School is Cool

Today's storytime was all about the end of summer and the beginning of the school year. We had almost twenty-youngsters attend today - which is record attendance for an event that was not a party or contain giveaways! We started out discussing the end of summer and then read four books about starting school or the school experience. We sang "Mary Had a Little Lamb" and "The Wheels on the Bus" and did two finger plays (one I made up!) and sang two other going-off-to-school songs. The group was very engaged and very participatory - always great fun. Here are the books we read today:

Summer's End by Maribeth Boelts
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is a very sweet read-aloud for this time of year! A young girl, Jill, mourns the end of summer and all the wonderful things that she experienced while getting ready for the first day of second grade. The softly colored water color illustrations are lovely. This captures all of the emotions that we all experience with the change of seasons and the transition from summer to the school year.

Bailey by Harry Bliss
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Bailey is quite a dog. He goes to school with regular kids, who love him, but he retains his own doggie quirks! For instance, when it comes to choosing his school "outfit" his closet is filled with half a dozen dog collars. He eats his own homework, and then has to visit the school nurse. Bailey is so very lovable, and when that is combined with wonderful illustrations and a text filled with humor, the result is a fun read aloud book about school.

Never Spit on Your Shoes by Denys Cazet
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Arnie arrives home from his first day of school and tells his mother all about his great adventure over milk and cookies. As he recounts his day, we see the events in big bright illustrations. He describes his diverse group of classmates and enjoys the school tour, learning to write his name, and lunch in the cafeteria. Filled with humor, and interesting misadventures I read this one for all of the moms in my audience, who can identify with the experience of listening to tales told by sons and daughters.

We Love Our School!: A Read-Together Rebus Story by Judy Sierra
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
The kids at my story time loved this book, which allowed them to participate in the telling of this story. The brightly colored illustrations held their interest and they loved this rebus story, happily yelling out the words represented by the rebus pictures. The rhyming text bounces along to make this a great interactive read aloud.

Mom, It's My First Day of Kindergarten! by Hyewon Yum
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
My storytime loved this story about a young boy getting ready to head off for his first day of kindergarten. In this version of a first day, it is the mom rather than the child that has first day jitters. The kids loved this twist to the traditional stories - you know, where the child is anxious about starting school and the parent is the calming influence. The text and illustrations are engaging and my audience loved this book.

Summer Time

It feels like I posted here just recently, it is difficult to believe that my last post was from May! It has been a summer of great challenges and great fun. It has also been a summer filled with two different summer reading program themes. At the Public Library, the theme was "Dream Big Read" which included "Own The Night" as the teen theme...lots of night time stories, and stories about imagination. At the Military Base we used the iread program theme: "Reading is so Delicious." For the storytimes on base the themes were "Pizza, Pizza!", "Just one Bite...Please?", "Breakfast", "Lunch", "Dinner", and "Party Food" - here are some of the highlights: Pizza is a popular food with kids and they loved this theme. There are lots of great songs and rhymes, and we recycled old CD's to make mini-pizzas as a craft. Our favorite pizza books were:

Hi, Pizza Man! by Virginia Walter
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I love this simple, funny, and oh so imaginative book based on a game the author would play with her granddaughter while waiting for dinner to arrive. This book starts out innocently asking what the little girl will say to the pizza man when the door bell rings (Hi, Pizza Man!) and then the question changes to, but what if it is a pizza lady? dog? dinosaur? The kids in my audience loved this book, and happily helped make the appropriate animal noises and giggled at the wonderful illustrations.

The Little Red Hen Makes a Pizza by Philemon Sturges
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Anyone familiar with the traditional tale of the busy red hen with the lazy friends will recognize elements of that tale in this modernized story, especially the recurring phrase "Not I." However, this tale, with the lovely cut paper illustrations from Amy Walrod, is fresh and funny. The story opens with the LRH, having finished the last of her bread, preparing to make dinner - looking in her pantry she finds, next to the canned worms, a can of pizza sauce and decides to make pizza. She doesn't plan very well and makes multiple trips to the store and asks to borrow items from her - predictably - unhelpful friends. The detailed pictures engaged my story time audience as we talked about items in shopping carts (she always buys "some other stuff") and ingredient preparation. There are lots of opportunities to count and to predict what will happen next...and a happy ending for all the characters.

