Story Time Registration

Story Time registration will begin at 10:00 a.m. on Monday, January 4th.  Our classes will be held on Tuesday or Wednesday at 10:00 a.m. for our Jr. classes, suggested age 2-3 years. And Tuesday or Wednesday at 11:30 a.m. for our Preschool classes, suggested age 3-5.  Register at Eventbrite.com, you can follow a link from our webpage www.bcpl.lib.ut.us. Limited space is
available, so plan to reserve your spot early. Classes have a suggested donation of $1 for the session, to help cover the cost of supplies. You do not need a library card to attend. Story time classes include stories, games, activities, rhymes and a craft. These classes last approximately 50 minutes.

For those wanting a drop-in option; we will resume our Free Reading Time programs on Thursday, January 7th at 10:00 a.m. This program is for all age children. Those children under age 6 must be accompanied by an adult. Reading Time will include stories, songs, and rhymes and last about 30 minutes. This program will continue throughout the school year.

For more information about our children's classes contact Michele Schumann, children's librarian at the library 435-723-5850.

Story Time Review

Halloween Story Time

Our final week of this session and we did Halloween stories with the children. We read It's Halloween Night by Jennifer O'Connell, Ghost Ate it All by Janee Trasler, The Spooky Wheels on the Bus by Elizabeth Mills, Algernon Graves is Scary Enough by Peter Bollinger and How Big Could your Pumpkin Grow? by Wendell Miner.

Since the Ghost Ate it All book is so small I decided to translate it into a flannel board story. I printed off pictures of the food mentioned in the story and laminated it. I then made a tissue paper ghost and printed out a picture of the Frankenstein monster. This worked so well the kids really enjoyed it. As an extension activity I also printed out some picture of Halloween items like spiders and bats and such. I took an empty milk jug and cut out a square mouth and drew on some black eyes with magic marker. Then the kids took turns choosing a picture and feeding things to the ghost. Sorry somehow the photos of all of this got deleted from the staff camera! But I think you can use your imagination since it was fairly straight forward.

For our craft we continued with The Ghost Ate It All theme. I gave the children a die-cut ghost and some pictures of the Halloween items we used for the previous activity. They glued the ghost onto a piece of construction paper and added what they wanted inside the ghost. Then they could take home the ghost and retell the story.

Next session will begin in January! Registration day will be January 6th at 10:00 a.m.
See you all soon!

Michele Schumann,
Children's Librarian

The Eensy Weensy Spider...came to Story Time!
This week our story time topic was spiders. We read Halloween Bugs by David A. Carter, A Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle, and Spider Sandwiches by Claire Freedman with our Jr. classes.  We read Be Nice to Spiders by Margaret Graham, The Spider and the Fly by Mary Botham Howitt with Illustrations by Tony DiTerlizzi, and The Eensy Weensy Spider Freaks Out (Big Time!) by Troy Cummings with our preschoolers.

We did a couple of spider finger plays and of course we had to sing the Eensy Weensy Spider song.

I created a spider web with some chairs and some yarn and the children pretended to be little bugs and climb under the web without getting caught by the spider. To add to the challenge, I hung some bells on the web. If they touched the web they would be caught when the bell rang and alerted the spider.

For our craft we created a web for our spider using a paper plate and some black yarn.

Next Week: Flies and bugs
Michele Schumann
Children's Librarian

Story Time with the Stars!

This week we read books about stars in our classes. We read Wynken, Blynken and Nod by Eugene Field, How to Catch a Star by Oliver Jeffers, The Stars by Martha Rustad, Flashlight by Betsy James, and Star Climbing by Lou Fancher. I loved using The Stars non-fiction book in the mix. I approached it with an introduction, what you might not know about stars. As we read, it was great to stop and ask, "Did you know stars are burning?" it made for some nice discussion.  We used the book and CD When You Wish Upon a Star. The book has paintings by Eric Puybaret which illustrate the words of the song from Walt Disney's film, Pinocchio, the CD contains the song performed by Judy Collins. After we played the song we did an activity with a magic wishing wand and repeated the poem Star Light, Star Bright. Each child got to tell us their wish when the magic wand pointed to them. The best wish of the week was for a unicorn!

