Toddler Time - At The Beach!

Today's Toddler Time was all about the beach! It's summer (finally, even if I don't like the hot), and the beach is such a perfect theme for summer.

Books We Shared
This week we read two of my absolute favorite books. First I had a show and read version of I'm the Biggest Thing in the Ocean by Kevin Sherry. OMG, I love this story so much. It's a perfect story for a show and read/show and tell as well.

Next up we read A Beach Tail by Karen Lynn Williams. I have so much love for the illustrations in this book. They are so detailed and have so much life.

Flannels We Shared
I turned I'm the Biggest Thing in the Ocean into a show and read story this week. As I read the story I placed the pieces on a magnet board. They LOVED this so much, we ended up doing it three times. The first time I read the book and placed the pieces, the next two times we just placed the pieces. I used the patterns from KidzClub which are adorable and free.

We also had a flannel game based off the Little Bird game using pails and a little tiny whale (He's adorable if I do say so myself.) which I found on the Fun With Friends at Storytime blog, and a counting rhyme with shells.
     Little Whale
     Little Whale, Little Whale
     Are you in the [color] pail?

     3 Little Seashells
     3 little seashells all pearly new,
     Swish! went the waves and then there were two.
     2 little seashells lying in the sun,
     Swish went the waves, and then there was one.
     1 little seashell lying all alone,
     I picked it up and took it home!

Rhymes We Shared

As usual we sang our shaker song from Jbrary and our closing song of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. The Shaker Song continues to be a favorie, and no one (grown ups) has gotten bored with it yet!

Early Literacy Tips We Shared

• Children learn language by listening. They learn new words and absorb general knowledge about the world around them. Talking to your child can help them develop vocabulary. Stretch your child's vocabulary by repeating what they say and adding new words. "You want a banana? That's a healthily choice."
• Singing slows down language and helps children hear the different sounds that make up words. Singing also develops an awareness of rhythm and syllables.

Toddler Time - Mud and Dirt

Today's story time was all about dirt and mud. Seemed fitting after the ridiculous amount of rain we've been getting!

Stories We Shared

Our first story of the day was UnderGround by Denise Fleming. I have so much love for this story it isn't funny.

Our second story is more appropriate for early spring, but I love it so we read it anyway. Mud by Ray.

Flannels We Shared

What goes with mud better than pigs? Nothing! Today's flannel was from Sunflower Storytime.

     Five little pigs rolled in the mud
     Squishy, squashy, felt so good.
     The farmer took one piggy out.
     ‘Oink, Oink, oink,’ the pig did shout!

           4,3,2,1

     No little pigs rolled in the mud.
     They all looked so clean and good.
     The farmer turned his back and then,
     Those pigs rolled in the mud again.

 Note: because my kids are so young we only used 3 piggies.

Rhymes We Shared

Today we sang our Shaker Song, but added the rest of the verses to it. Our verses aren't in the same order as Jbrary's, mostly because I had shortened the song to begin with, but we were SUPER excited over this song. We sang it 6 times. Six times. Yes, six. Then we played with our shakers, taking turns deciding where/how we would shake them. Always a huge hit.

     Shake Your Shaker
     Shake your shaker in the air
     Shake it here, shake it there
     Shake your shaker in the air
     Shake your shaker

     Shake it up and shake it down
     Shake your shaker on the ground
     Shake it up and shake it down
     Shake your shaker

     Shake it fast and shake it slow
     Shake it stop, shake it go
     Shake it fast and shake it slow
     Shake your shaker

     Shake it high and shake it low
     Shake it yes, shake it no
     Shake it high and shake it low
     Shake your shakers

We closed with Eensy Weensy and Twinkle Twinkle as is becoming our habit lately.

Early Literacy Tips We Shared

Don't forget, talking with your child helps them learn about the world around them. As children listen to spoken language they learn new words and what they mean while gaining important knowledge about the world around them.

Toddler Time - Orange!

This was week two of my color series! Last week we read about the color red, this week we're doing orange! Last week was the first of this color series. Hopefully it works well.

Stories We Shared:
Due to a couple of factors we only read one story today. Everyone had so much energy that I focused on more movement, and I had no one to cover the Children's Desk so I had to cut Toddler Time short today.
We read Orange, Pear, Apple, Bear by Emily Gravett today. It's a nice short book with fun illustrations. It worked perfectly for my distracted group today.

Flannels We Shared:
Again this week we did the Little Bird flannel from last week. We'll be repeating this one for the next few weeks. (To see my flannel for this one check out the link above.) Little Bird is a great color learning rhyme.
     Little Bird
     Little Bird you've flown so far,
     And now it's time to rest.
     Fly back and sleep in your
        RED nest!
     Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple

I also wanted a flannel STORY this week. I went looking for either a good flannel story of The Carrot Seed (not my favorite because the book is teeny) or a version of The Turnip. I ended up finding an awesome version from an old Flannel Friday post by Miss Mary Liberry talking about the story The Great Big Turnip from The Bilingual Book of Rhymes, Songs, Stories, and Fingerplays. It's  a shorter story with only 4 animals, so kept the attention of my toddlers. Little Bear discovers something orange (in the original purple) in the ground and wants to take it to Momma Bear. She gets help from Squirrel, Skunk, and Mouse and they bring it to Momma Bear who identifies the veggie and makes soup!

I'd like to send a HUGE shout out to the wonderful librarians at the Scarborough Public Library for scanning the story and emailing it to me the day before my program! They totally made my day.

Rhymes We Shared:
Since I'm focusing on a lot of repetition for this color series we again sung Shake Your Shaker by Jbrary. It's fun, it's easy to sing, and it's shakers! Win all around.
Shake Your Shaker
     Tune: London Bridge
     Shake your shaker in the air
     Shake it here, shake it there
     Shake your shaker in the air
     Shake your shaker

     Shake it up and shake it down
     Shake your shaker on the ground
     Shake it up and shake it down
     Shake your shaker

We also sung Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and danced with our scarves to De Colores by Raffi again today. Both are always a hit.

Early Literacy Tips We Shared:
Again, since I'm doing repetition for this series my tips were repeated from last week.

• Research shows that repetition helps young children form and maintain connections in their brain and nervous systems. 
• Color and shape are among the first concepts babies learn. Babies can begin to associate words with objects and people as early as 6 months. Parents who identify the color of objects and frequently repeat this concept will find that their toddlers will start to recognize color names quickly. 

Toddler Time format

I'm working on a new format for my Toddler story times.  This is the first time I've done a toddler program, my previous library only offered programs for 3+ when I did programming.  When it was finally allowed I had been moved out of children's programming.  So as I go along I am learning and experimenting.

Last session I did:
Opening rhyme
Book
Poem/fingerplay
Book
Poem/fingerplay
Play time

As I ran the program I was continually researching, reading blogs, and seeing what others did in their programs.  I also offered a survey asking what parents thought at the end of the program.  Unfortunately, I didn't get as many suggestions as I hoped from that.  But, I do think I've picked up some good ideas from other story timers.  So I'm changing how I do things.  I'll see how it goes and tweak things for the fall.

My new format will be:
Welcome songs & announcements
Intro song
Repeat rhyme (a rhyme we will repeat for 3 weeks)
Book
Shake my sillies out (Raffi)
Rhyme
Book
Flannel
Rotating nursery action rhyme (we will cycle through 4 different rhymes, 1 a week)
Goodbye song
Play time

I'm hoping that this new format will work out well.

*Songs/rhymes will be on a separate post or page, when I'm not using my tablet and have full blogger functionality.