Fizz Boom Read: Space!

 July 8, 2014

Fizz Boom Read: Space!

A storytime devoted to sciency and spacey explorations, entities, and...things that fall from the sky!

Books:

 Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

Oliver Who Would Not Sleep! by Mara Bergman

Henny Penny by H. Werner Zimmermann

How To Catch a Star by Oliver Jeffers

Songs:

Opening Song: Where is thumbkin? - Kimbo

Song 2: Skinny-Marinky-Dinky-Dink - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Song 3: Let Everyone Clap Just Like Me - Wee Sing in the Car

Song 4: Dance Your Finger/Clap Along With Me - Wee Sing for Baby

Song 5: Shake Your Sillies Out - Raffi

Song 6: Wheels on the Bus - 100 Singalong Songs

Felt/Magnet Board:

This week I found a cute rhyme called Five Little Men in a Flying Saucer at Storytime Katie's flannel friday stash!

 Five Little Men in a Flying Saucer

 Five little men in a flying saucer
Looked around the world one day.
They looked left and looked right,
But they didn’t like the sight
So one man flew away.

Four little men in a flying saucer

Looked around the world one day.
They looked left and looked right,
But they didn’t like the sight
So one man flew away.

 And so on...

Experiment:

This week we made SPACE EGGS! Actually - this we a retroactive experiment and it takes 3-5 days to make a space egg and I may have only remembered the day before storytime to prepare for such an experiment...so we actually did the demonstration the following week.... But who cares?! It was meant for this week.

Anyway - SPACE EGGS! aka The Bouncing Egg Experiment.

This experiment is all over the Internet, but if you would like a book on how to do this experiment you can find one here.

Basically - you place raw eggs (as many as you want as long as there's room) in a container. I placed 6 in an 8 cup glass container with a lid. I recommend having a lid! Next, you pour vinegar over the eggs - enough so that they're completely covered. Next, let them sit for at least 3 days. Over that time, the vinegar will dissolve the outer shell (actually, I think it's the calcium in the outer shell that the vinegar dissolves). What you have left is an egg with a flexible coating holding it together. Three of my eggs survived this process - I believe one was already cracked, the other two I cannot account for.

Also - THEY BOUNCE!! And if squeezed - THEY POP!! One of my eggs suffered this fate. So that left us with two for picture taking!

Side Note - they guys REEK of vinegar (hence why I recommend using a lid to keep them). So if you hate the smell, this is not the experiment for you. 

 Craft:

For our craft today we made telescopes to decorate! This came in a pre-made kit and no, I'm not completely sure there is a way to make your own telescope at home. However, if you figure it out - more power to you! I didn't make a completed example mainly because that would be one less telescope to give out to the kids and as it turned out we did only have 1 lonely telescope remaining! Good thing too or there'd be no picture at all here!

Fizz Boom Read: Loud And Quiet

July 1, 2014

Fizz Boom Read: Loud and Quiet!

A storytime devoted to sounds - the loud kinds and the not so loud kinds too!

Books:

Stop Snoring, Bernard! by Zachariah Ohora

Shhh! by Valeri Gorbachev

One Drowsy Dragon by Ethan Long

Noisy Nora by Rosemary Wells

We changed our format and it works brilliantly! We switched from Book*Book*Magnet Board*Attempted Book*Attempted Book to Book*Book*Book*Book*Magnet Board!! And it works splendidly for us!! Needless to say, we're very excited about this four book stuff!

Songs:

Opening Song: Where is Thumbkin? - Kimbo

Song 2: Skinny-Marinky-Dinky-Dink - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Song 3: Let Everyone Clap Just Like Me - Wee Sing in the Car

Song 4: Shake My Sillies Out - Raffi

Song 5: Dance Your Fingers/Clap Along With Me - Wee Sing for Baby

Song 6: Wheels on the Bus - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Felt/Magnet Board:

This week's magnet board is based on a Yiddish Folktale, It Could Always Be Worse by Margot Zemach.

I adjusted a few points in the story, but it's the same basic framework.

