Snowmen!

Another fun morning at Story Hour!  After playtime we began with some warm-up movements where we pretended to be big, fat snowmen lumbering about, jumping and melting. Then we moved to the weather board and discussed today's weather. I could tell the children have been doing this with the adults as they were quite familiar with this topic today. I also showed a variety of tiny snowmen that I had brought to Story Hour, and then 3 very large ones.  We also discussed what snowmen wear.

We read two books today:

Snow Friends by M. Christina Butler and Tina McNaughton 

It is about a little bear who wakes up and is all alone so he starts to build a snowman friend. Otter and rabbit join him and they become good friends. There is a surprise at the end also. This is a great book to check out at our library and read (or reread) to your child.  The kids loved touching the snowman (he was sparkly!).

Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner. 

After our craft I talked us through this second book.  It is a funny story about snowmen who come alive after dark and all the things they do. The book also reminded us that if our snowman is a bit crooked in the morning it just might be that he got that way from doing what snowmen do at night.

After hearing the story of the sparkly snowman the children were provided supplies to make their own little sparkly snowman that was like the one in the book.  They even had googly eyes.

Bryce and Aleah proudly show off their snowmen pictures. Bryce also has a funny snowman on his shirt!

Lauren was also willing to allow her snowman to have his picture taken.

The morning ended with a snowball fight (with the little cloth snowballs that we used once before) and lots of laughs and giggles. As the children left they were each given a bag of snowmen marshmallows.

Mitzi Manthey

All About Teeth!

In spite of the somewhat inclement weather and the late start of the schools we had five regulars and one guest attend story hour this morning.

Many toys were brought out and the adults had a few minutes to visit before we began our hour with our wiggle song. 

After the song we changed our routine and turned our attention to Morgan, our guest from Pardeeville Family Dentistry. She gave us all a pair of pink gloves and a nose/mouth mask with pink flowers to put on so we know what it looks like when we go to the dentist.

Morgan brought Roo, a plush kangaroo along and each child got to brush Roo's teeth while learning to brush in circular motions. We learned that we should brush in the morning and just before going to bed. We also learned that until we can tie our shoes alone we need to have an adult help us brush so we are sure to get all 20 teeth very clean.

After that Morgan brought out a cute monster board and we talked about foods that are good or bad for our teeth.

The children took turns putting good foods in the monster's mouth. A couple of foods that were tricky were fruit juices and milk (especially chocolate milk) which are to be drank with meals and not by themselves. Water is the best thing to drink between meals.

 

 
After Morgan finished we read two books:

 

Brush Your Teeth Please by Leslie McGuire

Brush Your Teeth Please was a pop-up book with different animals and the children got to take turns brushing the animals' teeth.  

 

The Missing Tooth by Mary Packard

The Missing Tooth helped us learn that about the time we start school our teeth will start to fall out so new ones may grow in their place. This seemed to be news to most of the children. In the story a little girl is disappointed because her friend's are losing teeth and she isn't. When one of her teeth finally comes out she loses it, but then finds it when she gets ready for bed. One of the children wanted to know "why she couldn't put it back in her mouth" and that gave all the adults a good chuckle.
Our morning ended with each child receiving a "goody bag" from the dental office with a toothbrush, bubble gum flavored toothpaste, a letter for parents and several activity sheets for the children. 

They were also given a very colorful book titled Four Seasons for Little People by Dr. Jerry Ballard.

 

Valentines!

Story Hour this morning was all about valentines, love, the color red and the number 2.

The morning began with most of the children arriving early [doors open at 9:45] and enjoying some social playtime until 10:05. We then started our morning with our "wiggle song" and the children are beginning to sing along with the actions.

After that we discussed the weather for today. We decided today was cold, snowy and cloudy with no sun showing in the sky. This would be a good topic to discuss on the way to story hour each Thursday.

We had a little difficulty with the color red, but finally decided that the two hearts and Mitzi's sweater were red things. We learned that valentines represent love and then learned hand signs to show "I love you" and practiced doing them with our adult. The most difficult part of this was understanding "you", so this is another topic to work on with your child.

We read two books [click the link to find it on LINKcat and check it out for yourself]:

Valentine Mice! by Bethany Roberts. 

Happy Valentine's Day, Mouse! by Laura Numeroff.

As we listened to the story we talked about the silly mice in Valentine Mice! who threw their valentines in the air, slipping and sliding on ice, and how sad the mice felt when one of them was missing [but happy when they found him later]. We acted out words like skip, hop, looking high and low and calling for someone who's lost, and being happy and shouting "Yay!", when he's found. We also found a red cardinal, red mittens, and red valentines in the book.

Happy Valentine's Day, Mouse! was about a cute mouse who makes and gives valentines to all his friends; then they surprise him by coming to his house with valentine cookies. Mitzi then gave each of the children a valentine cookie in a sandwich bag, so they could take it home for after lunch [or some couldn't wait and ate theirs right away].

Our activity was to make a "love tree" to hang up at home or give to someone we love. We did this by having our adult trace our arm and hand on a sheet of brown paper and then cut it out. We then learned to use a glue stick in a circular motion and glued the tree to a sturdy white paper. We then had plates of punched hearts that we could glue onto and around the tree like leaves.

Next week we will have a guest who will talk to us about teeth and their care.

In two weeks when we have a snowman theme I would like the children to bring one or two pictures of a snowman. It may be one they helped make, one where they are making a snowman, or just a picture of one they like. Please encourage them to be ready to talk about their picture, if possible.

*Snow!!*

Our first story hour on February 6, 2014 seemed to be a success and fun learning experience.

We started story hour by getting our wiggles out!  We used an action song to the tune of The Hokey Pokey.   We had a big red circle on the ground and the kids had to put various parts into the circle to get the wiggles out.  We wiggled our heads, arms, legs, and bottoms!

We learned about winter weather using our weather board.  We decided it was winter, cold, and sunny!  We discussed what we wear and how it feels.  To show the kids how it feels we touched the snow that was brought into the room in a tub.  We also looked through a magnifying glass to see how the snow sparkles!

We read two books (click the link to find the book in LINKcat):  

Snow by Manya Stojic

 

Dream Snow by Eric Carle  

The kids really enjoyed finding out who was hiding under the snow in Dream Snow.  The kids thought the geese in the snow were penguins!!  We had a good laugh at that, the geese really did look that way in the picture. So we talked about the flock and what sound geese make.  The kids started giving animal sounds after that and when the fox came up one of them started singing the "What Does a Fox Say" song!  Which made us all laugh again!

We painted snowflakes and put glitter on them.

The kids got to take the snowflakes home. 

The day ended with an indoor "snowball fight".  The kids seemed to love singling out the parents and even the librarian!