Story Time Wednesday! Letter K! Kisses! Knuffles! Cows in the Kitchen! Kites!

 Good afternoon! Welcome to another Story time Wednesday with Mr. Mike! Today we continued our ABC adventure with a letter K story time. Today I tried something new. I remember Sueann Posthumus from the Patmos library showed us a sorting game she used when she had a Things that Go story time.I ran with that idea to sort keys instead. When the kids got into our story time room, there were keys scattered all over the floor and color matching buckets around the edge of the room. "Oh no!" I said. "Someone made a mess with all of these keys! Can you help me pick them up and put them in the buckets? Make sure to match the key color with the bucket color." So glad that Sue P. brought that idea in to share at our workshop. The little ones were scurrying all over the floor to pick up those keys. What a fun activity! I'll definitely try it again sometime.

I went back and forth about which books to pick for today. You have a lot of options when thinking about letter k. I had a few picked out, then changed my mind, and then changed it again last night before I went to bed. I ended up with a good mix of silly, heartfelt, and musical stories that the kids and parents all enjoyed. First I read Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems. I brought in our Knuffle bunny from home and actually taught a lesson on how it actually is pronounced Kuh-nuffle which is the Dutch word for snuggle. Well, the parents can all relate to their own children losing a stuffed animal and not being able to understand what their upset little one wants and the kids think it's funny when Trixie does the baby talk. One of the story time Grandmas actually checked out the other two Knuffle Bunny stories so I was happy. I also picked David Ezra Stein's Dinosaur Kisses. I love this one because it makes me think of when my boys first learned to give kisses. Baby kisses are wide open mouthed, drool-soaked affairs. In this story, Dinah the baby dinosaur is trying new things like stomping, chomping, and whomping. She then sees a kiss! She gets so excited that she tries it out with many different dinosaurs and animals, all with hilarious results. The last book I chose was Cows in the Kitchen by June Krebbin. This one is a musical book with lots of animal sounds to keep the kiddos excited and participating. I had the kids sing along and I strummed/plucked the ukulele for accompaniment. I haven't done that during a book in awhile. It was fun!

The Activities:

ABC Action!

We're All here! (Skip to my lou)
Here, here, we're all here!
Here, here, we're all here!
Here, here, we're all here!
We're here at story time.
Hello _______________. How are you?
Hello _______________. How are you?
Hello _______________. How are you?
Key Sort- I printed six copies of six different colored keys on card stock. I used Yellow, Green, Orange, Pink, Light blue, and Dark blue. I had matching colored buckets to sort into, but you could use just about anything or decorate your own sorting containers. As mentioned above, I scattered all the keys on the floor ahead of time and had the kids pick them up and sort them out.

Letter K Song and Dance
/k/ /k/ /k/ Katie! (Bring both arms up above your head)
Make a line down and (Bring both arms to your toes)
Then go in and then go out (Bring arm close to your body from up above, then shoot it out again low like you're drawing a letter K in the air)
and that's a K!

Repeat three more times!

Cows in the Kitchen- Just like my greeting song, Cows in the Kitchen follows the tune of Skip to My Lou. I had all the kids practice their animal sounds with me as I read. If you use an instrument, I simply alternated between C major and G7 as I sang. When I as turning the pages, I just vamped on a C major until I was ready to sing again.

We Wave Goodbye Like This. (The Farmer in the Dell)
We wave goodbye like this. 
We wave goodbye like this.
We clap our hands for all our friends
We wave goodbye like this.
Switch it up and alternate silly waves a few times.

Craft- Letter K Kites
I hand drew the template for the letter K's. Then I used the scraps to cut out the diamond shapes for the kites. Finally, I found some purple ribbon and cut out small strips for the kids to glue onto their kites. It turned out pretty cute. I got the idea from the measured mom. If you have cotton balls, you could stick them to the background as clouds. This was fun and easy for the kids to do. Nothing more than gluing and sticking.

Nick and Tesla's High Voltage Danger Lab: A book review by Pixelbeard the Librarian

After two long and extremely busy weeks, I am back with a new book review. Here we have the mystery series about Nick and Tesla, two science loving, genius level twins who build gadgets from everyday materials in order to solve mysteries.

These books were written by the team of 'Science Bob' Pflugfelder, a school teacher, scientist, and showman who has been featured regularly on shows such as Jimmy Kimmel Live, and on his website www.sciencebob.com, and Steve Hockensmith who has penned a number of mystery and zombie novels including Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls. This is the first book in the series and since, there has been another called Nick and Tesla's Robot Army Rampage.