Another fun activity we did was play a shooting star game. I made some "stars" out of tinfoil. They were cheap and easy and the best part is  they are so light weight they can't really hurt if they hit you. Then we held up a hula hoop and the children tossed their stars through. We started out low and they rolled them through then I raised it higher and they tried again. We played several rounds until the hula hoop was up to the ceiling. I was surprised at how much the kids loved such a simple game. Some even asked if they could take their stars home. 

For our craft we made a star necklace with a simple star die cut and some yarn. We decorated the star with colored salt.  The salt is easy to make, just add a few drops of food coloring to a Ziploc baggie full salt. Mash it around until it is the color you want, adding more food coloring if you want it darker. Pour out onto a paper plate to dry overnight before using. Apply glue to your project and sprinkle, much like applying glitter. I used salt shakers from the dollar store.

 Next Week we will change our focus toward Halloween and talk about spiders!

Michele Schumann,
Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

When the Moon Hits Your Eye...

This week for our Story Time classes we discussed the moon. We read The Mouse Who Ate the Moon by Petr Horacek, Papa Please Get Me the Moon by Eric Carle, Kitten's First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes, and Hello Moon! by Francesca Simon with our Jr. classes. We added Ten Moonstruck Piglets by Lindsay Lee Johnson and The Boy and the Moon by James Carroll for our preschool classes.


We did some space finger plays and the song Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star with our Jr. kids. We sang the song Aiken Drum and used some picture props on the flannel board to help everyone remember the words. I also used the flannel board to introduce the nursery rhyme Hey Diddle Diddle. After we had done the rhyme the traditional way we mixed up the pictures so we ended up with a silly nonsense rhyme, something like... Hey diddle diddle the cow and the fiddle the dog jumped over the spoon, the little cat laughed to see such a thing and the dish ran away with the moon.

 For our older kids we did an activity on the white board. I used a picture of the moon taped on the
board and we talked about the legend of how some people say the moon is made of green cheese. Then I asked the kids to decide of what they thought the moon could be made of. We listed the answers on the board around the moon. One especially thoughtful child decided that since the moon floats in the sky it must be made of a balloon. Other answers included wood, bricks, bubbles and plastic.

For our craft we created a night sky picture with black construction paper, a yellow cut out of the moon and some star stickers. Our take home pages were a space objects page and a circle pre-writing practice sheet.

Next week: Stars and Space
Michele Schumann
Children's Librarian

Welcome Back to Story Time!
Finally our fall session of Story Time has begun. We started this week with the theme of Bedtime. I read Goodnight Dog by Ed Heck, Goodnight Tiptoe by Polly Dunbar and  Put Me to Bed! by Nicola Smee with our Jr. Story time classes. We read What! cried Granny: an almost bedtime story by Kate Lum, What's Under the Bed? by Joe Fenton, Floop in the Dark by Carole Tremblay and Sleepy, oh so Sleepy by Denise Fleming  with our preschool classes.

 I showed them the Van Gogh painting Starry Night and we talked about how you know that it is time for bed.

We sang Rock-a-bye baby and rocked an animal puppet to sleep. Most of the kids know this song so they could sing along easily. We did the rhymes/songs No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed, 5 Bears in the Bed, and Mother Hen and her Chicks. We also did the following finger play:
Here is the baby, (hold up one finger)
Here is her bed, (hold up the other hand palm up)
Here is her pillow, (wiggle thumb on "bed" hand)
So lay down her head, (lay finger across bed)
Pull the covers up nice and tight,  (fold fingers over baby)
Then rock her and kiss her (rock and kiss baby)
And tell her good night. (whisper) (if baby isn't asleep hold up finger and cry, then begin again)
Of course, the baby never goes to sleep the first time. So I ask the children what they think the baby could need to go to sleep. They give answers from a bottle or teddy bear to a diaper change or a lullaby. We do the rhyme again as many times as we can allowing for our schedule, making sure that the baby has what it needs each time. If they mention that she needs a bedtime story we always read her one of ours. And of course, she is asleep at the end.

