak & Mary Peterson,
"Twinkle Twinkle Little Car" :

 

  

After surfing the web & finding a cute flannel song, I made the following truck to go along with the lyrics:

There were 5 in the truck and the little hen clucked 

"MOVE OVER! MOVE OVER!"

So they all moved over and one fell out...4...3...2...1...

There were none in the truck and the little hen clucked.... 

"I'VE GOT THE WHOLE TRUCK TO MYSELF, 

I'VE GOT THE WHOLE TRUCK TO MYSELF!"

This spring I am focusing my passive displays on local wildlife & conservation to promote my upcoming programs: Design Your Own Bird Nest, Make a Bee Hotel, and Where Do Birds Nest? - a talk with guests from the Native Songbird Care and Conservation nonprofit in Sebastopol.

           

To peak patron interest and stimulate introverts, I put together the following displays to promote these upcoming sustainability STEM programs for K-3rd & 3rd-5th:

                  

The Stick Together display for Read Across America was such a hit, that we've decided to keep some kind of passive activity in that area for middle grade kids & families. This season we are encouraging kids to trace their Laguna de Santa Rosa neighbors. I printed out and laminated illustrations/photos of local wildlife from Pixabay, referencing the "Field Guide to the Laguna de Santa Rosa." The purpose of this activity is to instill a deeper connection between resident and local wildlife. 

 

  

To compliment this activity I made a "Meet Your Laguna de Santa Rosa Neighbors" display, giving names and friendly gestures to various native plants, mammals, birds, and insects. My goal for this display is to make patrons aware and more conscientious of the diverse wildlife in their area.

       

This season's Early Literacy Scavenger Hunt bookmark was easy to make because of these displays:

All images used are fair use / public domain or given express permission to me to use for such purposes. I collected them from Wiki Commons and credited them as required, and Pixabay. We are maintaining a google spreadsheet to keep track of the images we use.

Happy Thursday,

Courtney Klein, Sebastopol

Sharing and a Parachute

Thankfulness and Sharing

We had so much fun with a sharing and thankfulness storytime. Sometimes having a group of 8-10 small three-year-olds is perfect. 

"Bow Wow Wow, whose dog are thou? You are _______'s dog. Bow Wow Wow."

As people walked in we wrote down the names on our Dry Erase board, so at each child's name we passed the stuffed dog around the circle until it got back to me. 

We skipped adults, so the small group of kids on the carpet worked out beautifully. 

We had the best conversation with Should I Share My Ice Cream by Mo Willems, many preschoolers had strong feelings about Gerald sharing or not sharing. 

I made a Stone Soup Flannel and handed out the vegetables to the children so that they could each add a vegetable to the soup pot. 

We then shared the Parachute and the songs we came used were:

• If you're happy and you know it shake the chute...jump around
• Popcorn, popcorn sizzling in a pan. We started this with the children holding, but once they got underneath at the end, we had to sing it 2-3 times with them underneath. 
• Parachute up, parachute down, parachute dancing all around the town. Shake it on your shoulders, shake it near your head, shake it at your knees and tuck right into bed. (We all got under the parachute at this last line. We had to sing this three times also. I think the preschoolers could have played with the parachute for the whole half hour!
• We did a round of ring around the rosy, but this was not nearly as popular, and so was harder to coordinate properly; our circle got smooshed and lopsided. 

For our craft we made bookmarks to give as gifts with stickers, since we have a crazy drawer full of stickers, and they had fun. 

Autumn Kick-Off  

Wee Read Baby Story Time

Hello Story Time Village!

The story time hibernation was perfect because Adriel and I began to miss it terribly. In this context absence really does make the heart grow fonder! Adriel, Mathew, Rosalie, Carrie and I pitched ideas and used the time off to get pumped for Fall story times. 

Adriel is talented at weaving weekly themes into her preschool story times. She is focusing her Fall theme on the world and multiculturalism to promote her new International Family Book Club. I'm sure she'll share the amazing stuff she's done on here.

My Fall theme is space related since I'm promoting a three week STEAM series for first and second graders called "Stories & Space." Thus, our cumulative theme is "Read Across the Universe." I posted a picture on Sebastopol's Facebook of the passive displays we made to compliment this theme.

However, when it comes to baby story times, I prefer to go completely rogue. Sometimes I have a little anarchist spirit animal on my shoulder.

Adriel and I made these story time displays which we hope will be active (switch out the songs / books). Rosalie pitched the idea to us! We'll see how long it lasts. I really love it and want to keep up with it! If only I had Hermione Granger's time-turner....

Here is my Wee Read Display:

Semi-autumn themed display includes song of the week (or rhyme/ lap bounce/tickle, etc), book of the week with a text sample, a flannel piece squirrel sharing an early literacy tip, and bookmarks for an "early literacy scavenger hunt" at the library.

Book of the Week: 

I also LOVE Emma Garcia's new "Chugga Chugga Choo-Choo!" 

Song of the Week: 

Brown Squirrel, Brown Squirrel

Shake your bushy tail

Brown Squirrel, Brown Squirrel

Shake your bushy tail

Wrinkle up your nose, Hold a nut between your toes!

Brown Squirrel, Brown Squirrel

Shake your bushy tail

...continue with grey, green, orange, black squirrel

My obsession with Jbrary led to my discovery of my new obsession:

  Mr Keith's Felt-Tastic Flannelboard Funtime blog!! 

He makes kawaii inspired flannel pieces for story time. 

Here's my version for "Brown Squirrel, Brown Squirrel." And yes, the squirrels are wearing accessories:

During summer we had a camp visit and the facilitator put together a library scavenger hunt for her students. She hid pictures of literary characters in the children's area and had prompts for catalog searching. Mathew was inspired by this and pitched the idea of creating a passive early literacy scavenger hunt. Thus, I created this bookmark that relates to our Autumn theme of 

"Reading Across the Universe."

The idea is to get caregiver talking and bonding with baby through this simple activity. Our children's area is nicely decorated and the items should be easy to find.

"Explore the library together to find these ten items! 
Get a hand stamp at the desk when finished"
Backside includes early literacy tips and book suggestions for babies


I'm very happy to work here! I'm surrounded by incredibly creative, enthusiastic and funny people in Sebastopol. During my training I was fortunate to join Charity's Bibliobop, Sandra, Kim and Tiffany's story times. You all inspire me! I hope to engage in more library story time tourism.

My next post will not be this long, I promise :)

xoXOxo, Courtney

The Little Red House Flannel

I received this flannel when I first became a children's librarian based on the book "The Little Red House" by Norma Jean Sawicki.  I've used it for my toddler time and outreach storytime this past week and it's a big hit.  The houses change colors and get smaller and smaller.  In the last house there is a teddy bear.

Preschool storytime: The Letter W

Books:

The Crocodile Who Didn't Like Water by Gemma Merino

The kids enjoyed this one. They were able to guess why the crocodile didn't like water before the end.

The Whale in My Swimming Pool by Joyce Wan

This one was okay. I love the pictures, but I don't remember getting much response from the kids.







Songs and Chants:

• Welcome, Welcome, Everyone
• Alphabet song
• Buenos Dias/Frere Jacques
• The Itsy Bitsy Spider
• Dance Your Fingers
• Peanut Butter and Jelly
• If You're Happy and You Know It
• Dinosaur, Dinosaur, Turn Around
• Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes
• Rocketship Run
• The More We Get Together

Flannel:

 The Wolf's Chicken Stew by Keiko Kasza

The kids enjoyed this, but I messed it up a few times. There are a lot of pieces to this one! (It is a purchased one, not a homemade flannel.)








Craft:
Watermelons and whales with paper plates