Nick and Tesla begin the book in a taxi cab on their way to live with their Uncle Newton (Uncle Newt). We learn that they are going to stay with him for the entire summer when their parents are sent to Uzbekistan to learn about soybean irrigation. Well, Uncle Newt is not the most responsible adult in the world but he does have a super spectacular laboratory that he opens to the kids. The book paints uncle Newt as an eccentric kook with a heart of gold. He obviously has no idea on how to house children and makes us all wonder why any parent would send their children to a person like this. Well, uncle Newt has been working on spray on clothes, so when Nick and Tesla find him in his lab, he is trapped underneath a huge blob of orange foam that has stuck him to the ground. The kids need to find the purple solution to pour on the blog so uncle Newt can escape. He's escapes unharmed, but decidedly orange so he takes to his shower which is behind a submarine airlock door. Before he does this, however he grants Nick and Tesla access to use his lab to build whatever they desire. The kids find the necessary materials to build a soda bottle rocket and take it to a nearby estate yard to try it out. The rocket launches, but snags Tesla's special pendant on it's flight and lands behind a fence. The kids then start to formulate a plan to retrieve the pendant and that leads them to discover that something more sinister is going on.

What I like about this book is that it was very easy to read. The plot moves along at a very brisk pace, on a straight line, with no time spent developing character or getting inside for emotional depth. That isn't what this series is about. The plot itself is fairly cliche, but it is fun to read.

Nick and Tesla themselves are great characters, so is Uncle Newt. They are pretty standard character archetypes, but they work here. Tesla is the adventurous, impulsive one. Nick is the reserved thinker. Uncle Newt is the eccentric inventor who manages to do the right thing in spite of himself. The supporting characters, Silas, Demarco, Lily, Vince, and Frank aren't even really worth a mention because they are paper thin, truly one dimensional. Silas and Demarco are the not so smart sidekicks. Frank and Vince are the tough, gruff bad guys, Lily is the "damsel in distress". Silas and Demarco help Nick and Tesla uncover the mystery, Frank and Vince intimidate and scare the kids.

The writing quality is solid, but standard fare. There isn't anything flashy or overly creative about how the story is told or the descriptions. One might even call the writing drab. However, this is not what these books are about. These books are about the science and that's where their bright spots are.

As stated above, Nick and Tesla use homemade gadgets to help them solve the mystery. These include a DIY (do it yourself) burglar alarm, a DIY car tracker, a nail, wire, and battery electromagnet, and a DIY mentos and coke dog distractor. It's really fun to read about them in action, but even MORE fun is that the book actually includes blueprints, instructions, and a list of materials so that the reader can build the gadgets themselves. None of the experiments are dangerous, and only the soda rocket really requires any adult help. A curious mind with a steady hand could build most of these in an hour or so and they do actually work. What really helps these to stand out is that they are presented in context. When Nick and Tesla get set to use their gadget, the book stops the story for a few pages and presents the DIY instructions. They don't slow down the pace or interrupt the flow of the story at all, and I like how they allow the reader to make a connection with the story by building the gadget almost alongside the characters as if they were right there in the middle of the action.

Overall, outside of the great science content, this is not my favorite mystery series. If you want a better mystery, see my review of Three Times Lucky by Sheila Turnage. If you like science and want something quick and fun, then Nick and Tesla's High Voltage Danger Lab just might electrify you.

Story time Wednesday! Letter J! Jungle sounds, Jeep riding sheep! Jump, Frog, Jump!

 Hello and thanks for stopping by another Story time Wednesday with Mr. Mike. It was a great crowd today on a rainy Wednesday. The perfect weather for a story time experience. I had a lot of fun with this story time. It's become sort of an in-joke with parents and me during our ABC action song that I'll forget letter s. It happens every time and today was no different. You can see it on the video I'll post below. Good stuff. The kids liked the stories, had fun with the magnet board and enjoyed shouting along and guessing different animals. For letter J, I used Jump, Frog, Jump! by Robert Kalan, Guess Who's in the jungle by Naomi Russell, Sheep in a jeep by Nancy Shaw, and I made a magnet board story based on the book Jump In! by Ian Whybrow. Jump, Frog, Jump! is an ideal story for kid participation. Just being able to shout out every other pages really engages preschoolers and helps them feel like an important part of story time...well...because they are THE most important part. Guess Who's in the jungle is a short, Lift the flap story where kids guess what animal is hidden behind the flap on each page. It really reinforces the participation portion of story time and I'll use it again. Jump In! is simply really funny, silly fun where a girl invites all these animals to jump in her car. Then, a tiger sneaks up on them and all the animals willingly jump into his mouth. Then the girl chases the tiger with her car and it hiccups all the animals out. The animals all really liked being in the tiger's belly and they all do the same thing again the next day. Yeah...you just read that. I had one mom laughing out loud at that book because it is just unabashedly absurd.

