so tomorrow

Letter Monster Magnet Board

Letter Monster wanted to read.
He thought if he ate letters, it was all he would need!

On Monday he ate A B C.
"MMMM, they taste so good to me!"

On Tuesday, he chomped D E F G. 
"Eating letters is fun as can be!"

On Wednesday, he nibbled on on H I J K.
"More letters, more letters, is what I say!" 

On Thursday, he feasted on L M N O
"Letters are so good, you know!" 

On Friday, he swallowed P Q R S T U.
"I think letters are good for you!" 

On Saturday, he gobbled V W X and Y
"I'm almost finished," he sighed. 

On Sunday he slowly ate the Z.
Then he fell asleep and caught some more zzzzz's.  

Source notes: This is an activity left by one of my former coworkers. The only source note left with it was an email address so I Googled the words and found them on Dr. Jean's site, with the patterns to make it is a file folder story. There is also an alternate version with different words from Dr. Jean. That second …

Recently I was at our local Dollar Tree picking up supplies for another program. I like to wander around and just see what catches my eye that could be useful for storytime or to build a different program around. I spotted these little frogs in the bath toys and thought they would be perfect to do a prop version of Five Green and Speckled Frogs with!

I plan to set them on the magnetic shelf our storytime room's easel has, but they could easily sit on the edge of a table or a book cart, whatever you have handy. When the frogs jump into the pool, just push them off. 
The frogs come in a set of 3 for $1 per set. So I now have 6 frogs! I will store the 5 for this rhyme together and the 6th one will go in my random animals box for when I need miscellaneous animals to fill out an idea, as in Little Gnome Hide and Seek. 
In addition to the frogs, Dollar Tree has very similar ducks.

Crayons in the Box Song Tune: Five Little Ducks
Song Source: Not Just Cute
Prop Source: Zippy Paws dog toy from Amazon.


So many crayons in the box for you, Red ones, orange ones, blue ones too. But the one little color that rhymes with (head) It’s my favorite color, it’s the color….(red!)(Hesitate at the end so the kiddos can fill in with the mystery color!)
This is an item I bought to update our Colors storytime tub for our library system!

Here is a list of ideas I have previously blogged that will fit the Collaborative Summer Library Program's 2020 theme of "Imagine Your Story" (Fairytales, Mythology, and Fantasy). I hope this list helps somebody out there!

Storytime Ideas
A-Hunting We Will Go puppet song
The Ant and the Grasshopper shadow puppet story
A Blanket for the Princess flannel board
The Dog and His Bone shadow puppet story
Dragon Egg storytelling with prop
Going on a Quest puppet rhyme
The Great Big Enormous Turnip flannel board
Humpty Dumpty puppet
I Had a Little Rooster puppet song
Little Gnome Hide and Seek prop game
The Little Red Bird Japanese nursery rhyme flannel board
Little Mouse Chinese nursery rhyme flannel board
Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary puppet
Roll a Rhyme storytime cube
Two Little Bluebirds flannel board
Two Little Garden Gnomes prop rhyme
Two Little Unicorns prop rhyme

Programs
Mother Goose Games nursery rhyme Olympics-type program for preschoolers
STEM + Stories: Fairy Tales STEM program for school…

Two Little Garden Gnomes
This is a variation on “Two Little Blackbirds” Two little garden gnomes Playing in the snow One was Fast And the other was Slowwwwww
Run away Fast Run away Slow Come back Fast Come back Slow

Other pairs: Rolling down the hill/named Jack and JillBy the garden gate/named Early and LateFlying in the sky/named Low and HighSitting on a lily, named Serious and Silly
The garden gnomes are from a Zippy Paws dog toy set (link). I use the same gnomes (and their mushroom home) for a Little Gnome Hide and Seek game. This will be a realia option in my library system's fairy tales storytime tub that rotates among our branches.

Thank you to King County Library System for the wording inspiration.

I decided to plagiarize my own flannelboard, Little Worm (that I posted way back in 2011), and adapt it to a prop rhyme featuring gnomes! This will be a new addition to our Fairy Tales storytime, and would be a great fit for those of you using the "Imagine Your Story" 2020 Summer Reading Program theme.

Little Gnome Hide and SeekLittle gnome playing hide and seek. Little gnome are you in the mushroom home? Let’s take a peek!
Pull out one of the non-gnome stuffies “by accident” before finding the gnome. Repeat the rhyme until you find that elusive gnome!

I suggest holding the mushroom house upside down to load the stuffed animals, and start with the gnome. I used a selection of misc. toys that I keep (the endangered animals are old Happy Meal toys) at the library once my kids are done playing with them. 
Like many of my props, the gnomes and mushroom house are Zippy Paws dog toys. Here is a direct link for the Zippy Paws webpage for the gnomes. As of this writing, I couldn't f…

Here's an activity I put together for our upcoming robot storytime tub: Roll a Robot!
Roll the die to build a robot together! Keep rolling until all the parts have been added (2 arms, 2 feet, the body, and the head).
Robot source: Amazon (I did not use all of the parts for this activity)

If you'd like to make your own die, using the file I created,
you can download it for free from here!

This is a flannelboard set I put together for a Little Makers program I covered at one of our branches during a coworker's medical leave. I thought it was a great opportunity to introduce some scientific vocabulary to preschool aged kids!  Scientist, Scientist, What Do You See? Adapted from Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? By Bill Martin
Scientist, scientist, what do you see? I see a _______ looking at me.
Verses: …scales, magnets, magnifying glass, microscope, beaker, computer, safety goggles,
Last verse: _______ whatever the last thing is_____, what do you see? I see your lab partner ready to work!


Words adapted by me Flannelboard source: Target dollar spot July 2019 (not sold online)

Dollar Tree has these great gingerbread and snowman flannel board sets in their stores now. They also have a Christmas tree one (not shown) which I did not purchase. They are nice and big (each is over 12 inches long). Best of all, the sets are $1 each!




You can also buy a case of them online.

I just purchased these today, so there should be plenty of time to pick some up before winter storytimes!