We talked about bedtime routines and did an activity on the board about which bedtime activity should we do first. Get in pajamas then take a bath? Get in bed then turn off the lights? Get a drink then brush your teeth?

For our craft we had a die-cut paper doll that the children colored. I gave them each a picture of a pair of pajamas or a nightgown that they colored and glued on to get the paper doll ready for bed.

Our take home pages were a bed time routine chart and a pencil drawing of the Van Gogh painting to color on our own.

Next week: The Moon

Michele Schumann
Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

Flutter and fly into Story Time

This final week of our Story Time session we focused on bugs. We read The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, I Love Bugs by Emma Dodd, The Apple and the Butterfly by Mari Lela, Summer Birds: The Butterflies of Maria Merian by Margarita Engle, Lady Bug on the Move by Richard Fowler, and Alpha Bugs by David A. Carter. Surprisingly, the favorite book of the week was the wordless book The Apple and the Butterfly. It describes how a worm gets into an apple, how it gets out and the general life cycle of a moth. This deceptive book looks so simple but is fascinating it show the changing seasons and lots of other details one might miss if not studying the pictures closely.

We Used the CD Tiny Tunes by Carole Peterson to play the song Fuzzy Wuzzy Caterpillar and I am a Butterfly. I pre-cut some fabric to have the children hold in each hand to make "butterfly wings" as we danced around the room. If you had scarves you could use them for this simple activity. Continuing our butterfly theme, we water color painted some die-cut parts for a butterfly and glued them to a mask for our craft.

Our take home page also featured butterflies to trace, to practice our pre-writing skills.

Next session registration is June 3rd at 10:30 a.m.

See you then!
Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

Story Time is Egg-citing!

This week we talked about eggs. It was a fun topic to bring in a little Easter without actually doing an Easter theme. We read Oliver by Christopher Franceschelli, Egg Drop by Mini Grey, Ten Eggs in a Nest by Marilyn Sadler, Roly-Poly Egg by Kali Stileman, Egg in the Hole by Richard Scarry, and The Golden Egg Book by Margaret Wise Brown.

We played with our shaker eggs and we had a game of follow the leader with eggs. I filled plastic Easter eggs with small notes and had each child draw an egg one at a time. I would read the note and then we would do whatever activity it listed. Hopping like a bunny, singing like a frog and spin around 5 times fast were some that we did that were fun.

For our craft I just gave each child a paper with a white oval printed on it. Then I set out sequins, stickers paper shapes and other items that the children could decorate their egg with.

Our take home page was a dice rolling game. It had two rows of eggs each with numbers from one to six. To play the players get six markers like beans or buttons or pennies. They roll the dice and then place a marker over the number they roll. The first one to cover all the eggs wins.

Next week: Bugs
Michele Schumann
Children's Librarians

Hippity Hop to Story Time!

This week we read about rabbits at Story Time. Our books were Big Bunny by Betsy Gail Rand, The Black Rabbit by Philippa Leathers, Duck! Rabbit! by Amy Rosenthal, Home for a Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown, Little White Rabbit by Kevin Henkes, The Terrible Plop by Ursula Dubosarsky, and Oh So, Tiny Bunny by David Kirk. I used the song  Here is a Bunny by Carole Peterson from her CD Season Sings and Hop like a Bunny from the CD Toddlers on Parade. 

We did a fun activity with the flannel board. I drew some unusual carrots on 2x2 cards. Carrots that were squares or ovals or hexagons. Some that were green and yellow and purple too! Then I taped the carrots to the flannel board and taped some brown construction paper strips over the top to make dirt. Just the tops were sticking out. I had each child come up one at a time and pick a carrot, they showed what kind of carrot they got and then fed the carrot to a hungry bunny. The bunny I made with an empty #10 can. I taped a photo copy on the top of a rabbit face, with a whole cut out for the mouth. The children just slid the carrots through the hole into the can. They loved this activity. It was fun to tell them about real purple carrots, one mom said that they had even grown purple carrots in their garden last summer. 


For our craft we took a plain white paper plate and glued on some white rabbit ears. We used a pink pom pom for his nose and some cotton balls for his puffy cheeks. We glued on some googly eyes and drew a mouth and little tongue. Some children drew on whiskers as well. We could have also used pipe cleaners for whiskers but our Walmart was out of them the day I went shopping for supplies and I didn't have time to drive anywhere else to get them. 

