Baby Lapsit 7-27-17

Last Baby Lapsit of Summer Reading!

After the usual introduction, our first story of the day was I Love my Dinosaur by Caroline Jayne Church. It's a very cute, very short board book about a child and her stuffed dino. Caroline Jayne Church has a series of "I Love My ___," including a puppy and a robot, among others. All of her books are short, sweet, and perfect for readers under two.

 

Our lap bounce portion began, as always, with "Bumpy Road." Grownups are instructed to seat their baby facing forward on their laps and bounce along with me as I demonstrate with a roughly baby-sized teddy bear. Here is the chant:

Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Smooth road, smooth road. (Move baby smoothly back and forth)
Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Smooth road, smooth road. (Move baby smoothly back and forth)
Rough road, rough road! (Bounce baby higher than before)
Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Rough road, rough road! (Bounce baby higher than before)
Hole! (Hold baby under armpits and let them fall between your legs)

Mixing it up today, our lap bounce songs were "Wheels on the Bus" and "Pop Goes the Weasel." I like "Wheels" because it can work as a lap bounce or simple gesture song, and is therefore great for all ages. I like this particular version because after the mommies and daddies are done saying "shh shh shh," they also say "I love you."

Click here to listen to the version of "Wheels on the Bus" that I use.

The second story today was One, Two, Baa, Moo by Jonathan Litton. Farm animals are always a winner with the teeny tinies. Plus, this is a pop-up book, so it's full of surprises!

Our last song before saying goodbye was one of my favorites, "The Goldfish." I have to shout out again to Laurie Berkner for her wonderful children's music that I shamelessly steal almost every storytime. 

I don't have a list of display books this week because there was no solid theme. Thanks for reading!

Baby Lapsit 7-20-17

Hello again! Today's Baby Lapsit did not have a theme. Instead, I relied on some tried and true storytime favorites because we're knee-deep in Summer Reading and planning time has been scarce!

After the usual introduction, I segued right into the lap bounce portion instead of reading a story first.

Our lap bounce portion began, as always, with "Bumpy Road." Grownups are instructed to seat their baby facing forward on their laps and bounce along with me as I demonstrate with a roughly baby-sized teddy bear. Here is the chant:

Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Smooth road, smooth road. (Move baby smoothly back and forth)
Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Smooth road, smooth road. (Move baby smoothly back and forth)
Rough road, rough road! (Bounce baby higher than before)
Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Rough road, rough road! (Bounce baby higher than before)
Hole! (Hold baby under armpits and let them fall between your legs)

I used "Walkin' Ol' Joe" and "The Noble Duke of York" next, which are both great lap bounces but very different from each other in terms of tempo. "Joe" changes up several times to show the different speeds the horse walks, while "Duke" stays at a steady marching beat the whole time. I've found that both babies and grownups stay more engaged if you keep your activities varied. 

Our story today was I Am Tall by Flying Frog, a fun, short story about animals of varying sizes. The great thing about this one is it's a lift-the-flap. It's great for teaching small children about opposites. And, they get a big surprise at the end when you actually have to turn the book sideways and lift the flap to expose the tall giraffe!

The last song we did before saying goodbye was "Milkshake," a storytime classic that works great as a lap bounce or simple song with gestures. I saw grownups doing both, and it made me happy that they make this program their own and do what feels best to them and their baby! I do it with the music, but I've also included a great video from the amazing blog Jbrary where they do it a capella. 

Preschool Storytime 7-20-17

Hello again, and welcome to another Preschool Storytime post!

We have been doing a lot of themed storytimes lately, and today's theme was supposed to be robots, but I had trouble finding anything to go with that theme except the "I Am a Robot" song (which we did actually dance to today). I figured rather than put on a subpar storytime that stuck with a difficult theme, I would put on a GREAT storytime without a theme. 

So our first story today was I Am Tall by Flying Frog. This is a lift-the-flap book I like because at the end, you have to physically turn the book sideways in order to reveal the tall giraffe. It's also a fun book of opposites, and the preschoolers have fun calling them out. I like to prompt them by saying things like, "If the bird is small, then the giraffe is..." and they almost always catch on right away. 

