Storytime break!

We are taking a bit of an extended storytime break at my library from now though the end of January. For us, December always yields low attendance at programs. Kids and their families just have too much to do!

I will be blogging every now and then about other programs going on in December. Between now and January, I will be planning all of my storytimes. I wish we could do storytime non-stop, but it’s really important to have a break. It keeps us fresh and fun!

In the meantime- Happy Thanksgiving!

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Colorific!

Storytime this week was all about colors. This is one of my favorite themes because there is so much you can do with it.

First we read A Color of His Own  by Leo Lionni.

This is a book all about a chameleon who wished he did not change colors and tries very hard to make that happen, but it doesn’t work out very well. Luckily, he makes a friend and they are the same together. It’s a nice story about being different and also friendship. I love Leo Lionni’s books and they always make for a great addition to storytime. This book was sort of the inspiration for the whole storytime.

Next we read White Rabbit’s Color Book by Alan Baker.

I thought this book would be good preparation for our craft later on. It’s a great way to introduce colors and what happens when you combine them.

Finally, we finished with Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr., illustrated by Eric Carle.

I don’t know if I could have done a color storytime and not included this book. This book is so popular and every kid in the room commented that they had read it before. I know that some librarians like to mix it up and do new books every storytime but I think that sometimes kids really like a little repetition.

As an added bonus, we sang a really fun song this week. It goes to the tune of Mary Had A Little Lamb and goes like this:

If you’re wearing red today, red today, red today,
If you’re wearing red today,
Please stand up. (and then the children wearing those colors stand up, this can go on forever and ever.)

This was a lot of fun, every one really enjoyed identifying what colors they were wearing.

This week’s craft was pretty awesome.

First the children glued the chameleon onto the paper and then we used closepins with pieces of sponges to sponge tempura paint onto the chameleon and the apple.

Each child was able to choose two colors and see what happened when they put them together. It was A LOT of fun.

Fish

This week we went under the sea and had a fish storytime.

We started with Not Norman by Kelly Bennett.

I have been wanting to do this in a storytime for a long time. It’s so cute and was very popular with the kids. It also opened up the conversation to discussing our pets.

Next we read Little Fish, Lost by Nancy Van Laan.This a great book about a little fish who loses his mom and meets all sorts of nice animals while he is looking for her. Of course they are reunited and it’s a happy ending.

We finished this week with Fish is Fish by Leo Lionni.

I really like Leo Lionni and had planned on reading another book by him, Swimmy, but then I saw this one on the shelf and decided to switch it up. It’s about a fish who is friend with a tadpole who learns that its ok be different. It’s a beautiful book and was a good way to end storytime.

For our craft this week, we put scales on fish!

 Gluing is very popular with the kids, they could glue all day long. So I made lots of colored circles for them to glue and they had a ball.

Kangaroos!

This week in storytime we read some really fun books about kangaroos.

We started with Kangaroo Christine by Guido van Genechten.

This book is about a kangaroo named Christine who does not want to hop on her own. However, she makes a new friend and quickly realizes how much fun it is. This book was a great segue into us doing a little hopping of our own.

Next we read Where Are You Blue Kangaroo? by Emma Chichester Clark.

Lilly keeps losing her stuffed kangaroo, which makes the kangaroo very uneasy. I love reading books like this because the children always like to point out how the character has made a mistake- something they would never do!

That’s about it for books this week. We did do some hopping games. In one, each child was given a felt kangaroo and they had to hop around a table. We also practiced hopping on one foot.

Our craft this week came from one of my favorite craft sites, DLTK. We made our own kangaroos!

This is the one that I made, but I think that two made by some of the girls in storytime are much more awesome:

These girls told me that their kangaroos were best friends!