We read books about wild food and picky eaters for "Try Just One Bite":

To Market, To Market by Anne Miranda
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
For any food-based story time this book is a must-read. A wild variation on the nursery rhyme "To Market, To Market" this is one wild, hysterically funny version. All the animals are live and they make mischief once home. My story time audience LOVED this one and laughed out loud at the wonderful illustrations. Fun to read, with rhyming text, this is a real winner

Rah, Rah, Radishes!: A Vegetable Chant by April Pulley Sayre
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
With full page photographs of the most beautiful vegetables this is a wonderful story time book. The rhyming, rhythmic text will make even the most passionate vegetable hater change his/her mind!

Our favorite meal time books were:
If You Give a Pig a Pancake by Laura Joffe Numeroff
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Laura Numeroff's books are such classics, and all the kids love them. The gently outrageous consequences that stem from a simple act: giving a mouse a cookie, a muffin to a moose or a pancake to a hungry pig - are sure to make any reader smile. The kids hung on every word and took in every colorful, detailed picture. They even giggled at most of them. They also knew what was coming so when we got to the last page, they all knew that the pig, in the end was going to ask for a pancake. After words I got out a flannel of the story, and the children retold the story with the help of the flannel clues - and they did a very good job of it, too!

A Most Unusual Lunch by Robert Bender
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
When a hungry frog innocently eats a beetle it starts a most...unusual chain of events. Each animal is swallowed whole by a larger animal who displays artifacts of the swallowed animal. My story time audience loved the soft, colorful illustrations and giggled at the wild combinations that occur - for instance lion, the top of this food chain, awakes from a nap to find he had "two antennae, six tiny little legs on his underbelly, two big green legs, a fish tail that rattled, a long forked tongue, plus strange scales.." the expression on the face of this unhappy lion is just priceless. He lets out a roar that begins the chain of animals being released and returning to normal. The warning is clear - you are what you eat - and laughter is guaranteed.

Little Whistle's Dinner Party by Cynthia Rylant
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
My story time audience was familiar with Little Whistle, the adorable guinea pig who lives in a toy store. He is nocturnal and spends many happy nights, once the store shades have been drawn, visiting with his toy-friends in the shop, who come to life at night as well. All of our favorites are here, soldier who reads stories to all the store's babies, lion who loves vanilla cookies, and bear who loves hats. In this book, Little Whistle invites all of his friends to a dinner party, makes elaborate preparations and then arrives in a helicopter to the dinner bringing dessert. Charming and lovable my story time audience hung on every words and smiled at every illustration.

Company's Coming by Arthur Yorinks
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
It was the quiet, normal suburban neighborhood where Moe and Shirley were preparing to host a quiet family spaghetti dinner when....
Aliens drop in on their way to another galaxy and ask to use the bathroom. Shirley is polite to these new guests inviting them to dinner and then calmly offering drinks and appetizers once they arrive to dine. Moe, on the other hand, calls the FBI and has the house surrounded by all sorts of big military tanks and guns. There is humor in the text as well as the wonderful illustrations - very popular with my story time audience.

Little Mouse and the Big Cupcake by Thomas Taylor
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Sweet book about how difficult it is to share. When mouse finds an enormous cupcake he is thrilled - until he realizes that he can't carry it home! One by one he enlists all his friends to try and help him. Of course, Mouse allows each to take a bit...but then hungry mouse begins to fear that there may not be any left for him...

We even did a finger play about five little cupcakes, and I used the new glove set that I created:

For the storytime that included our end of SRP party the theme was - what else? - Party Foods and included these two favorites:
The Beastly Feast by Bruce Goldstone
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
The illustrations in this book are detailed and vibrant, they almost jump off the page. The text is simple and the rhyming is wonderful. The beasts are having a feast and every animal is bringing something. Bears bring pears and parrots bring carrots....mice bring rice and mosquitos bring burritos. This book is a very engaging read aloud...kids loved the pictures and completing the rhymes (not always successfully) For instance when the feast is over everybody claps - the armadillos bring some pillows and then everybody...."Sleeps!" called out my young audience...naps. I'll keep working on rhyming...

