Baby Bloomers- Winter & Snow

Our Babies enjoyed a morning of Winter & Snow stories, snowflake dancing songs, flannels, and fun. Before each class we had a chance to play with small toys and board books with a nice soothing melody playing on the background.  This gives everyone in the group a chance to say hi and for the babies is a great way to relax and interact with each other.

We started our program with our opening song "The More We Get Together" followed by our "Wiggle, Wiggle" rhyme.  This short rhyme is becoming a great way to stretch and get moving for some of our early walkers.  Our first book was


The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats,  I was very excited to read this book again and the babies loved the big format and the bright suit our main character wears. As a prop I used a stuff toy that resembles the boy in the story. It was perfect!

We followed our story with the "Five Little Snowmen Fat" flannel and a short song "Say, Say, Oh Baby" from Mel's Desk.  The next book was


How To Build A Snowman by Jon Moon.  The text in this book is minimal but the tactile and visual images are perfect for babies. I had the babies touch the different parts as we were reading from the soft snow to the leathery buttons.  We followed the book by building our own snowman.  This is the our final "Baby Snowman"

 


We followed our flannel with "Mitten Weather" song/fingerplay and the  "Three Little Kittens" nursery rhyme.  Our final book was



My First Season: Winter by Giovanni Caviezel. The size of this book is not ideal but the images are bright and the text stands out against the white snowy landscape.  We closed with our "Dance Like Snowflakes" song using snowflake props.

The babies loved to hold them, and of course to chew on them.  Our final song was "We Wave Goodbye Like This".

Totally Tots- Winter & Snow

Our Totally Tots enjoyed a "Winter & Snow" theme on a bright sunny morning, ideally it would have been snowing but we still had fun with our snowflakes and snowmen.

We started with our opening song "The More We Get Together" followed by a quick fun song that kicks off our story time "Let's Start StoryTime".

Our first book was Ezra Jack Keats classic

 
The Snowy Day I am lucky that our library owns a big book copy which is so much more fun to read and look at when you have a room full of little ones.

We followed the book by building our own felt snowman and a fun fingerplay "Here's a Hill". One of the lines had us jumping on our sleds and ZOOMING down the hill.

Our next book was

 
Oh! by Kevin Henkes I loved this book. The combination of short text against a full page illustration with one focal point work great. I created a flannel using the images and put them up as we were reading and as we were saying goodbye we took them down.

The group was in need of some movement so we did a round of Open, Shut Them and Shake My Sillies- unfortunately they just replaced our computers but not the speakers- the kids didn't mind my singing and we all had fun.

Our final book was

 
Snowy, Blowy Winter by Bob Raczka. The kids were a bit distracted and restless maybe because we kept talking about how much fun they had had sledding over the weekend. To wrap up our session I had make Snowflakes that we used to sing "Dance Like Snowflakes".  We followed all our dancing with our closing song "We Wave Goodbye Like This".

Some of my latest reads

Over the last few weeks I have been trying to catch up with my new juvenile selections. This is an age group that I usually struggle with when recommending what to read next. Here are a few suggestions:

 
Katerina’s Wish by Jeannie Mobley. Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2012. 
Katerina’s life in America is a far reality from her dad's dream of becoming farmers and owning their own farm, instead they are living in a miners camp working their days away with little hope of ever being able to leave the mine.  All this will change when Katerina makes a wish on a magic carp after listening to old Bohemian folk tales but could wishing on a fish truly work?  Would a few seeds and chickens turn their lives around?  Everyone around Katerina starts to believe that dreams do came true, including Mr. Johnson the owner of the only store at the camp. Would he stop Katerina's dreams? Would love and tradition derail her dreams? This book reminded me of The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate, set around the same time period Katerina's defiance of the traditional roles, her passion, ambition, and ingenuity makes her persevere against all odds. Great role model for girls.

Homesick by Kate Klise. Feiwel & Friends, 2012.
Kate Klise is one of my favorite authors, I love her series "Regarding the Fountain"  so when I saw this book on our New Books Shelf I had to read it.  It is a quick read where we meet Benny our main character, who is dealing with his parents separation after his mom leaves him behind with his hoarder dad. Benny has to figure how to help his dad while surviving a collapsing house but a lucky turn would have the entire town pitching in after they win the American Most Charming Small Town contest. Would they manage to clean Benny's ramshackle of a home before the dignitaries arrive or would it be to late? A good read for boys.  

 
Starry River of the Sky by Grace Lin. Little Brown Books, 2012.
I picked this book  after reading reviews about it and while it had a slow start it turned to be an amazing storytelling book.  Rendi has run away from home when he arrives at the Village of Clear Sky. Here he seems to be the only inhabitant to notice that the moon is missing and the sky is oddly crying each night. This changes when a mysterious lady arrives at the Inn and they start to exchange stories. Would their exchange solve the moonless nights, the odd rivalries, and disappearances?  The book includes marvelous full-color illustrations with Chinese folklore, fascinating characters, and exciting adventures.
 

Baby Bloomers- Noise & Quiet

Our Baby Bloomers theme this week was "Noise & Quiet" same as Wednesday's Totally Tots group but with different books, rhymes, and songs.  It was adorable to see the little ones come in smiling and ready to play with the toys and books I set up for them.  The group was the same size, which works great in our small room but we had a few new babies.

This week's program started with our opening song "The More We Get Together" followed by this quick rhyme "Wiggle, Wiggle" we actually sing it twice because the tune is catchy and the little ones liked it.
Our first book was

Pots and Pans by Patricia Hubbell. We had a couple of late comers right as we started the book, which resulted in interruptions and cry-outs. I had been very excited about this book because the story carries a tune when read aloud but with all the interruptions the rhythm was broken. Overall I think this book could work well with babies and could be paired with a nice flannel.

We followed with a finger play from Mel's Desk- This Is Big and a the noise flannel I used with Totally Tots. The older babies on the group were excited to participate and share animal and trucks noises. 

The next book was

The Baby Goes Beep by Rebecca O'Connell. I had anticipated the babies to be really interested in the bold and bright illustrations, plus all the noise going around this book but it seemed they were more interested on each other.  The adults seemed to enjoy the book and could relate to the final page when baby is peaking over his crib at his sleeping parents.
I was very excited about our next song because it was the perfect transition to our last book.  I found this song "Clap My Hands" by Milkshake on their "Happy" album. The volume and pace is ideal to sing along, plus I included the lyrics on my handout so we could all sing together. It worked so well that we decided to sing it twice :)

My last book was
 
Clap Hands by Helen Oxenbury. This was another book I was very excited because I had managed to secure a large size (not big book size) ideal for everyone to see the large illustrations.  The text is minimal and the book is over in 8 pages. It was a great closing for all our clapping.

I decided to go ahead and hand out small shakers after checking with the parents for our "Hokey Pokey" rhyme song and it actually worked better than the day before with the Tots. The noise level was manageable and we were able to sing and shake at the same time. Success!

I had one last book handy and a few minutes so decided to read it as well, it was a repeat from the Totally Tots group
 
Toot Toot Beep Beep by Emma Garcia.  The older babies on the group kept making the car noises and pointed to some of the cars and trucks. 

After this book we just moved to our closing song "We Wave Goodbye Like This".  Some families stayed in our story hour room after the program ended, which I always encourage because it give us a chance to get to socialize plus the babies were having so much fun playing and interacting with each other.  I truly enjoyed this session and our families, at the end of my day yesterday I was reflecting and realized how blessed I am to have this amazing job.