E-I-E-I-O! Farm Storytime for Babies and Toddlers

I had a very small intimate crowd and it worked very well with these books!

Opening Song:  If You're Happy and You Know It from Music from The Complete Book of Rhymes, Songs, Poems, Fingerplays and Chants

Book:  Who's Hiding? On the Farm by Christiane Gunzi
This is a good lift-the-flap, which are always popular with the baby/toddler crowd.  This one is nice because it has very bright, clear photographs of farm animals.

Book:  Baby's First Farm by Hinkler Books
I used this one to start with to talk about things you might see on the farm.  I asked the kids to tell me about the pictures they saw, since there is no real story.

Book:  Baby at the Farm by Karen Katz
The kids love the touch-and-feel books and this is a great one!

Song:  Old MacDonald Had a Farm from Music from The Complete Book of Rhymes, Songs, Poems, Fingerplays and Chants

Book:  Big Fat Hen by Keith Baker
This is a version of "1, 2, Buckle My Shoe" with beautiful large illustrations.  It's perfect for this age!

Song:  I Know a Chicken from The Best of the Laurie Berkner Band CD

You can read my review of The Best of Laurie Berkner Band CD here.  We absolutely love this CD at home and it's come in very handy at work also.  Here are the lyrics to the song:

 I Know a Chicken
(L. Berkner)

This developed out of an improvisation with the kids. They were playing with egg-shaped "shakers" and I needed a song to go along with it. What could be more fun than shouting out a little blues?

I know a chicken (I know a chicken)
And she laid an egg (and she laid an egg)
Oh I know a chicken (I know a chicken)
And she laid an egg (and she laid an egg)
Oh my goodness (oh my goodness)
It's a shaky egg! (it's a shaky egg!)
Shake your eggs! 

Closing Song:  Roly Poly from Kindermusik's Fiddle-dee-dee
I play this at the end of every storytime and we use shakers to follow along with the motions. 
Here are the words, which can be used with our without the music:

Roly Poly:
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
UP UP UP!
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
OUT OUT OUT!
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
TAP TAP TAP!
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
Lay them in your LAP!

Silly Monsters Storytime for Preschoolers

Book:  Go Away, Big Green Monster! by Ed Emberley

This is an all-time storytime favorite!!  Adults and kids LOVE this one!  This is a great one to remind kids that monsters are make-believe.  They get to help 'create' the monster and also help make him go away!  I also used this Go Away, Big Green Monster! Storytelling Puppet Kit from Lakeshore Learning Materials.

Book:  Go To Bed, Monster! by Natasha Wing and Sylvie Kantrorovitz

In this story, Lucy can't go to sleep.  She ends up drawing a monster to play with and then he is the one who doesn't want to go to sleep!

Book:  Goodnight, Little Monster by Helen Ketteman and Bonnie Leick
A cute story about the bedtime rituals that preschoolers face each night, like bathtime/ brushing their teeth/bedtime stories/etc, but in this one it's a little monster.  He's cute and the illustrations are very popular with kids due to the bugs/spiders/work juice!

Book:  If You're a Monster and You Know It by Rebecca and Ed Emberley
This is a great monster version of "If You're Happy and You Know It!"

Song:  Monster Boogie from The Best of the Laurie Berkner Band CD

You can read my review of The Best of Laurie Berkner Band CD here.  We absolutely love this CD at home and it's come in very handy at work also.  Here are the lyrics to the song:

 Monster Boogie
(L. Berkner)
Susie Lampert, piano
I'm the biggest monster that you've ever seen
My eyes are purple and my teeth are green
I'm big and I'm scary, you know what I mean
This is what I like to do

I do the monster boogie, the monster boogie
The monster boogie round the room
Everybody does the monster boogie
The monster boogie, the monster boogie
So can you

I'm the biggest monster that you've ever seen
My eyes are yellow and my teeth are green
I'm big and I'm hairy, you know what I mean
This is what I like to do

I do the monster wiggle . . .

Rraaaahhh!

Monster Feet Craft:  I found this great 'monster feet' craft from Storytime Crafts by Kathyrn Totten.
I copied the feet on cardstock, cut them out and let the kids color them.  Then we taped them on their hands.  It was a hit!

Mommies Rock! Mother's Day Storytime for Preschoolers

Book:  Mommy is that you? by Atsuko Morozumi

A sweet story with beautiful illustrations!  The ducklings get lost and think that every animal they meet is their mommy, until they are finally reunited with her in the end.

Book:  Is Your Mama a Llama? by Deborah Guarino and Stephen Kellogg
LOVE this one!  Great rhyming text, which makes the story kind of like a game for children to guess the name of the next animal.