Bear Wants More by Karma Wilson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I love Karma Wilson's books. They are great read alouds. With Jane Chapman's charming illustrations this one is an absolute winner. It is spring and one skinny bear wakes up hungry...with the help of his friends he eats his way through the day, devouring everything and wanting more (a great repeated phrase that a story time audience will pick up on. The rhyming text is very readable and the party scene at the end elicited giggles galore from my audience.

My biggest challenge at my public library job was to work with a fleet of volunteers to manage a summer reading program that included 1,045 registrants, 10 weekly programs and a teen lock-in event with a zombie theme (remember "Own the Night") It definitely kept me on my toes. We had a 56% completion rate, and huge attendance at the programs, so I guess I had a very successful summer@my library.

Celebrating Water Awareness Month

So, our city water department offers to send goody bags out to libraries who schedule a story time to promote May as water awareness month...and offer that I couldn't refuse, once I made sure I could find enough suitable titles for my preschool audience. I did find plenty and I also stumbled upon some story time kits that our Central Library Children's staff have put together. What a wonderful resource. They include a music CD in support of the theme, books, song and rhyme suggestions and in one case a glove puppet set and in another character cards from one of the books that I was able to use as a flannel board story. So, on Saturday I presented this at a branch of the public library in front of fifteen or so kids and their parents and today, I repeated it at the base library for a group of three children and parents. The three are a core of regular attendees and we have so much fun together - I have watched all of them grow and change over the last six months or so and it has been a great journey!Here is a picture of the glove for "The Itsy Bitsy Spider and Friends" for after we sang the song through using the glove, we sang again about a GREAT BIG SPIDER and again with a teeny tiny spider. Many smiles and giggles!

We did other rain rhymes and with the larger group we "made" rain - first a gentle drizzle (rub hands together) then gentle drips (slow quiet hand claps) getting faster and louder as the rain increases - at the height of the storm everyone is slapping their thighs and stomping their feet. Again lots of smiles.

Here are the books we read:
Precious Water by Brigitte Weninger
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This book's simple engaging text and lovely illustrations really struck a chord with both story time audiences as it discussed the importance of water to all living things. There is a sweetness and light humor in the illustrations that the kids really seemed to enjoy - the cat's eye being magnified by the glass of water...a frog happily sitting in the pouring rain. There were counting opportunities as well as pages where my audience took great delight in identifying what they were seeing. Very engaging and lead easily into a discussion of all the ways we use water in our every day life.

Hey, Frog! by Piet Grobler
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This tale of a greedy frog is filled with detailed pictures filled with all sorts of animals. When frog drinks up all the water, all the other animals plot to get him to give it back. One by one they put their plans into action - but frog keeps his lips clamped shut. But the eels know a secret about frog...and their plan is successful in returning the water to the puddles, the brook, the river and even the big, blue lake.
Listen to the Rain by Bill Martin Jr.
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a gentle, beautifully illustrated book filled with wonderful language to describe a rainstorm from the first gentle whisper of the rain through "splash and splash and splatter, the steady sound of the singing of the rain" through to the "quietude, the silence and the solitude, of after-rain". My story time audience hung on every word and studied every picture - and this book seemed to have very broad age-appeal.

Cloud Dance by Thomas Locker
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Simple text and beautiful full page illustrations describe the beauty of all types of different clouds. There is a glossary in the back with the scientific names and descriptions of clouds, but my audience enjoyed the poetic descriptions while looking at the beautiful cloud portraits.

Ten Little Fish by Audrey Wood
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a fun counting book with big beautiful illustrations. Nice real aloud, even with a large group because of the illustrations. One by one the line of fishes gets shorter, until there is only one left...then there are two, who fall in love and then start a family...of ten little fishes. The colorful character cards made this a fun flannel board story and both audiences loved helping to count the fish.

Rain by Manya Stojic
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Through simple, repetitive phrases and big, bright bold illustrations, we see how the animals of the Savannah sense an approaching rain storm using all of their senses. At first, porcupine smells the rain and rushes off to tell zebra, who see the lightening of the approaching storm...and so on...until the rain passes and then the animals use their senses to enjoy the gifts the rain has left behind...the taste of the cool water, the lush green leaves, the tasty fruit. We leave the animals happily anticipating the next big rain.

