The Mitten: Week 4

      

Books:
In the Snow by Sharon Phillips Denslow
Clifford’s First Snow Day by Norman Bridwell
The Mitten by Jan Brett (to hold up)

This is our final week for the telling of the tale, “The Mitten”! I think that having one consistent story for a whole month helps the Storytime kids gain knowledge and experience with stories through review, and it also shows the parents how a simple story can be retold and enjoyed in different ways. It is also a way for the kids to be more active in the telling of the story, and I can layer in actions and repeat-after-me-phrases that I could not do if I was sharing new stories all the time. I also like to bring some theater in the form of play for the final week in the telling of the story, and this week we used masks that Jan Brett made available on her website for our props that each child was able to hold for our final telling of the story! Thank you Lynette, one of university interns, who made printed, laminated, and cut the masks out for us! We did not glue sticks on the back of the masks. I think sticks can make homemade masks harder for little hands to hold.

Opening Activity: Stretch and wave

Sing: Welcome Song: If you are happy and you know it clap your hands!

Read: In the Snow by Sharon Phillips Denslow

(Possible aside for parents: Books can be an ideal way to expose your children to new vocabulary. This book has several different names for the birds, Sparrow, Chickadee, Cardinal, and Crow. Pointing these words out, and showing how each bird is different from one another can be a way to build vocabulary through books.)

Sing: Snowflakes, Snowflakes

Snowflakes, snowflakes dance all around, (Have hands wiggle fingers and move up and down, and side to side)
Snowflakes, snowflakes touch the ground, (touch the ground with fingers)
Snowflakes, snowflakes in the air, (Fingers wiggling)
Snowflakes, snowflakes everywhere!  (Stretch arms out with fingers wiggling)

(Possible Aside for parents: Singing is a fun way to bring up topics in ordinary life, like snowflakes coming down from the sky. As simple as this concept is, the more that children understand what happens in the world around them, the easier it will be for them to learn how to read about those things when it is written abstractly in a book.)

Credit: Preschool Education

Read: Clifford’s First Snow Day by Norman Bridwell 

Play: I asked the kids about the story of “The Mitten”. Even the little kids (ages 3) were able to tell me all about the story. Whoop! Repetition is working! I held up the book by Jan Brett and pointed out some of the pictures as the kids kept contributing parts of the tale. Then, I asked the kids to come up and take one of the masks I had printed and laminated showing each of the animal characters in the story. To prep for this program, I had drawn out a mitten shape on the magic Storytime carpet using blue painter’s tape. Once each child had an “animal”, I began to tell the story, inviting each child, as their animal character, to come sit in the mitten I had drawn on the floor as their part of the story unfolded. The kids loved it, especially at the end of the story where the mitten bursts, and they all got out to jump out and shout, “The mitten exploded!”

Sing: Sing 5 Little Snowmen while holding up the puppets. Ask the kids to hold up 5 fingers as you sing the rhyme, and with each verse, one of their fingers becomes folded down.

5 Little Snowmen:
5 Little snowmen all in a row,
5 little snowmen all made of snow
Out popped the sun and it shown all day (bring the sun out)
One little snowmen melted away (take one snowman away)
Credit: Laptime Songs

Play: Find the lost snowball while asking, “Snowball, snowball cold and round! Behind which mitten can you be found?” Have kids close their eyes while I hid the snowball. They lift each mitten looking for it until they find it.

Credit: So Tomorrow Blog

 

I gave this Storytime twice, and I also layered in these old standbys when the kids needed a little more active time:

Popcorn Kernels Song using scarves
Egg Shakers Up (using scarves)
Parachute Play (Singing Popcorn Kernels and using brown pom-poms as the popcorn!)

Sing: End of Storytime Closing Song:

Tickle the Stars,
Tickle your toes,
Reach down over and tickle your nose,
Reach down low,
Reach way up high,
Storytime is over can you wave goodbye?

Credit: Laptime Songs