Flannel Friday: One Day in the Jungle

Adapted from Colin West’s book One Day in the Jungle, this flannel (magnetic board in actuality) was a BIG storytime hit this week.  And fun, too!  But get ready to sneeze. I did this for my sneezes and noses program, and we had already done quite a bit of sneezing by the time we got to this point in storytime (sneezing into our elbows, of course).

The story is simple: one day in the jungle, there is a little sneeze (butterfly).

   

Lizard says “bless you, butterfly”. The next day in the jungle there’s a not-so-little sneeze. It’s Lizard, of course, and Parrot says bless you.

Then it’s Parrot’s turn, and Parrot sneezes a big sneeze. The sneeze chain goes all the way to Elephant (with the sneezes getting bigger each time), who says after his ginormous sneeze “Bless me, I’ve blown away the jungle!”  When I say this, I take the tree off the board.

We do each animal’s sneeze as the story moves along. By the time we reach the elephant, the kids are so ready for that ginormous sneeze!

The animals and tree are from coloring pages that I colored with markers.

This week’s round up is being hosted by Katie (thank you, Katie) from Storytime Katie.  Be sure to visit the beautiful Flannel Friday Pinterest account. So Tomorrow has past roundups and the future hosting schedule, as well.

favorite storytime book of the week

My favorite book from this week’s storytime was One Day in the Jungle by Colin West.  I actually made a flannelboard for this book to use this week, but this book remains a favorite of mine to use in storytime.  The illustrations in this book are delightful, and I love the bright, happy colors.  When I read the book out loud, I always have a hankie (actually just a square of brightly colored fabric) handy to emphasize the sneezes.

Flannel Friday: underpants matching game

What’s up with these suspiciously grinning dinosaurs? Why, they don’t have underpants on, of course.  I made up this flannel game to go with the book Dinosaurs Love Underpants by Claire Freedman.

We matched underpants to dinosaurs. This pair goes–

here.

I made several dinosaurs and pairs of underpants  (the patterns were coloring pages).  I  colored pairs of dinos/underpants to match each other. The underpants stick to the dinos via double sided tape.

This week’s round up is being hosted by Meghan (thank you, Meghan) from Busy Crafting Mommy.  Be sure to visit the beautiful Flannel Friday Pinterest account. So Tomorrow has past roundups and the future hosting schedule, as well.

 

favorite storytime book of the week

My favorite book  this week was Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes by Eric Litwin. This book is so much fun to read out loud. The kids loved saying “Oh, no!” My favorite comment came from one little girl who, when Pete’s shoes turn blue, said “now his shoes match his fur!”  Love that.  Oh, and the parents loved Pete’s comments, but see how old it makes you feel to have a child ask you “what’s groovy mean?”

(not a) flannel friday: 5 Little Valentines

I have had this rhyme in my files for many years:

Five Pretty Valentines waiting at the store.
(name) bought one and then there were four.
Four pretty Valentines shaped like a “V”
(name) bought one and then there were three.
Three pretty Valentines said “I love you”
(name) bought one then there were two.
Two pretty Valentines, having so much fun.
(name) Bought one and then there was one.
One pretty Valentine says “buy me and run”,
(name) did just that, and then there were none.

I wasn’t planning on using the rhyme, UNTIL…

I bought these.

They are the cutest knitted finger puppets!  I bought them from a local store, and they had so many I could barely choose which ones to buy. I settled on these, with more to come, I’m sure.

Anyway, while trying to figure out how to use these puppets in storytime, I remembered this rhyme. I thought that instead of using a (name) in the rhyme, I could use a puppet.  I wanted to use the pink glove to fit into my Valentine’s theme. The hearts (the Valentines from the rhyme) are attached to the glove with velcro dots, and I was ecstatic to see that the hearts (or rather the velcro dot on the back) stuck to the knit finger puppets!!!

So, it took a minimum of finagling, but here’s how it worked. I put on the glove with the hearts attached, and had the finger puppets on the table next to me.  I said the rhyme, had the kids show me the numbers with their fingers, and when I got to the (name) part of the rhyme, instead of a name I said the name of the animal, who then took a Valentine off the glove.  Fun!

