Winter Fun 2014

OK, so here in San Diego our winters are very mild.  While most of the rest of the country is currently in a "Polar Vortex" creating record cold, we are sunny and in the 70's.  That doesn't stop me from presenting my annual Winter fun story time featuring all sorts of winter/snow books, songs and rhymes.   Since I presented this story time at the Base, most of the kids in my story time audience had seen and played in snow before, as this is a very transient population.

Here are the books we read:

The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
The reader follows Peter on a snow day.  Peter wakes up to find snow has fallen overnight.  He puts on his snowsuit and makes funny tracks in the snow, shakes snow from a tree, takes part in a snowball fight, etc.  I like that Peter is African-American (uncommon enough to note that this is special)  The illustrations are as soft as newly fallen snow and the text is simple and flowing.  Nice, gentle read-aloud.  Caldecott award winner - and it shows.

All You Need for a Snowman by Alice Schertle
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
The colorful illustrations in this book are great fun as a group of kids (not very ethnically diverse) build a giant snowman. The text playfully lists everything one needs to build a snowman, "one small snowflake fluttering down - that's all you need for a snowman….EXCEPT" turn the page and there's more.  My story time audience loved this device... This book captures all the joy of building a snowman in a colorful, playful way.


Winter White by Christianne C. Jones
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This winter book definitely invites the reader to become aware of color.  The end pages have crayons and stylized color wheels and there is a note about color…and then the reader is taken through the land of winter white.  The illustrations are big and bold and there are plenty of white things for a story time audience to spot, count, etc. to encourage engagement.  The simple rhyming text flows.  Great winter themed read aloud.


Oh! by Kevin Henkes
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
When snowfalls everyone wants to play in it - gray squirrels, shy rabbits, cats and dogs…oh, and children, too.  When the sky grows dark, everyone goes home.  Simple, charming book with lovely soft illustrations, Which give a slightly different slant to a winter story.  Great addition for a winter story time, but the book is physically small, so probably wouldn't work for a very large audience.

For today's craft we colored, cut, and glued together all the parts of a snowman.  Good Pre-K skill building.

We did a number of songs and rhymes, but here was our favorite (which we did three times):

Sledding 

(tune: "Row, Row, Row, Your Boat")

Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch (walk fingers slowly up your arm)

Up the hill so slow

Sliding, sliding, sliding, sliding (slide fingers down arm from shoulder to wrist)

Down the hill we go.