Our first movement song of the day was "Clap Your Hands," which I got on a burned CD from a previous library and haven't been able to find another downloadable version of since. Some children's songs are illusive like that (and like the Out of the Box goodbye song), and I'm glad I kept my version because it's a great movement song that keeps the kiddos engaged. I like to start it out by asking if they know how to clap their hands, stomp their feet, brush their teeth (that always gets a laugh), and touch their nose. They always respond that they do, and show me how they do it. My answer before pressing play is, "Well then, you guys will do great at this next song!" I've found a short introduction like this to movement songs makes them more interested to see what is about to happen.

This is the version of "Clap Your Hands" that I use. 

Next we danced to "Arms Up," a simple and slightly mellower tune which is also impossible to find on the internet without knowing who sings it. 

Click here to listen to the version of "Arms Up" that I use.

Our second story was Grumpy Bird by Jeremy Tankard. I love, love, LOVE this book. It is so funny, and formulaic enough that the kids can follow along almost immediately, without ever becoming boring. 

 

One thing I like to do with this book is teach the kids the sign for "grumpy" before we start reading. Then every time the bird declares that he's grumpy, we practice the sign while making our grumpiest faces.

angry/grumpy

Our last movement song was the fun, fast, and silly "I Am A Robot." Even though the kids (and me, most of the time) have a hard time following all the directions quickly enough, we all have fun doing our best robot dance and powering down at the end. 

After that, we said goodbye to all our friends until next week, and ended with the bubble-filled baby mosh pit that pretty much the best part of my day.

Play Book BINGO Live!

This event was the culmination of a whole summer's worth of passive programming.

For the whole summer, I printed BINGO boards that I made for children, tweens, and teens, and left them at the circulation desks so kids could pick them up and mark off what they read. There were spaces for actual books that had pictures of the covers, and there were also spaces with descriptions of books such as "A book that takes place in Arizona" or "A book with an LGBTQ+ main character." For these spaces, the kids could choose their own books as long as they applied to the description, and write them in.

When the boards were returned to the library, participants received a prize from the treasure chest if they had completed one row, and $2 to spend at our used book sale for a totally full board. Click on the pictures to enlarge for a closer look.

Picture book board 1

Picture book board 2

Picture book board 3

Tween/middle grade board 1

Tween/middle grade board 2

Teen/YA board 1

Teen/YA board 2

Teen/YA board 3

Finished tween board!

Finished picture book board!

Finished picture book board!

For the BINGO Live event, I printed and laminated 20 BINGO boards with book cover art in each square (the fill-in-the-blank concept would have been too difficult to incorporate in this program, I think). I created a slide show with the cover art and brief synopses of all the books that appeared on every BINGO board from the passive program. Then I randomized the slide show so the slides would appear out of order, and projected the slides on the wall.

We played several rounds, including a couple of total blackout rounds. The winners of each round received a snack of their choice from my snack bin and a $5 gift card to our book sale.

What I liked about the passive BINGO program was that, like the Summer Reading Program itself, it encouraged children to use their summer vacations to read as much as possible. It also gave a mix of book suggestions and opportunity to choose their own.

For the active program, I was able to show more than 50 titles to a group of people who may have never heard of them. Not only that, but the group was diverse in age. We had a family with little ones drop in, a couple groups of middle- and high-schoolers with their chaperoning adults, and even several retired adults who like BINGO! I was delighted by the turn out, and will definitely repeat a Book BINGO program again.

Book Notes

This is a program I put together as a drop-in for teens and tweens, but it would have been applicable for readers of any age. The goal was to write inspirational notes that we will leave in books in the Young Adult section, especially books with difficult themes such as suicide, drugs, abuse, rape, and difficult LGBTQ+ issues. It was a really easy one to put together, and well-received by out summer visitors, especially a group of teen volunteers.

Here are some of the many amazing messages the teens wrote, on the template I made so they can be recognized by our staff as a piece of a library-sanctioned program:

They had a good time coming up with encouraging, funny, and uplifting messages to add to our circulating library books.