Our take home pages included some bunny finger puppets to color and cut out and the finger rhyme 5 Little Bunnies.

Next week: Eggs, both the regular kind and the Easter kind
Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

I Can Quack like that!

This week for our Story Time classes we read about ducks. We read Clumsy Duck by Britta Teckentrup, Duck to the Rescue by John Himmelman, It's Quacking Time by Martin Waddell, 10 Little Rubber Ducks by Eric Carle, The Fuzzy Duckling by Jane Watson and Ducks don't Wear Socks by John Nedwidek. I made flannel board pieces to tell the Ducks don't Wear Socks story. This book is a simple story about all the silly things a duck wears to try and make a serious girl smile. In the end she turns the tables on him and makes duck laugh by dressing up like a duck. I like this story because the duck is a mallard and gives the children a chance to see a different type of duck. They are not all just fuzzy and yellow.

Ducks Don't Wear Socks Flannel Board

We sang 5 Little Ducks with some stick puppets and sang Little Duckie Duddle by Carole Peterson from her CD Tiny Tunes. We played a game called Do like a duck does. I had several rubber ducks of different colors on the board and as we said the poem we would take down each duck and do the action. The poem is:
I am a little yellow duck,
as happy as can be.
You can be my special friend
If you talk like me!

Rubber Duck Poem/Flannel Board 

For each duck we changed the color and the action, we swam, walked, shook our tail feathers, and flapped our wings. It was a great wiggle activity and went well with the 10 Rubber Ducks story.

For our craft we made a duck from a paper plate, some feathers, and some construction paper feet, beak and head. Simple and cute glue activity. For our take home pages, I sent home a set of five little ducks for the children to color, so they could sing the 5 little ducks song at home and a maze titled  "Help the duck find the pond".

5 Little Ducks song puppets

    Next Week: Bunny Rabbits
    Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Paper plate duck craft

Story Time Review

Heigh Ho! The Piggy Oh...

This week in Story time we continued our farm animal theme with pigs. We read the books Piggies by Audrey Wood, Ping Pong Pig by Caroline Church, Churchill's Tale of Tails by Anca Sandu, Piggy Pie Po by Audrey Wood, Pigs to the Rescue by John Himmelman and Happy Pig Day! by Mo Willems.

In the book Ping Pong Pig the little pig jumps on a trampoline in an attempt to fly. So I pulled out the parachute and used a pig puppet to have the children assist the pig in "flying". It was great fun to try and get the pig to jump as high as the ceiling. In the end we discovered that pigs don't fly, just bounce.

I used the same pig puppet to sing the song, Pig on her Head by Laurie Berkner. It was fun to have the children come up one by one and we sang about the pig, their name and where the pig was sitting. On noses, necks, toes and ears we funny places for our pig to sit. It goes like this...
Laurie has a pig on her head
Laurie has a pig on her head
Laurie has a pig on her head
and she keeps it there all day!

Oliver has a pig on his nose
Oliver has a pig on his nose
Oliver has a pig on his nose
and he keeps it there all day!

...and so on, until everyone who wanted a turn had one.

I looked at  the end papers of the book Happy Pig Day for inspiration for our craft. In the front of the book the character Piggy is holding a sign that says I love Pigs. In the back the character Gerald(an elephant)
is dressed up in a pig nose and is holding a I love Pigs sign. So naturally we created a I Love Pigs sign and a pig nose to wear. To make the noses, we cut a paper tube into thirds, covered it with pink construction paper then taped a pink circle to the top. Punch two holes on the sides and tie some elastic string in the holes so we could wear them around our head. To make our signs I pre-printed the words and the heart and the children colored them in. Then we just taped the paper to a Popsicle stick. We practiced saying Happy Pig Day in pig, which is, "Oinky, Oink, Oink!"  We even wore our noses and waved our signs when we sang the goodbye song at the end of the day.

Next week: Ducks
Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

Welcome back to Story time!