A Salute to Mothers

The theme of this week's story time was celebrating Moms. There are so many wonderful children's books out there that focus on mothers and the bond they have with their youngsters, that it wasn't difficult to find great books to read. The problem was limiting it to three or four! I'm not sure whether it was the books I chose, or the make up of my audience, but the kids were much more interactive and engaged with the books than they usually are. I was a little frustrated by the lack of good rhymes and finger plays that fit - but we did sing My Mommy Plays With Me (Tune: "The Wheels on the Bus") with the additional verses of "My mommmy reads to me" and "My mommy loves me so" and using the line "all through the year" to end each verse. We read four books for the kids - and one for the moms. Although the kids and moms enjoyed all of today's selections:

Hugs and Kisses by Christophe Loupi
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I fell head over heels in love with little Hugs the dog in this story. Early one morning he sneaks away from his sleeping family because "there was something he had to find out." He wanders around the farm asking all the animals for a kiss. The descriptions of all of the kisses he receives are wonderful - and the illustrations are filled with tenderness and emotion. I just wish there were more than five stars to give this book! My story time audience fell in love with Hugs as well - and the kids loved pointing to the spot on their bodies, where Hugs had just asked for a kiss (check, nose, top of the head...) as we turned the page.

Does a Kangaroo Have a Mother, Too? by Eric Carle
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Eric Carle is such a gifted artist that I would recommend any of his books for story time. The pictures in this book are bright and tender and the kids, predictably, loved them. The text is very simple and repetitive - asking if a particular animal has a mother, too - and then turn the page for the answer, "Yes! A has a mother. Just like me and you." The kids at story time would try and answer the question each and every time. Some even answered, "no" all the way through the book. It was wonderful to see every child in the audience earnestly try and answer each and every page. My audience, predictably, did engage with the illustrations. They also surprised me by interacting more with the text. This was a great story time read aloud.

Is Your Mama A Llama? by Deborah Guarino
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a sweet book with a highly engaging "guess the mom" rhyming text. Lloyd the llama approaches all his friends asking, "Is your mama a llama" and each responds with a two line description of his or her mom and the kids call out a guess as the page is turned. Even young ones can guess and do. Steven Kellogg's illustrations are lovely. This one was also a big hit.

Leap Back Home to Me by Lauren Thompson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

With beautiful and fun watercolor illustrations and bouncy rhyming text this is a great story time read aloud. Little frog "leap frogs" over increasingly bigger things and has ever bigger adventures and then leaps back home to mom. Mom is always waiting with a hug, crayons, a snack or a story. The kids hung on every word, and stared at every picture with smiles on their faces. Definitely a hit with my audience.

I Love My Mommy by Sebastien Braun
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

We all loved this book. The illustrations are big, bright and filled with love. The text is very simple and describes all the ways that moms show their love. Although the moms in this book are all animals the things they do for their young are the same things my story time audience look to their moms to do. This book is all about mom knowing just what we need at any time and being there to give it to us - from climbing lessons to a cuddle. I really liked that one of the pages talked about one mother (a beaver) who works very hard. These days not all mothers are able to play games with their children, or "stay by their side" as much as they might like to. Wonderful read aloud in celebration of mothers.

Five Minutes' Peace by Jill Murphy
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I discovered this book many years ago when I was home raising three young children and wondering if I would ever enjoy a hot meal or converse with an adult in full sentences ever again. Mrs. Large yearns for just 5 minutes peace. So she sneaks off to the bathroom to enjoy a soak in the bath with tea and the paper...and enjoys about a minute of "heaven" before, one by one, her three youngsters invade the bathroom, and finally end up in the tub with her. She sneaks back down to the kitchen where she enjoys three minutes and forty-five seconds of peace before her three wet young find her, wrapped in towels. This is my mother's day gift for the moms in my story time audience, and every single one can identify with Mrs. Large and her desire for just a few minutes of peace. But they can also identify with the love and humor that fills this book about that very special bond between mothers and their children.

Happy Mother's Day to all you Moms out there. May you enjoy some special time with your children...perhaps snuggling up together with a good book?

