An absolute favorite author of mine is Mo Willems. I think I would be like a teenage girl meeting a rock star if I ever got to meet him. He is just FANTASTIC children's author, with a wonderful and witty sense of humor. I don't know that I have found one of his books yet that I don't like. The Pigeon books and the Piggie and Elephant books are by far my favorite, but I say that and I really like the Knuffle Bunny books, too. It's hard to pick!!!
This morning we began with
The Duckling Gets a Cookie!?, by Mo Willems
I had made some felt figures for the story, and after we read the book, we "retold" the story using the felt pieces on the flannel board. We had a relatively small group, so it went okay, but they are a young group, and they have a hard time not being very handsy and want to "help"...it worked okay today because I had several pieces and they all behaved and cooperated really well together.
We then did the classic "Who Stole the Cookies from the Cookie Jar". It's a fun, but again because we are a pretty young group, most of them didn't "get" that they were supposed to "answer" back, but it still went fine. The two older ones did get it, and we ALL sang the whole thing with the little ones.
Here is a link to a really nice printable to use with the song.
http://mrsgilchristsclass.blogspot.com/2011/08/who-stole-cookie-from-cookie-jar.html
After sharing apple juice and of course some cookies with the children, we concluded our storytime this morning with the very classic big book of
If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, by Laura Numeroff. A definite favorite. Many of the children commented that they had the book at home and knew the story, but I think that is totally awesomely acceptable!