We had a great first week to our Spring session. We talked about farms and farm animals. We read, Say Hello! Like This by Mary Murphy, Flip Flap Farm by Axel Scheffler, Simms Taback's Farm Animals, Funny Farm by Mark Teague, Big Red Barn by Margaret Wise Brown and Driving my Tractor with the CD by Jan Dobbins. It was fun to listen to the music that goes along with the story and we added 

some simple actions for the part of the

 story that goes, "Chug, Chug, Clank, Clank, Toot!"

We played a game with some of our animal puppets. I would like to be a...cow, goat, frog, pig, etc. Where would I live if I were a cow? What would I eat if I was a pig? How would I sound if I was a frog? It was fun to talk about the answers. Interestingly, I showed the monkey and asked where would I live? A little girl said, "The Zoo!" "That is true, but where else could I live?" I asked.  This stumped them! I guess they have never encountered a monkey in the wild, so this wasn't where they expected to find them.

We sang Old MacDonald and used a paper bag "barn" as a prop to put in different animals as we sang about them. At the end of class, we created a paper bag barn for each of the children to take home, so they could sing the song to their family. I gave each of the children a sheet of animals to color to put into the paper bag barn.

I showed the children some seeds and they tried to guess what kind of plant would grow from each seed. I had a large variety of sizes, from pumpkin to carrots. Many of the children wanted to touch the seeds to explore them that way. We discovered that pumpkin seeds are smooth and beet seeds are very bumpy and rough.

Next week: Pigs!
Michele Schumann
Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

Sharing and Caring @ the Library

For our Story time classes this week we read books on the topic of sharing. We used The Bear who Shared by Catherine Rayner, We Share Everything! by Robert Munsch, Should I share my Ice Cream? by Mo Willems, Dot and Dash Learn to Share by Emma Dodd and Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister.

Instead of reading the Rainbow Fish story I showed a YouTube Video  found here. I don't usually show movies since I feel like they get more than enough screen time but this video was simple and creative using the original illustrations and the text was read by Ernest Borgnine.  After the video we played a game of pin the scale on the fish. I created the fish by copying a fish outline onto poster board. I covered the fish with clear contact paper so we could stick the scales on without damaging the
drawing. For scales I used my
 1 1/2" circle cutter to cut out circles from some glitter paper and some shiny foil coated paper. For our younger classes I just let the kids each have a scale and stick it on. For the older kids we used a blind fold.  During this activity I talked to the kids about how when someone shares with us then we return the favor and share with them. We "shared" back some of the Rainbow fishes' scales.

We used the song Wonderful Friends from the CD Music Time by Johnette Downing and clapped along and followed the directions in the song for finding a wonderful friend.  We had a guessing activity where I hid a toy inside a #10 can. I had prepared the cans before by cutting a hole in the plastic lid and stretching and gluing a tube sock over the hole. The children could reach inside the sock and feel what was in the can but could not see it or pull it out. They had to guess what toy was inside that we could share. I hid a stuffed animal and a ball in them. The ball was easy to guess, the stuffed animal (The very hungry caterpillar) was harder.

For our craft I used a print out of a fish outline that included scales. I gave the children some glitter and foil papers cut into scale shapes to glue on. Then we used watercolor paint to make the fish rainbow colors.

This was the final week of our Story time session. Registration for the next session will be on March 11th at 10:30 a.m. Hope to see you there!

Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

We Love Story Time!

This week we took time to celebrate the St. Valentine's Day holiday. We read Louanne Pig: In the Mysterious Valentine by Nancy Carlson, Be Mine Be Mine Sweet Valentine by Sarah Weeks, There was an Old Lady who Swallowed a Rose by Lucille Colandro, If you'll be my Valentine by Cynthia Rylant, Henry in Love by Peter McCarty and Love Monster by Rachel Bright. I also had planned to use Happy Valentines Day Curious George by H. A. Rey but I didn't have time for this title.