  

 

 

favorite storytime book of the week

My favorite storytime book this week is Hugless Douglas by David Melling.  The search for the just-right hug is one that we can all relate to. And the kids loved the sheep hugs! The end pages are great.

This week’s storytime theme: getting dressed

favorite storytime book of the week

My favorite storytime book this week is Let’s Play in the Forest While the Wolf Is Not Around by Claudia Rueda.  I turned this into a participation book by having the kids call “wolf, are you there?” with me. And there’s a surprise ending, too. So much fun!

This week’s storytime theme: getting dressed

The Tree Stump

This is my live-action version of  The Tree Stump.  The reader is too short (in length) and small (in size) to share as a book, but it’s such a fun story that I made this version for storytime.  I used a paper grocery sack and small stuffed animals to recreate the story.  Basically, the story goes like this: forest animals find the tree stump one by one, and decide to take a nap/look for a snack/play peekaboo/etc inside.  After each animal’s spiel, I say ‘and he (or she) jumped in’ and then toss the animal in through the hole.

Here is my tree stump:

It’s a paper grocery sack, which I decorated using markers, then cut out the circle from just one side of the sack.

Here are the stuffed animal actors:

I tried to use animals that would naturally live in the woods, but a few of them are a bit of stretch. The kids like those the best, of course.

The animals are happily snuggling inside the tree stump (I have the kids keep track of how many animals are inside as we add them to the stump family) when along comes a skunk:

The skunk is missing his animal friends. For some reason (!), he can’t find them anywhere. The kids tell skunk where his friends are hiding, and he jumps in.

When skunk jumps in, the other animals jump out–literally! I take them out one by one, tossing then onto the floor in front of me. Chaos ensues.

As I tell the story, I  keep the animals in a bag next to me.  This one, unfortunately, does some free advertising, but since I keep the bag at my feet, it stays pretty hidden.

The clip on top is extra important. I keep it on the bag until I am ready to tell the story, otherwise the kids’  ”there be stuffed animals near” sense is awakened and the story is over before it began.

Flannel Friday: Who’s Hiding in the Woods?

I saw the Forest Animal flannel on Falling Flannelboards, and thought a version of that flannel would be perfect for my Walking Through the Woods storytime. I changed the basic flannel just a bit and made it into a sort of game. I hid one animal at a time behind the larger woods picture, and gave them the clues (see the link above).  Then we counted to three and took off the woods picture to see who was hiding underneath. The kids loved the game aspect of this flannel, and even the younger kids were able to make good (but not always correct) guesses as to the identity of the animal.

The animals are from Kidzclub.  The picture of the woods is clipart.

Thank you, Falling Flannelboards, for the inspiration!

 

And now a bonus, very silly, flannel, because it was still up on my board at the end of storytime today: 1 little, 2 little, 3 little animals.

I put various and random animals on the board, and we counted to well, 9, because animal 10 was a surprise. Then we sang 1 little, 2 little, 3 little animals.

Oh no, a skunk! We had just done a version of the story The Tree Stump (post coming soon), and so we knew all about skunks, and how stinky they are. Once skunk joined the other animals, it was time for them to leave, so we sang 10 little, 9 little, 8 little animals all the way back down to 1, holding our noses, of course.

The animals, with the exception of the clipart skunk, are from the envelope of generic animals I keep handy, just in case, and are from Felt Board Fingerplays by Liz and Dick Wilmes.

This week’s round up is being hosted by Andrea (thank you Andrea) at Roving Fiddlehead Kidlit.  Be sure to visit the beautiful Flannel Friday Pinterest account. So Tomorrow has past roundups and the future hosting schedule, as well.

favorite storytime book of the week

My favorite book in storytime this week is Mole’s Hill by Lois Ehlert.  This has been a favorite of mine for years. I love the simplicity of the story, the letter Skunk, Raccoon, and Fox leave for Mole, the hill of flowers, and of course the stunning illustrations. The kids loved this one, too!

my storytime theme this week: a walk in the woods