Flannel Friday: Great Big Enormous Turnip

While the thought of eating an itty, bitty turnip let alone a great, big enormous one totally grosses me out, this is one of my favorite stories to tell. There are several versions, of course, and I chose to flannelize the animal version of the tale.

A horse is out walking in the fields, as horses are wont to do, when he comes across what appears to be a tree. But Horse knows better. It is a Great Big Enormous Turnip. Horse grabs hold of the turnip and begins to pull, and pull, and pull…but the turnip doesn’t budge. It stays–stuck–in the ground.

Along comes Sheep, who sees Horse trying to pull a tree out of the ground. “What are you doing, Horse?  Why are you trying to pull a tree…”  Then Sheep begins to sniff, sniff, sniff. “Why, that isn’t a tree, that’s a turnip!”  “Help me, Sheep! Help me pull this delicious turnip up out of the ground!” says Horse. So Sheep grabs hold of Horse’s tail, and together they pull, and pull, and pull…but the turnip doesn’t budge. It stays–stuck–in the ground.

Repeat the above with dog and cat.

Then along comes mouse, who is the smallest of all. The other animals aren’t sure that she will be much help, but they really, really, really want that Great Big Enormous Turnip, and Mouse really, really, really wants to help, so they ask her to grab on and help. So together they pull, and pull, and pull…and pull, and pull, and pull…and pull, and pull, and pull…until…POOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP! Up comes the Great Big Enormous Turnip!

And all the animals share their turnip and eat it up together. Except for Mouse, who doesn’t like turnips, but is happy that she was able to help her friends succeed.

I love that this story offers so many chances for the kids to join in telling the story. Words can be repeated, everyone makes the pulling motion, and everyone together makes the loudest POOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP! noise possible.

The pieces are clipart, printed out and laminated, easy peasy.  Just be sure that all your animals point in the same direction when you are choosing your clipart–they need to be able to grab onto each other’s tails ( I learned that one the hard way).  And my turnip is so big and enormous that it took up two pieces of paper.

Ah flannelboards–all the fun and none of the turnip!

Holiday update: Big Pumpkin is a somewhat similar Halloween picture book that is a great read aloud.

This week’s  Flannel Friday roundup can be found on Future Librarian Superhero.  Click the Flannel Friday icon on the side of this blog entry to go to the Flannel Friday Pinterest account. If you’d like your own badge, go to Mel’s page to get the code (on the right hand side of the page). Archived Flannel Friday roundups can be found at sotomorrow.  There is even a Facebook page now! Check them out, just do that right now!

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