We got our wiggles out with the CD Smart Moves II, using the track Balance it on my Head. I gave each child a beanbag to balance on their head and we marched, skipped, danced and spun around trying to keep the bean bag in place without touching it with our hands. Tricky to do when skipping! We also did an activity with some valentine hearts. I had written an activity on the back of each one and one at a time the children chose a valentine and we stretched, or blinked or jumped. The children enjoyed choosing. One three year old took her heart and since she, of course, couldn't read it she just made something up. "It says to jump up and down." she guessed.  It didn't, but I thought that it was great that she tried to read it on her own and failing that predicted what it might say.

For our craft we created a Valentine Day hat with a simple paper plate and some heart stickers and plastic jewels. Our take home pages were Valentine related find the item that doesn't belong and a tracing page with hearts to practice writing control.

Next Week: Sharing
Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

What Shape is Story Time?

This week we explored more shapes in our Story time classes. We read Mouse Shapes by Ellen Stoll Walsh, The Shape of my Heart by Mark Sperring, It Looked like Spilt Milk by Charles Green Shaw, What Shape? by Debbie McKinnon, and  I am a Blop! by Herve Tullet. Although I wanted to focus on shapes I found that a lot of these titles were also good at discussing that everything has a shape, not just what we call "shapes". It is a bunny shape or a house shape or a people shape. To help with this line of thought I used balloons and filled them with a variety of things. Salt, beans, water and corn syrup etc. They all had the same shape of a balloon but when the children held them and squished them they were very different. Some were hard some soft, some smooth and some bumpy. I loved this activity but one of our mom's in our Jr. Story time class is highly allergic to latex! Oh, I felt so badly for exposing her. She ran upstairs and took allergy meds and we had to make sure that her daughter washed her hands very well at the end of class. I usually am aware of things like peanut allergy and that is why I don't often give food to kids during our classes but this was a new and scary allergy to worry about.

We got out the Sound Shape drums and played around with different ways to play them. Fast, slow, loud, quiet, on the side, on the bottom, with your fingers, toes, elbows and head. Lots of fun and really noisy for the library. We danced along to the tune We are Rolling from the CD Smart Moves II.

For our craft we used heart shapes, stickers and markers to make some "Love Bug" valentine day cards for someone in the child's family. A lot of pieces but they were super cute when they were finished.

Next week: Valentine's Day/Love
Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

'Round & 'Round in Story Time!

Our lesson for Story time classes began this week with an activity of playing with circles. I made the circles using 1" clear tubing, some bulk sequins and a  1" piece of dowel rod to make a connector. These circles can be used in a variety of ways. We drove them like a car, we twirled them around on our arms, we held them up like picture frames around our faces and we sat inside of them. We looked inside the circle to see if we could find different shapes in the sequins. I can see a green leaf or a purple heart, can you find one too? Who knew that a simple hoop could be so much fun!  Our stories were mostly about circles although some general  shape books were also included. They were Circle Dogs by Kevin Henkes, Shapes: Circles by Esther Sarfatti, Math Everyday: Shapes around Us by Daniel Nunn, So Many Circles So Many Squares by Tana Hoban,  Dot by Patricia Intriago, and The Dot by Peter Reynolds. I liked including the Shapes Around Us book because the front of the book is completely lacking any circles. I introduced the book by asking the kids if they could find any circles. Then when they said no, I asked them what shapes they did see. It was a great way to get them really looking at the book cover! This subject can get a bit repetitious because shape themed books don't usually have a story line and tend to be mostly the same. I loved that Circle Dogs and The Dot both were real stories!

I pulled out the parachute and we played along to the song Round and Round the Village from the CD Smart Moves II by Russ InVision. I pointed out to the children that the circle of our parachute was made up of different colored triangles, it was interesting to see them recognize that shapes can be made of of other shapes put together. While we were in the circle anyway we also played the classic Ring around the Rosie game, this was a huge hit with the 2-3 year old kids and even the 5 year old kids liked it well enough to play several times. In between books, we used the CD Put your Finger in the Air by William Janiak and played the track Make a Circle to get some of our wiggles out.