Once upon a time, there was a farmer who lived with his wife and many beautiful, loving, NOISY children! Someone was always sick or crying or losing a toy or having a nightmare and the poor farmer could not get a good night's sleep!

So, one day the farmer went to see Wise Old Wendy to ask her advice.
"Wise Old Wendy," said the farmer, "I have such a noisy family - how can I get a good night's rest?!"
Wise Old Wendy thought this over and asked, "Do you have a cat and a dog?"
"Why, yes!" said the farmer, "I am a farmer and I have lots of animals!"
"Bring the cat and dog inside," said Wise Old Wendy, "and you will have the best night's sleep."

So, that night the farmer brought in the cat and the dog. Not only did he have the normal noise of his family, but not there was MEOWING and BARKING too!

The farmer went back to Wise Old Wendy and said, "Oh! I had the worst night's sleep! Not only was my family noisy, but there was MEOWING and BARKING too! How can I get a good night's rest?"
This time, Wise Old Wendy asked, "Do you have any chickens?"
"Why, yes!" said the farmer, "I am a farmer and I have lots of animals!"
"Bring the chicken inside," said Wise Old Wendy, "and you will have the best night's sleep."

So, that night the farmer brought in the chicken with the cat and the dog. Not only did he have the normal noise of his family, but not there was CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too!

The farmer went back to Wise Old Wendy and said, "Oh! I had the worst night's sleep! Not only was my family noisy, but there was CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too! How can I get a good night's rest?"
This time, Wise Old Wendy asked, "Do you have any pigs?"
"Why, yes!" said the farmer, "I am a farmer and I have lots of animals!"
"Bring the pig inside," said Wise Old Wendy, "and you will have the best night's sleep."

So, that night the farmer brought in the pig with the chicken and the cat and the dog. Not only did he have the normal noise of his family, but not there was OINKING and CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too!

The farmer went back to Wise Old Wendy and said, "Oh! I had the worst night's sleep! Not only was my family noisy, but there was OINKING and CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too! How can I get a good night's rest?"
This time, Wise Old Wendy asked, "Do you have any cows?"
"Why, yes!" said the farmer, "I am a farmer and I have lots of animals!"
"Bring the cow inside," said Wise Old Wendy, "and you will have the best night's sleep."

So, that night the farmer brought in the pig with the chicken and the cat and the dog. Not only did he have the normal noise of his family, but not there was MOOING and OINKING and CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too!

The farmer went back to Wise Old Wendy and said, "Oh! I had the worst night's sleep! Not only was my family noisy, but there was MOOING and OINKING and CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too! How can I get a good night's rest?"
This time, Wise Old Wendy asked, "Do you have any horses?"
"Why, yes!" said the farmer, "I am a farmer and I have lots of animals!"
"Bring the horse inside," said Wise Old Wendy, "and you will have the best night's sleep."

So, that night the farmer brought in the pig with the chicken and the cat and the dog. Not only did he have the normal noise of his family, but not there was NEIGHING and MOOING and OINKING and CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too!

The farmer went back to Wise Old Wendy and said, "Oh! I had the worst night's sleep! Not only was my family noisy, but there was NEIGHING and MOOING and OINKING and CLUCKING and MEOWING and BARKING too! How can I get a good night's rest?"
This time, Wise Old Wendy asked, "Go home and put all the animals back where they belong and I promise you, you will have the best night's sleep."

 So, the farmer went home and put the horse in the pasture, the horse in the barn, the pig in the pen, the chicken in the coop, and the cat and dog on the porch. And he truly did have the best night's sleep without all that animal noise!!

PS - all of the adorable clipart came from http://mycutegraphics.com/.

 Craft:

This week we made a rain stick! It'd be fairly simple to make yourself, although ours came from a prepackaged kit. It's a tube (toilet paper or paper towel) with two curled pipe cleaners and a handful of tiny beads or rice inside. You cover the ends with paper (our fancy ones came with foam pieces) and voila! Rain Stick! The idea is that if you tip it slowly from one side to the other, the beads or rice with trickle along the pipe cleaners and make a tinkling sound - a QUIET sound. However, if you shake it it will make a LOUD sound. 