Book:  Mommy, Do You Love Me? by Jeanne Willis and Jan Fearnley

This one went over okay, but a much more popular one with adults.  It's the "Mommy, will you love me if I'm silly/dirty/bad/etc," to which the mother always responds that she'll always love her baby, no matter the situation!  Very sweet!

Flannelboard Story:  Whose Baby Am I? by John Butler

I found this printable set of animals for this story, printed them on cardstock, laminated them and put sticky back velcro dots on the back of each one.  I don't use the actual book when telling this one.  Instead, I hand out either the set of baby animals or the mommies (this could be used for daddies too!) to the children and I keep one set.  Depending on how many children there are, I let them have one or two animals each. 

 Book:  Mommy, Carry Me Please! by Jane Cabrera

I like this book, because children are able to see how animal mommies carry their babies, which is usually different than how their mommies carry them.

Today, we had a pretty small crowd, so I decided instead of doing music, we'd do 2 crafts!

Flower Bookmark for Mommy Craft:  I found these on Oriental Trading Company's website.  They're foam flower shapes, with foam stickers the kids could decorate the bookmark with. 

Mother's Day Handprint Craft:  I copied the Mother's Day Handprint poem below on card stock, then painted their hands with red paint and each child made a handprint for their mommy.  This could be adapted for daddies, grandmothers, teachers, etc. 

For Mommy
This little hand will never grow
It will always stay just so
When I am grown and far away,
This little hand with you will stay.

Happy Mother’s Day 2011

Mommies are #1! Mother's Day Storytime for Babies and Toddlers

Since Mother's Day is this weekend, I read books that featured mommies and grandmothers.  I had to shorten this storytime, since we were doing a craft today.

Opening Song:  If You're Happy and You Know It from Music from The Complete Book of Rhymes, Songs, Poems, Fingerplays and Chants

Book:  Charlie Chick by Nick Denchfield and Ant Parker
I absolutely love this one, and the kids do too!  The version I have looks a bit different from the one pictured above and it has a "Press my Tummy" feature, where you can press Charlie's tummy and he cheeps--very popular with kids of all ages.  It's a great big pop-up book with very little text, but very effective for little ones! 

Book:  Little White Fish by Guido van Genechten

This boardbook can be used with many themes: mommies, ocean, or colors.  There are also other Little White Fish books that I like to use:  Little White Fish Gets Bigger and Little White Fish is Happy.

Books:  Where is Baby's Mommy? and Grandma and Me by Karen Katz
The kids love taking turns with lift-the-flaps, so these are always very popular!

Closing Song:  Roly Poly from Kindermusik's Fiddle-dee-dee
I play this at the end of every storytime and we use shakers to follow along with the motions. 
Here are the words, which can be used with our without the music:

Roly Poly:
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
UP UP UP!
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
OUT OUT OUT!
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
TAP TAP TAP!
Roly Poly, Roly Poly
Lay them in your LAP!

Mother's Day Handprint Craft:  I copied the Mother's Day Handprint poem below on card stock, then painted their hands with red paint and each child made a handprint for their mommy.  This could be adapted for daddies, grandmothers, teachers, etc. 

For Mommy
This little hand will never grow
It will always stay just so
When I am grown and far away,
This little hand with you will stay.

Happy Mother’s Day 2011

Welcome to my Storytime Blog!

You may be wondering where the "Longfellow" part came from in my blog title!  My maternal grandfather, Edmund Henry Longfellow, was a descendant of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the poet.  He and my grandmother had three daughters, one of which is my mother, so unfortunately this line of the family name ended with him.  Sadly, I lost my grandfather when I was 2 years old. 

His wife, my maternal grandmother, Mary Grace Orr Longfellow, worked for 17 years (1969 - 1985)  in the same library system where I work. Her favorite part of the job was the weekly storytime.  She's even mentioned in this book, Fountain City-Images of America by J. C. Tumblin.  Their oldest daughter, Anne, who is my aunt, also works as librarian and performs multiple weekly storytimes.

So, it seems fitting that I have carried on this legacy!  It's apparently in my blood, seeing that I have worked for the public library off and on for 20 years now.

The idea of this blog came to me as I often struggle for themes/ideas for my weekly storytimes.  I love browsing other storytime blogs/websites looking for inspiration.  I decided that I'd start organizing my storytime plans so that maybe they could help others get some new, fresh ideas when planning a storytime, a school/daycare lesson, or just for that stay-at-home mommy who wants to get some great new book suggestions!

Every week I plan/conduct a preschool storytime and every other week, a baby/toddler storytime.  My plan is to include the storytime plans each week, detailing the songs/books/fingerplays/flannelboard stories/crafts/etc. that I've used. 

I hope you enjoy visiting and I also hope that you will send me any suggestions/comments!  I welcome any guest posts that you'd be willing to share with my readers, also.
-Julie