For our craft we made fruit loop necklaces. Instead of stringing them onto yarn, which is always too floppy. I gave the children plastic lace. It is just stiff enough to push through the holes and it doesn't shred or fray like the yarn always does, even if you put tape on the end. Plastic lace is small too, so even tight holes in the cereal can work. Of course, I had to give them extra cereal because who can resist eating some, or even most, of the cereal before it is strung. One little girl of about 2 1/2 kept telling her mom to stop touching her cereal! Mom was trying to show her how to string it but she wasn't interested, she just wanted to eat it. One little boy said to his mom, "I want some milk with my cereal!"  I love it :) I was torn this week about a craft. I could have had them make paper chains but I realized that I have never done cereal necklaces in all the time that I have done Story time, so it was a fun new craft for us.

Our take home pages were a shape recognition sheet and a find the shapes in the picture sheet.
Next week: More Shapes!

Michele Schumann
Children's Librarian

Storytime Review

Once there was a Snowman at Storytime!

This week for our Story Time classes we read about snowmen! Our books were Snowmen at Work by Caralyn Buehner, Snowy Blowy Winter by Bob Raczka, Making a Friend by Alison McGhee, Just a Snowman by Mercer Mayer and Snowzilla by Janet Lawler. To begin our class we did a white board activity. I had drawn shapes on cards and put them in a basket. The children would draw out a shape and I would draw that shape on the board. As we combined the shapes a snowman was drawn. For example a triangle became his nose and circles became his body or eyes and squares for his hat or buttons etc. A great activity for identifying shapes.

We sang the tune of happy birthday and instead of the traditional words we gave things to a snowman.
Here's a carrot for you
Here's a carrot for you
Here's a carrot, Mr. Snowman
Here's a carrot for you!
(We also sang about eyes, buttons, scarf and hat)
I used some laminated construction paper cutouts of each item and as we sang about it, we added it to our white board snowman (I erased some details).
We also used the CD Season Sings by Carole Peterson and built a snowman and did a couple of snowman action rhymes.

For our craft we used a piece of blue construction paper and painted a snowman with shaving cream/glue/glitter paint. We added the parts of the snowman like google eyes, buttons and an orange triangle. Easy peasy craft, a little messy but since it's shaving cream, a cinch to clean up. After it dried it took on some of the color of the blue paper, so they did kind of turn purple, but what can you do?

Our take home pages included a note for the mom's about how to choose a child's book and 10 reasons to read to your child. Previously posted on our blog on January 9th. We also sent home a sheet for the kids to practicing writing wavy lines and a snowman dot-to-dot.

Next week: Circles

Michele Schumann
Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

Wonderful Winter @ the Brigham City Library

We discussed playing in the snow this week in our Story Time classes. We read First Day of Winter by Denise Fleming, In the Snow, Who's been Here? by Lindsay Barrett George, Snow by Roy McKie and No Two Alike by Keith Baker.

I started the day with a big brown paper bag. We discussed things that you might need to go outside and play in the snow like gloves, a jacket or a scarf. I pulled each item out of the bag as we talked. We discussed what each item did. Keep your hands warm, or keeps you dry etc. We did several snow related finger plays and one flannel board activity with snowmen.

"Five little snowmen" flannel board activity, use 5 snowmen on the board. Remove one after each verse.
   Five little snowmen sitting by the door
   One hopped away and that left, four.
   Four little snowmen sitting by the tree
   One skipped away and that left, three.
   Three little snowmen sitting in the morning dew
   One danced away and that left, two.
   Two little snowmen having lots of fun
   One slid away and that left, one.
   One little snowman sitting in the sun
   Oh no! do you know what happened?
   He melted and that left none!

We danced along with the tune Hat, Jacket, Pants and Boots from the CD Season Sings! by Carole Peterson. We created some snowflake crowns for our craft. I cut strips of card stock 1 1/2" wide and stapled two together to make a strip long enough to go around the children's heads. Then we stapled three die cut snowflakes onto the headband. We added some silver jewels and other sparkly white beads. Then we covered the snowflakes with glue and added white glitter "snow" to each crown.  Messy but they turned out super pretty and fun. Lots of the glitter ended up on my clothes and in the kids hair, but that is part of the fun of glitter.

I sent home two take home pages. One practice writing sheet where the children duplicated the patterns shown and the other a story mat of a snowman picture. The picture included questions like "How many trees are in the picture?" or "Count all the mittens in the picture."

Next Week: Snowmen!
Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

Happy Holidays from Story Time!