Fizz Boom Read: Butterflies and Insects!

June 24, 2014

Fizz Boom Read: Butterflies and Insects!

A storytime devoted to the little critters that ruins picnics and whatnot!

Books:

Buzzzzz Said the Bee by Wendy Lewison

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

I Love Bugs! by Emma Dodd

Songs:

Opening Song: Where is Thumbkin? - Kimbo

Song 2: Skinny-Marinky-Dinky-Dink - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Song 3: I'm Bringing Home A Baby Bumblebee - Wee Sing Animals

Song 4: This is the Beehive - Wee Sing Animals

Song 5: Eensy Weensy Spider - Wee Sing Animals

Song 6: Dance Your Fingers / Clap Along With Me - Wee Sing for Baby

Song 7: Let Everyone Clap Like Me - Wee Sing in the Car

Song 8: The Caterpillar - Wee Sing Animals

Felt/Magnet Board:

I got the idea for this week's board from Storytime Katie! I simply printed out six basic butterflies and colored them in different colors - much easier than trying to find six butterflies in six different colors! It's a rhyme that goes like this:

The first to come to the garden bed
Is a lovely butterfly of brilliant RED.
Then in comes another and that makes two.
Fly right in, my friend of BLUE.
“The garden is fine, the best I’ve seen,”
says the butterfly of softest GREEN.
Our garden needs a sunny fellow,
Fly on in, butterfly with wings of YELLOW.
Little friend of PURPLE, fly in too.
The garden is waiting for a color like you.
ORANGE, orange, you’re waited so long.
Fly right in, where you belong.
Butterflies, butterflies, you’re such a sight!
Flying together – what a delight!

I paused before each color and showed the butterflies to the kids to try and get them to say the color and complete the rhymes; it mostly worked :-)

Experiment:
This week we didn't do so much of an "experiment" as a presentation. Knowing we were going to explore butterflies and insects and all their sciency wonder, our library was able to get us an Insect Lore Butterfly Garden kit. You send off a little certificate and you receive little caterpillars in a cup in return!  See:

They munch on the brown stuff for a while and eventually spin their cocoons:

About a week and a half later we had butterflies!! We set them in their net (or Butterfly Garden) and let the kids take a look. Let's just say - they were very enthusiastic! We had a small release ceremony (one little girl showed up) and had to manually help the butterflies out of the netting. Once they took off, they were long gone!

Craft:
This week our craft was a caterpillar!!

His circles are connected with tiny green brads (I finally learned the proper name for those metal connector thingys) so that he can wiggle along. Very, very cute!!

Fizz Boom Read: Opposites!

June 17, 2014

Fizz Boom Read: Opposites!

A storytime devoted to things that are opposite, alike, or just plain different!

Books:

Oppsnakes by Salina Yoon

Eric Carle's Opposites by Eric Carle

Ten Dirty Pigs, Ten Clean Pigs by Carol Roth

Silly Sally by Audrey Wood

Songs:

Opening Song: Where is Thumbkin? - Kimbo

Song 2: Skinny-Marinky-Dinky-Dink - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Song 3: Dance Your Fingers/Clap Along With Me - Wee Sing for Baby

Song 4: Let Everyone Clap Like Me - Wee Sing in the Car

Song 5: Shake My Sillies Out - Raffi

Song 6: If You're Happy And You Know It - Kimbo

Song 7: Wheels on the Bus - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Felt/Magnet Board:

This week we did two magnet boards - one in the middle of storytime and one at the end. We're finding that this helps keep the kids on track and brings their focus back to the stories.

To fit in with our Opposites theme we first did 5 Pigs So Squeaky Clean:

5 pigs so squeaky clean,

Cleanest pigs you’ve ever seen,

Wanted to go outside and play

1 jumped into the mud,

landed with a great big THUD!

now there are 4 pigs squeaky clean...

And so on until you have no more clean pigs!