I will be making color photocopies of the originals and replenishing the supply in our YA section every few months. I kept the originals so that they will not get damaged in circulation, and I always have them to refer back to.

Baby Lapsit 7-6-17 Feelings

You can find my Baby Lapsit hello and goodbye routine by clicking this link. 

The theme today was feelings. Our first story was Wild Feelings by David Milgrim. It doesn't have a story, but I like this book because it helps kids associate their feelings with things they understand, like animals. It asks questions like "Have you ever felt as stubborn as a mule? As chicken as a chicken?" and ends by normalizing these feelings: "Of course you have. Everyone does."

Our lap bounce portion began, as always, with "Bumpy Road." Grownups are instructed to seat their baby facing forward on their laps and bounce along with me as I demonstrate with a roughly baby-sized teddy bear. Here is the chant:

Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Smooth road, smooth road. (Move baby smoothly back and forth)
Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Smooth road, smooth road. (Move baby smoothly back and forth)
Rough road, rough road! (Bounce baby higher than before)
Bumpy road, bumpy road. (Bounce baby on lap)
Rough road, rough road! (Bounce baby higher than before)
Hole! (Hold baby under armpits and let them fall between your legs)
I used the theme of "pop" for our two musical lap bounces today. First, "Pop Goes the Weasel," where the grownup bounces their baby on their lap until the POP, when they lift them up high. Next we bounced to Raffi's "Popcorn." the sizzling is similar to our "smooth road," and then the baby POPs up high again at the end! I like to do this song twice because it's less than 30 seconds long.

Our second story was Llama, Llama, Mad at Mama by Anna Dewdney. This is another one that definitely went over the babies' heads, but the grownups enjoyed it. I also shortened it by paper clipping some of the middle pages together. None of the plot was lost, the babies are still able to enjoy the rhythm and rhyme, but they don't have to sit still and quiet for quite as long.

To conclude feelings day, we sang "If You're Happy and You Know It" with gestures, clapping, stomping, and cheering. Then it was time for our closing songs, bubbles, and toys (see above). Here is a list of books I displayed:

• Feelings—Aliki 
• Consider Love—Boynton
• Who Is Happy?—Jarvis 
• If You’re Happy and You Know It—Ormerod 
• Wild Feelings—Milgrim
• Stuck With the Blooz—Levis
• I Am Yoga—Verde
• Llama Llama Mad at Mama—Dewdney 

Preschool Storytime 7-6-17: Feelings

Today's storytime had some good moments, but the second half was overall not very successful because of too many wiggles and too mellow of music and stories. But, it was a learning experience, and maybe I'll try a feelings storytime again at some point. 

First, we said hello with our usual introduction. Our first story was Stuck With the Blooz by Caron Levis. This book is a great one for learning how to get rid of a bad mood, but would be better for one-on-one reading than storytime with a group because of the length. 

Next we sang my favorite version of "Happy and You Know It," and "Milkshake" to get some wiggles out. 

Our second story was I Am Yoga by Susan Verde, which I was especially excited about because of my recent discovery of the music artist Emily Arrow. She takes children's books and writes songs about the stories they tell. We read the book first, and then I attempted to lead the kids in some simple yoga moves while listening to the song. It was a great idea poorly executed because they weren't that receptive, but I might try it again at some point with an older group.

I was successfully able to get the kids to listen to one more short book, Wild Feelings by David Milgrim. It's a very easy book to listen to without a real storyline, just comparisons between feelings and animal traits. If you're ever at a loss in a group of four-year-olds, just ask them what sound a lion makes and enjoy the ROAR!

Our last song before goodbye was "It's Time to Stand Up."

Here is a list of the books I displayed for feelings storytime:

• Feelings—Aliki 
• Consider Love—Boynton
• Who Is Happy?—Jarvis 
• If You’re Happy and You Know It—Ormerod 
• Wild Feelings—Milgrim
• Stuck With the Blooz—Levis
• I Am Yoga—Verde
• Llama Llama Mad at Mama—Dewdney