     We always start our day with the Heidisongs ABC action song and dance to get warmed up. I actually had a fantastic mom take video so you can see it below! Yes, I skip letter S in the video. Yes it is hilarious.

ABC Action!

After the ABC action dance, we greet all the little ones with our greeting song,
We're All Here (Skip To My Lou)
Here, Here, We're all here!
Here, Here, We're all here!
Here, Here, We're all here!
We're here at story time!
Hello, ________! How are you?
Hello, ________! How are you?
Hello, ________! How are you?
I'm glad you're here today!

The first story I shared was Jump, Frog, Jump! It is one of my personal favorite story time books to read and most kids age 4 and under like any opportunity to shout out in a quiet place! This went very well. The book also serves as a good teacher of the prediction skill. Each page gives a hint as to what will happen next. Kids feel so smart when they can predict what is going to happen.

After the story, we stood back up and practiced our letter J song/dance from Heidisongs. This time, instead of posting the lyrics and such, I'll just post a link to the video below. I'm still having trouble figuring out all the ins and outs of blogger so I'm uploading through Youtube instead. Here's the link so you can see how we get down at the ICL.

Letter J song.

To cool down, the magic hat gave us an ipod that had jungle sounds on it so we listened to some jungle sounds and called out what animals we thought we heard. Then I read them the Guess Who's in the Jungle book. The older kids always shout out the answers first. I only had the kids stumped once because I don't think they knew what to call a parrot. Most of them shouted out bird. The rest of them are more obvious.

After our jungle adventure, we used the story Jump In! To have a little bit of magnet board fun. I'm very happy with this one because I made it up myself. I actually don't owe anyone any credit for this one. It's a proud day!

We ended with Sheep in a Jeep by Nancy Shaw. Somehow, the magic hat had a jeep toy from my house inside...hmmm. I found out that I had a few Jeep fans in our audience and they particularly enjoyed this story. The ending especially resonates with Jeep lovers because many of them have had yards strewn with spare Jeep parts for sale. Ahh...you've gotta love your jeep.





Finally, it was time for goodbye, so we sang our song like we always do
We Wave Goodbye like This (The Farmer in the Dell)
We wave goodbye like this!
We wave goodbye like this!
We clap our hands for all our friends.
We wave goodbye like this!
Repeat a few times and add some silly waves!

Craft: Bejeweled J's.

Easiest craft ever. I had drew a letter J in craft foam for a template, then cut them out of construction paper. The kids took them and stuck Oriental Trading jewel stickers all over them. They flipped for this craft. Stickers are hands down the easiest way to engage all kids in a craft. Anyone can do stickers and little ones just go nuts for stickers! I highly recommend them.

Story time Wednesday! Letter I! Iguanas, ice cream, and insects!

 Hello and happy Wednesday! It was story time here at the Library and we continued learning our ABC's with the letter I. We had two new families at our story time to join our fantastic cast of regulars and the new kiddos didn't waste a minute getting comfortable in the groove. Letter I was, again, somewhat difficult to choose topics for. Not so much for what books to read, but for what to pull out of the magic hat! I wish the magic hat really was magical so it could solve this problem for me. Anyway, I took a page from Storytime Katie and picked out Manana Iguana by Anne Whitford Paul, I'll Be There, by Ann Stott and Matt Phelan, and Ugh! A Bug! an easy reader by Ned Crowley. None of these books got an overwhelming response, but the kids all sat and listened politely while I read them and we talked a lot about some of the things we could learn from each book.

So, as per usual we started out rockin' to the Heidisongs ABC Action. It's great to be rested and over all my illnesses and have all my energy back. It's always much more fun for me and the kiddos when I dance as hard as they do. I had a lot of kids to greet today, many brought very young lapsit age siblings so my greeting song took a little bit of extra time.
We're all here! (Skip to my lou)
Here, Here, We're all here!
Here, here, We're all here!
Here, here, We're all here!
We're here at story time!
Hello, ______. How are you?
Hello, ______. How are you?
Hello, ______. How are you?
I'm glad you're here today!

Repeat for each child. (Yes, it takes a few minutes sometimes)

The first book was Manana Iguana. The kids liked the voices I used for each animal in the story, and I enjoyed teaching them the Spanish words inside. This book has a great lesson on friendship and being a good helper, and it's basically a re-telling of The Little Read Hen. Anyway, I would use it again if need be.