Earth Day

In honor of Earth Day the books I read at story time at Miramar were all about nature and taking care of the Earth. I found several websites with some good rhymes and finger plays. (see Earth Day Poems and The Holiday Zone) and a few books that worked for young kids. Here is what we read:

Nibbles: A Green Tale by Charlotte Middleton
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Not only is there a lot of green in here...the whole town loves dandelion greens...but it is also a story of living green, when Nibbles works to save his favorite food from extinction...I especially love that Nibbles, a charming Guinea Pig, goes to the library to learn all that he can about Dandelions. The illustrations are wonderful and the kids really loved how he repopulated Dandeville with Dandelions.

Who Will Plant a Tree? by Jerry Pallotta
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is a gentle, beautifully illustrated book about animals scattering seed that eventually grow into trees. Beginning with a squirrel who buries an acorn the kids focused on each and every picture and began joining in on the repeated phrase, "He/she/they didn't know it but he/she/they planted a tree" Monkeys throwing figs at each other, a wild horse planting a cherry tree and a beaver who plants maple trees when he nibbles down a maple tree for his dam all got the kids attention. Warning: there is a page about a fish who "poops" seeds...that got some giggles from my audience. They couldn't believe that I would say "poop" at a story time. They however did pick up on the scat the elephant leaves behind on the last page...

The EARTH Book by Todd Parr
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This book is a great book to teach toddlers about Earth Day and taking care of the Earth. It uses simple text and bright child-like drawings to talk about all the big and little things that kids can do to help make a big difference in protecting the environment. It does it in positive terms that even young kids can relate to. An example, "I use both sides of the paper and bring my own bags to the market because...(turn the page)...I love trees and I want the owls to have a place to live." The people and animals in this book are all sorts of bright colors - yellow orange and purple and the pictures just burst with childlike joy.

For the younger group, we read "just for fun":

Can't Sleep Without Sheep by Susanna Leonard Hill
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
What happens when the sheep a young girl counts quit because she will not fall asleep? An hysterical tale about a competition to find a replacement animal! The horses were too beautiful, the chickens couldn't jump the fence no matter how hard they tried. This is a laugh-out-loud good time story with lovely illustrations. There are all kinds of animals that try to be the next great counting animal - from armadillos to penguins...there are pigs more interested in snacks than jumping the fence, and buffalo that just run right through the fence. Finally, Ava talks the sheep who, after all, "are fluffy and peaceful and perfect" to come back to work and she is finally able to fall asleep. My story time audience laughed, and also enjoyed identifying all the different animals who are lined for the audition. Definitely a story time winner!

While the older group (7-11 year olds) heard:

There's a Hair in My Dirt!: A Worm's Story by Gary Larson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
From the creator of The Far Side comes a very funny tail of nature loving gone wrong. Harriet loves nature...and spends the day "helping" her forest friends...while in reality she does more harm than good. The kids all agreed that her intentions were good, and that she really thought she was doing good. However, Papa worm shows us that her actions had a very negative impact on the environment. This tale make the kids think about their own actions while making them laugh about the funny pictures and descriptions of the worm family who tell this tale. We even find out where the hair came from that little worm found - to his horror - in his dinner of dirt. The text was a little long for story time even with a group of 7-11 year olds.

Going to the Dogs!

Today's story time had a dog theme. There are terrific animations available for powerpoint slides (see Heather's Animations for example) and there are so many great children's books featuring dogs that the most difficult thing about planning this session was limiting the books, songs, rhymes that we shared. We did a "Five Little Puppies" finger play, performed a couple of action rhymes "Call your Dog" and this one:

Some Dogs Bark
Some dogs bark,
Some dogs growl,
Some dogs yip
Some dogs howl,
And some dogs...
...Just wag their tail.

Where the kids supply the appropriate noise. It was a big hit. They also loved our dog version of Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes:

Head, cold nose, floppy ears, floppy ears.
Head, cold nose, floppy ears, floppy ears.
Tail that wags, wet tongue and furry toes.
Head, cold nose, floppy ears, floppy ears.