This week we held our final story time classes before Christmas and so I finally had to do Christmas stories. I decided to focus on Christmas trees. We read Christmas Tree by Wendall Minor, Suzy Goose and the Christmas Star by Petr Horacek, Dream Snow by Eric Carle, Mr. Willowby's Christmas Tree by Robert E. Barry, and Minerva Louise on Christmas Eve by Janet Morgan Stoeke. Another title I could have used but didn't have time for is 10 Trim-the-Tree'ers: A Holiday Counting Book by Janet Schulman.

I created some jingle bell props by threading a pipe cleaner through the top of a Christmas bell and twisting the ends together to make a loop. We rang  our jingle bells and sang the traditional carol then used the jingle bells to dance to the tune Jingle, Jingle, Stop by Carole Peterson on her new CD Season Sings.  We used the jingle bells with the story Suzy Goose and the Christmas Star. In the story Suzy Goose gets lost in a snow storm but finds her way again when she hears her friend the cows' bell ringing. As she followed the sound in the story I had the children ring their jingle bells to help her find her way.

I made a simple outline of a tree on green poster board and hid circles of decorative paper around our story time room. I had the children hunt for the "ornaments" and hang them on the tree with tape. This simple activity was the favorite of the week, almost as exciting as decorating a real tree.

For our craft, I had a simple outline of a tree and gave the children green paint and a plastic fork instead of a paint brush to paint it. I showed the children how to make evergreen type patterns with the fork by dipping it into the paint and pressing the fork flat against the paper. After the tree was painted we added red hot candies for some decorations.

Next week: Merry Christmas everyone! Our next session will begin on January 14th, with registration on January 7th at 10:30 a.m.

Michele Schumann
Children's Librarian

Story Time Review

Mmmmmm, I smell Cookies!

I am still not in much of a Christmas mood so instead of reading Christmas stories this week for our Story Time classes I decided on cookies as a theme. I could still tie it in to Christmas a little bit but we could read all types of stories.  I chose Mr. Cookie Baker by Monica Wellington, The Cow Loves Cookies by Karma Wilson, Maisy makes Gingerbread by Lucy Cousins, The Doorbell Rang by Pat Hutchins, and Mmmmm, Cookies by Robert Munsch. I also used the Little Golden Book version of The Gingerbread Man by Nancy Nolte. Other books that would have worked well with this theme are Cookies: A Mr. and Mrs. Green Adventure, and any of the Cookie books by Amy Krouse Rosenthal among many others.

We played a game of Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar? on the flannel board using several bears that were pictured doing different things like picking flowers or wearing a tutu. I hid cookies beneath the one that was riding a bicycle and we would repeat the old rhyme. Then I would let the children decide which bear they wanted to look under, and ask is the dancing bear hiding the cookies? etc.

I had another activity planned that just wasn't coming together when I was doing my prep work, so last minute, I changed and made a simple matching game. I took some of the cookie cutters that we use for Playdough and traced them onto poster board. Then I placed the cookie cutters in a basket. I traced enough that each child could have a turn. They each took a cookie cutter out of the basket and then they matched the cutter with the correct outline. It was such a hit that several children wanted to play with the poster and cookie cutters at the end of class. A surprisingly simple game with fun results. I deliberately outlined the shape in a color different from the actual cookie cutter so the child had to focus on the shape.

We used the CD Action Songs for Preschoolers and danced along with The Bean Bag Rock, using bean bag props.

For our craft I prepared a copy of a simple gingerbread man outline on cardstock. I had the children color the details like buttons and eyes. Then using a homemade puffy paint recipe they painted the gingerbread man brown. The recipe required that we cook the paint so I hauled the library microwave downstairs. Since the paint needed to be brown I added cinnamon. The wonderful about it was as the gingerbread cooked the entire library filled up with the scent of cinnamon. The library still smells great this afternoon!  The drawback to it was that the paper warped a little bit during the cooking process so the gingerbread me didn't lay completely flat.

Our take home worksheets included a gingerbread man color by number and a roll a gingerbread man game.

Next week:  Christmas Trees
Michele Schumann, Children's Librarian