Flannel Friday: Falling Leaves

One of the hardest parts of changing jobs was leaving behind lots of great flannel boards. There were lots of great ones that I depended on that I am slowly beginning to re-create. One of my favorites was the tree flannel board.

Fall leaves is one of my favorite themes and I really missed this flannel board. So, I had to make my own!

I love flannel boards that can involve all of the children. With this one, I will hand out the leaves to the children and ask them to help me create our tree. But before we do that, we sing a leaves song such as Leaves on the Tree to the tune of The Wheels on the Bus.

The Leaves of the Trees
(to the tune of “The Wheels on the Bus”)
The leaves of the trees turn orange and red
orange and red, orange and red
The leaves of the trees turn orange and red
All through the town.

The leaves of the trees come tumbling down
tumbling down, tumbling down
The leaves of the trees come tumbling down
All through the town.

The leaves on the ground go swish, swish, swish
Swish, swish, swish, swish, swish, swish,
The leaves on the ground go swish, swish, swish
All through the town.

There you have it! Be sure to check out Cate at Storytiming for the full round up! Have a great Thanksgiving.

Grrrrr…. Monsters!

If I were to pick my most favorite theme ever it would have to be MONSTERS. This is a super fun theme because there are so many great books about monsters. I have done Monster theme before and it really never gets old. If you take a look at the craft on that page, you will see Storytime Katie peeking out from behind the mask.

Here are the books we read:

If You’re a Monster and You Know It by Rebecca Emberley and Ed Emberley

I like to sing If You’re Happy and You Know it as an opener each week.  I was going to sing this song with a monster twist anyway so when I discovered the book, I felt like I hit the jackpot! It has really great illustrations and is so silly, it was the perfect opener for storytime.

Leonardo the Terrible Monster by Mo Willems.

This is my all time favorite monster book. I love reading it aloud and I love sharing it with new kids. I am pretty sure everyone is familiar with this book because it’s been featured before

Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendek

This is one of those books that I assumed everyone has heard but there were a lot of children in my storytime who had not heard it before. What a pleasure it was to share it with them! This might be my favorite picture book of all time (cliché I know) and so I always try to find a way to use it in story time.

There Was an Old Monster by Rebecca Emberley, Ed Emberley and Adrian Emberley.

Full disclosure: this book was sitting next to If  You’re A Monster and You Know it and I had to include it. Usually I shy away from multiple books by one author (no good reason, just do) but this book is so great, it had to be included! Set to the tune of I Know an Old Lady who swallowed a fly, this book was more like a song and the kids really got into it.

Mostly Monsterly by Tami Sauer, illustrated by Scott Magoon

This is a very sweet story about Bernadette who is mostly monsterly but she sometimes likes to do very unmonsterly things (like pick flowers and bake cupcakes!) Of course, the other monsters at monster school think she is strange but in the end, she wins them over.

The Extras:

Yes, this week was a bit book heavy but since they were so interactive, I was all right with that. There are tons of great monster songs out there. this week, we sang Monster, Monster to the tune of Teddy bear, Teddy Bear. The inspiration for this came from Sur la Lune’s monster storytime.

We also did the 10 Little Monsters Flannel Board. Feel free to go take a look!

 

The Craft:

We made monster masks this week with paper plates! I did monster masks before and these were a bit different. The kids were able to make whatever kind of monster they wanted and of course it’s always cute to see them march around with their masks on.

Flannel Friday: 5 Enormous Dinosaurs!

I am back again for Flannel Friday! Last week went so well I decided to do it again

This week for my dinosaur theme, I made a flannel board for 5 Enormous Dinosaurs.

 

Five Enormous Dinosaurs
Five enormous dinosaurs, letting out a roar,
One went away and then there were four.
Four enormous dinosaurs, munching on a tree,
One went away and then there were three.
Three enormous dinosaurs didn’t know what to do,
One went away and then there were two.
Two enormous dinosaurs having lots of fun,
One went away and then there was one.
One enormous dinosaur afraid to be a hero,
He went away and then there were zero.

It was pretty easy to make, I just found a picture of a Stegosaurus (my most favorite dinosaur) and used it as my stencil. I think if I were to do it again, I would make five different dinosaurs. By the time I decided that, I was already committed to these five little guys. They’re pretty cute, after all.