Storytime Bulletin Boards for our meeting room

I'm very happy with the bulletin boards I put up for this fall.  (I used to LOVE doing bulletin boards, but not so much anymore, so I'm pretty proud of this one!)

I used the Nursery Rhymes Cricut Cartridge to cut these designs out.  The Words are part of the cartridge, as is that Font style.  Something I would perhaps do differently if I were to do the characters again would be to use a pen and draw the item first, and then cut it out (on the Cricut) so that they would look outlined and the detail would be more visible. 

I had actually seen this idea on another blog somewhere, and I really liked it.  I Googled the characters and tried to get coloring sheets of each character, with distinct enough features that people would be able to guess who it was when done in all black. I then outlined them and cut them out on black construction paper.  I must admit I think I have become spoiled by the Cricut, because this took me a long time! HA!

Olivia

Clifford

Grinch

Corduroy

Lilly (from "Lilly's Purple Purse" and others)

Pigeon (from "Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus")

Arthur

Week 3 - Humpty Dumpty

We are into our third week of storytimes this fall.  We had an awesome number of kids last week!  Today is a little cooler, and there was some drizzle in the air earlier. I wasn't sure if that would keep families from coming out this morning, but my fears were not necessary.  We again had a really nice group of kiddos and caregivers.

Today's nursery rhyme was Humpty Dumpty.

The first book I read was Humpty Dumpty, by Daniel Kirk



The second book I read was Mouse's First Fall, by Lauren Thompson




I wanted to emphasize that, since yesterday was the first day of fall, that the word "fall" has different meanings.  Humpty Dumpty had a great fall when he fell off of the wall; there is also a season called fall, which is part of summer, fall, winter, and spring, and is when the weather starts to get cooler, the leaves start turning colors, and fall off of the leaves.  I had enough really young kids this morning that I'm not sure they really picked up on this or not.

Our craft this morning was a simple activity to go with Humpty Dumpty.  I like to incorporate skills that kids can practice at storytime that they may or may not do at home.  Scissor skills in a controlled setting such as this is one of them.  I don't really expect all the kids to cut an entire project out, and yes the adults will probably have to help, but it's a good exposure to learning how to hold a scissors, being safe with them, etc.  Even if just a few snips are made, that's okay.

I photocopied the following egg shape -


I drew lines on the egg, and I had two different versions for the kids....this zig zag pattern for the older preschooler, and I drew 2 straight lines across the egg (slanted) for the younger preschooler who may not have as much cutting experience.    The kids then glued the pieces back together on a piece of construction paper and drew a face on it.  They could then put as many band aids as would fit! :)

The Humpty Dumpty poem is printed out below (click link) for you to print off and cut up.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1yqm00v-QofUVZyZ2xBWFAwbDA/edit?usp=sharing


Other links for handouts today:



and for the Itsy Bitsy Book

Week 2 = Hey Diddle Diddle

Our Second week of storytimes focused on the nursery rhyme "Hey Diddle Diddle".  I did actually find a book but it was waaaaaay too long for a preschool storytime, so I included books about cats, dogs, cows, and fiddles (music).

The first book I read was Dog Loves Books, by Louise Yates.


We are focusing during our mid-point in storytime so far of saying our nursery rhymes.  So far so good, but I need to find some more activities or songs or movement to do with them.



You can click on the picture above to go to the link to print the nursery rhyme, Hey Diddle Diddle.

The second book I read was The Doghouse, by Jan Thomas.  Jan Thomas is one of my very favorite children's authors/illustrators.  She does very, very simplistic text and pictures, but they are just PERFECT for preschoolers, with humor for all members of the family.



The craft today was a very simple one, to go along with the nursery rhyme...."...and the dish ran away with the spoon."

We attached the spoon to the dish with a glue dot.  If you do not have adhesive wiggly eyes (as we currently do not), I spent some time actually attaching enough eyes onto glue dots for the kids.  It is easier for them to adhere, but also sticks better to the plastic than gluestick does.  Plus I have found that for the really little kids, trying to put gluestick on a little eye is really really difficult.
I also provided small dessert size plates if kids wanted to use those instead of the bowl.  Unfortunately, with the weight of the spoon, the dish and the spoon did not sit up without being supported.

Another Itsy Bitsy book as a handout:




Maze just for fun:

"TIME" for Storytimes to Begin Again!

Storytime is baaaaaack!   We left off with our regular storytimes back the first of May, and picked up our six-week summer reading program.  That ended at the end of July, and after being gone on a family vacation, I had about a month to get ready for storytimes to resume again.  It's always a great thing to get back into the swing and see the kids, both new and returning.  It is also very frightening that....(gasp)...no one will come!!!!   I was blessed with 12 kids and 5 adults on our Tuesday morning time, and 11 kids and 8 adults at our Thursday evening time.....both are GREAT for our small library. I am totally tickled!!!

I decided to focus on trying to feature a different nursery rhyme each week.  It has been something I've discovered over the years that some children know nursery rhymes, and some children don't.  Nursery rhymes are pretty important helpful ways to get kids into reading and being able to read.

This week we featured the idea of "TIME"....It was time to get back to storytime, and I was so glad that it was TIME to see everyone again.  I then linked in the rhyme "Hickory Dickory Dock".

The first book we read was Boom Chicka Rock by John Archambault.  It is a fun, rhyming, lyrical story of 12 mice who live in the kitchen clock,and want a snack of birthday cake, but Max the cat is sleeping in the kitchen.



On Thursday evening I read 1000 Times No, by Mr. (Tom) Warburton.  It's a cute book about a little toddler/baby who tells his mom "No" in many different languages, before he finds out what he is saying 'no' to.



On Tuesday morning, I read a different book.  I read Llama Llama Time to Share, by Anna Dewdney.  If you've read other Llama Llama books, you know that preschoolers like the Llama Llama books.  This one is an adorable book about a little llama who meets a "gnu" friend.  They play together, and, as many other young children, have a variety of interactions together, both happy and not so happy.




Our craft this first week of storytime was to personalize a bookbag.  I ordered the bags from Oriental Trading.  I need to look at the size of items when I order them.  Although it says quite clearly how big they are (9 x 13 1/2), I just didn't think about what size it actually would be.  They were cute, and really the perfect size for young children, however, they really weren't big enough to put more than one or two small to medium size books.  We made Nursery Rhyme books (below), using a standard size prong pocket folder, and it rounded up when the kids tried to put it in the bag.



We also put together a very simple "Nursery Rhyme" book, using just a regular pocket folder with prongs, found in school supplies aisle or office supplies.  The children glued a cover image to the front of the folder.  Each week, the children will receive a coloring sheet with the week's nursery rhyme on it.  They can take it home and put it in their folder and then have a book when they are finished.

I also had handouts available about the nursery rhyme "Hickory Dickory Dock".  The first was an "Itsy Bitsy Book"...a nice little book for beginning readers to put together.