I loved Miss Mary's idea of having one side of the pigs clean and one side dirty so I decided to use that in my magnet board. I used a basic, cutesy pig clipart picture and added splotches of brown mud in Microsoft Publisher, but you could easily drawn muddy splotches on your pigs pictures.

I then printed out a set of clean pigs and a set of dirty pigs, cut them out, and attached a magnet to each side - THEN I glued them back to back. You end up having a magnet facing each way on the inside so either way they will stick!

At the end of our storytime, we did a Tortoise and the Hare magnet board.

It's our telling of the classic story. Once upon a time there was a Tortoise and a Hare. The Hare was the fastest animal in the forest and would tease the slow Tortoise. So they decided to have a race to see who who really was the faster animal!

The Hare took off like lightening while the Tortoise lumbered on - slow and steady. The Hare soon became very tired from running so fast for so long. He figured he was far enough ahead of the Tortoise that he could take a nap and still win. So, the Hare lied down and took a nap under a tree.

Meanwhile, the Tortoise lumbered on, slow and steady, until he reached the finish line! The Hare had slept straight through the race! And the Moral is: Slow and Steady Wins the Race!

Fizz Boom Read: Weather!

June 10, 2014

Fizz Boom Read: Weather!

A storytime devoted to wonderful weathery sciency stuff! Clouds and rain and tornadoes and more!

Books:

Itsy Bitsy Spider by Iza Trapani
Cloudette by Tom Lichtenheld
If Frogs Made Weather by Dane Bauer


Songs:

Opening Song: Where is Thumbkin? - Kimbo

Song 2: Skinny-Marinky-Dinky-Dink - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Song 3: Dance Your Fingers/Clap Along With Me - Wee Sing for Baby

Song 4: Let Everyone Clap Like Me - Wee Sing in the Car

Song 5: Shake Your Sillies Out - Raffi

Song 6: Itsy Bitsy Spider - Wee Sing Fingerplays

Song 7: It's Raining, It's Pouring - Wee Sing Fingerplays

Song 8: Mr. Sun - Raffi

Song 9: Wheels on the Bus - 100 Singalong Songs

Felt/Magnet Board:

Today we did a magnet board version of Leo Lionni's A color of His Own - the story of a chameleon who is tired of constantly changing colors and wants a color of his own (hence the title). It's a very, very cute story and since it involves leaves changing colors we decided to use it for our weather theme (it kinda makes sense! but whatever - it's cute!).

Ms. V printed out copies of the book's illustrations and we used those as our magnet board pieces. The illustrations are so vibrant, it really worked beautifully. We did this in the middle of our storytime when attentions were beginning to wane and the kids really seemed to enjoy the story.

Experiment:

Torandos!!!! Sort of!

We made a tornado in a bottle this week to show a scarier part of weather. It's not all sunshine and rainbows after all! We were fortunate enough to get two plastic tubes to connect two bottles to form the necessary parts to create a tornado! We then talked about motion and air movement and whatnot though frankly the kids were more interested in the spinning water than why it worked!


If you are not fortunate enough to get such a fantastic device, then you can make your own using duct tape and this book:

Craft:

This week we made a Weather Wheel Chart!! Whoo-Hoo! These kits were very simple - printed circles to color, a paper fastener, and a paper arrow - they were done in about 10 minutes, no problem!

Fizz Boom Read!: Colors

June 3, 2014

Colors!!

A storytime devoted to the SCIENCE of colors!

This is the first official week of Summer Reading for 2014! Our theme this year is "Fizz Boom Read!" which is a science based theme. So we put our super science thinking caps on a came up with 9 weeks of (what we hope will be) super fun!

Books:

Where is the Green Sheep? by Mem Fox

Monsters Love Colors by Mike Austin

Mouse Pain by Ellen Stoll Walsh

Songs:

Opening Song: Where is Thumbkin? - Kimbo

Song 2: Skinny-Marinky-Dinky-Dink - 100 Singalong Songs

Song 3: Dance Your Fingers / Clap Along With Me - Wee Sing For Baby

Song 4: Put Your Little Foot - Wee Sing Fun N Folk

Song 5: Let Everyone Clap Like Me - Wee Sing in the Car

Song 6: Shake My Sillies Out - Raffi

Song 7: Wheels on the Bus

Song 8: Mr. Sun - Raffi

Felt/Magnet Board:

Because we noticed last week that doing a magnet board towards the end of our program helps the kids refocus, we decided to give it another try this week. So! We pulled off TWO magnet board this week.