I then created an ice cream flannel board based on one that I found on DMCraftdesigns on Etsy. (I USED ACTUAL FLANNEL!?!?) The goal is to count the chocolate chips in the ice cream and match them to the cone with the same number. This was great practice for counting and number recognition. I had some older kids who knew all their numbers 1-8 so they were able to help the little ones recognize the numbers written on the ice cream cones. When we put the ice cream scoop on the cone, we made sure to count all the chocolate chips first, so everyone got some rote counting practice and the really little ones got to hear some good counting. I had volunteers put the ice cream on the cone and it was fun to watch even the more reluctant kiddos volunteer to come up in front of the group and participate.

We read I'll be there next. We had a great talk about all the things that Moms and Dads do for us, and all the things that we can do for ourselves when we get bigger. The story is very sweet and gets me in the soft spot in my heart. My wife teases me for being a big softie all the time.  But since I had kids, anything emotional in books, tv, or movies having to do with kids, and I just go to pieces. The little ones were pretty antsy after this book, so we turned Ms. Heidi back on the T.V. for the Letter I song/dance


Letter I (This Old Man)
/i/ /i/ I. /i/ /i/ I.
I is just a big straight line. (hold arms straight over your head)
With an extra line on the top and down below. ( Draw lines in the air0
Now it's time to go, go, go! (Put out the hitchhiker thumb)
Repeat
/i/ /i/ i. /i/ /i/ i.
Little i's a short, straight line (Make a line going down to the floor with both hands)
With a tiny dot above it in the sky. (Make small circle in the air above the line you drew)
Now it's time to fly, fly, fly! (Put arms out like an airplane)
Repeat

Finally, I pulled lots of plastic insects out of the magic hat. I really hammed it up and pretended to be grossed out by all the different kinds of bugs inside. Then we read, Ugh! A Bug! I don't do too much non-fiction because I don't like having to edit out a lot of text and let's be honest, there isn't a lot of non-fiction written and aimed directly at the toddler/preschool crowd. This one worked great. As an easy reader, it doesn't have too many words on the page, the photographs were fantastic and I love explaining to kids a different genre of book. It's never too early to teach this stuff!

Craft: Letter I insects

Materials: Construction paper I's. Glue sticks, six legs, eyeball stickers, and pipe cleaners cut up for antennae.

1.) Fold the letter I like an accordian.
2.) Glue three legs to each side.
3.) Put eyeball stickers at the front of your insect.
4.) Push the cut pipe cleaners through the construction paper where you want your antennae to be.

Letter H story time! Hippos! Horses? Hearts!

 It's story time Wednesday! We had another great crowd who were excited to get going and they had their dancing shoes on! For letter H, I chose three of my favorites. Are You A horse? by Andy Rash, George and Martha: One Fine Day by James Marshall, and The Day it Rained Hearts by Felicia Bond.

The kids were jazzed up for the Alphabet Action dance from Heidisongs. Even my more reluctant kiddos were up and moving around this time. It's so rewarding to see their confidence blossom! It truly makes my day.

After Alphabet Action, I greet all the kids with the same song, but today I got away from my ukulele and brought my acoustic guitar back out. I had forgotten how rich and full it sounds compared to the ukulele. I'll have to bring it out more often. But we sang We're all here (skip to my Lou)
Here, Here, We're all here!
Here, here, We're all here!
Here, here, We're all here!
We're here at story time!
Hello, ______. How are you?
Hello, ______. How are you?
Hello, ______. How are you?
I'm glad you're here today!
Repeat for each child. (Yes, it takes a few minutes sometimes)

The kids really liked my George and Martha plushies, but I think the three short stories in there were really over their heads. They did like the story where George and Martha were grossing each other out during lunch. George turns green and the kids thought that was silly.

We played a small game with the Magic Hat next. For Are You a Horse, I put a bunch of letter magnets into the hat. I pulled them out one at a time, and asked them "Are you a horse?" The kids loved shouting, "No! That's a _____!" I thought it really served as a good lead in to the book. However, the kids sort of lost attention toward the end of the book. They did key right in when they saw the horse in the woods toward the end. The parents thought the ending was hilarious. The little ones didn't quite get why it was so funny.

Our next activity was to sing H-E-A-R-T to the tune of bingo.
I know a shape that stands for love and heart is it's name-o
I'm sure you know where it's going from there.

The kids were kind of checked out throughout The Day it Rained hearts. I think perhaps, I could have led with it. They were ready to craft.

I found this letter H house craft at the ABC and 123 learning co-op. All you really need is an H cut from construction paper, a different color background, markers, glue, and a third color triangle for the roof. The kids glue the roof to the back of the H. Then they glue the H to the background Finally, they can add doors, bushes, flowers, windows, etc...It was fun! I have a very crafty group!

That's all for this Story time Wednesday! See ya next time!

-Pixelbeard the Librarian (Mr. Mike)