We started with a rhyme called "Mixing Colors" which I found at loving2learn.com. It goes:

Red, blue, and yellow

all standing in a row.

I mix them together

and this is what they show.

Orange, purple and green

these are the colors

that can be seen.

So, I had Red Blue and Yellow in a row and then I showed what happens when we mix the colors together:

Our second magnet board was What House is the Mouse In? We ask "Little Mouse, Mouse are you in the (color) house?" and we pull of the houses until we reveal which house the mouse is in!

Of course the house is in the last house you call out, but they don't need to know that!

Experiment: 

Yes! Yes! In the spirit of our Summer Reading theme we did a little experiment. Our experiment came from the book How to Make a Liquid Rainbow. I thought the "rainbow" part of it would be cool with our colorful theme. 

 

Now, it's supposed to look the the cover: a series of bright, happy, colorful layers that DO NOT MIX due to their various densities. I used the ingredients listed: corn syrup, dish liquid, water, oil, and rubbing alcohol. Apparently I did something wrong or my ingredients didn't get the memo because my rainbow turned into the black blob below:

So I did a little tweaking and used the three layers I knew without a doubt would not mix: corn syrup, water, and oil. I colored each layer to make them easier to distinguish. PS - Did you know you cannot color cooking oil - they color just forms little droplets that don't mix in with the oil. I learned something new!

I colored the corn syrup blue and the water red and was forced to leave the oil alone. And it made this: 

So I asked the kids "What will happen if I mix this up? Will the colors mix and make a new color or will they separate back out and make three different colors again?" The kids were pretty excited to see and, of course, the layers separated back out after I shook the jar. Not too bad for not being what I expected!

Craft: 

We made a very prettyful rainbow this week! It was a prepared kit (thank goodness) and we had only just enough to pass around! The direction were a bit confusing, but the kids produced some beautiful crafts!

Animal Mommies

May 27, 2014

Animal Mommies

A storytime devoted to mommies of the animal variety!

Books:

Hush, Little Dragon by Boni Ashburn
     No, it's not a traditional "animal mommy" story, but...work with me here. It's a new version of "Hush, Little Baby" but with a dragon trying to find food for her baby as the theme.

Babies in the Bayou by Jim Arnosky
     A highlighting of all the babies you find in the bayou:alligators, racoons, turtles, and ducks!

Mama Built a Little Nest by Jennifer Ward
   How many animals make nests? This book goes over a bunch of nest-making animals from all over.

Songs:

Opening Song: Where is Thumbkin? - Kimbo

Song 2: Skinny-Marinky-Dinky-Dink - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Song 3: Shake My Sillies Out - Raffi

Song 4: Peanut Butter and Jelly - Kimbo

Song 5: Dance Your Fingers/Clap Along With Me - Wee Sing for Baby

Song 6: Put Your Little Foot - Wee Song Fun N' Folk

Song 7: If You're Happy and You Know It - Kimbo

Song 8: Wheels on the Bus - 100 Singalong Songs for Kids

Felt/Magnet Board:

This week we did two magnet boards! We started with Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? We were able to easily print the graphics for this magnet board from the wonderful folks at DLTK Teach.That took care of our "Animal" aspect (again, work with me here!).

Out second board we made ourselves using simple clipart from Microsoft Word - 5 Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed. This took care of our "Mommy" aspect...since mama calls the doctor...and she's a mama of monkeys afterall (still...work with me!).

 Craft:

To go with our 5 Little Monkeys magnet board we made a Monkey Mask! Found at FirstPalette.com,
a website filled with tons of simple printable crafts! We printed ours onto different colors of cardstock paper and the kids LOVED looking like monkeys. We then had them tape or glue a large popsicle stick (tongue depressor size) to make the monkey face into a mask.