I made a flannelboard of Dogs Colorful Day by Emma Dodd. Although a pattern was available in Storytime Magic by Kathy MacMillan and Christine Kirker, I simply traced "Dog" from the cover and cut out appropriate spots:



Here are the books we read:


What Puppies Do Best by Laura Joffe Numeroff
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

With simple text and adorable illustrations this book covers everything that Puppies do - the really good (wake you up in the morning, climb onto your bed and give you a kiss) and the really bad (dig holes in the yard, track mud into the house and make a big mess). There are plenty of cute kids and even more cute puppies in this book. This is a small book, so it would be difficult to read in front of a large audience, because you definitely want to take in the detail of the illustrations - especially the last two pages, devoted to what puppies do best of all: give you lots and lots of love.


Good Boy, Fergus! by David Shannon
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

As one of my family's favorite children's book, I looked forward to reading this one at a story time but wondered if it would go over as well with an audience. It did! All the kids fell in love with Fergus, a happy-go-lucky West Highland terrier, who is the star of this book. As Fergus progresses through his day the refrain "Good boy, Fergus!" is repeated over and over again...in spite of the fact that Fergus rarely ever minds. The illustrations are bright and big and filled with humor and the text is simple and very funny. Kids and parents were both laughing out loud at story time especially when they see his new "hairstyle" after a car ride. This book was a BIG hit with my story time audience.

See Me Run by Paul Meisel
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The text of this book is very simple and repetitive as it is really designed to be a first reader. (The opening page: "See me run. I run and run.") The real beauty of this book - as a story time read aloud - are the fabulous illustrations and the giant surprise the dogs receive when they, "dig and dig and dig and dig." One dog leads and amazing pack of a dozen dogs on an adventure through a meadow, mud puddle, and joyous bath in a river (this is the only book out of four where the dogs enjoyed a bath!) The dogs then dig up an amazing treasure, that makes them "run again!" We had lively discussions and counting sessions during the sharing of this book, so the kids didn't seem to notice any limitations of the text. Great fun.

Bark, George by Jules Feiffer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book has everything you could want in a story time read: A lovable star, animal sounds, humor in abundance and a mother who experiences frustration, worry and joy because of her puppy. The story opens with George's mother asking him to bark. When he says, "Meow" she corrects him and has him try again and again - each attempt finds a new animal sound coming out of George's mouth, and mom becoming increasingly frustrated. Every mom at story time today smiled and nodded at being able to relate to George's poor old mom. She takes George to the vet, who manages to find the source of George's problems and George finally does bark...everyone is happy. There is also a nice twist at the very end, that flew over the toddler heads but made the moms laugh. Definitely a story time winner!

Doggone Dogs by Karen Beaumont
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Bouncy rhyming text and joyous illustrations make this book, about a ten dogs who take a wild romp through a park, a marvelous story time read. My story time audience loved this book (in spite of having heard three and a flannelboard story already!) They were counting dogs and pointing out their favorites. They also make a point of noticing the dogs' owner follow the dogs, leashes in hand, in a futile chase. Everyone does eventually make it home, including the slightly-worse-for-wear owner (still in his pajamas!) clearly exhausted after such a fun day out.

Baseball Season Starts!

At our house, one of the surest signs of Spring is the day that Spring Training starts. Surrounded by males in my house, sports in general, and baseball in particular, dominate the conversation and television viewing! So, is it any wonder that one of my spring story times has to be devoted to baseball? I found a couple of finger plays and songs...and then made up several more:

If You Want to Play Baseball
(Tune: “If You’re Happy”)
If you want to play baseball throw the ball (2x)
If you want to play baseball.
Be a batter, run the bases
If you want to play baseball throw the ball…
Swing the bat
Run to first
Yell out, “Safe!”

I’M A LITTLE BASEBALL
(Tune: “I’m a Little Teapot”)
I’m a little baseball
round and white
You can see my stitching
nice and tight
When the pitcher throws me from the mound
The batter hits me and I fly around.

The kids all had fun twirling around like flying baseballs. Fortunately, this is a pretty small story time audience!

We had a flannel board "game" where we had eight little gloves, each labeled a different color and the kids had to match the colored baseballs to the appropriate glove.

We read four books:

My Padres Baseball Game by Jenny Werner
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a fun baseball book, all about our "home team," the Padres. The narrator is a young girl attending a game with her dad. They begin their experience at the "Park at the Park" and then pick up snacks and watch most of the game from seats inside the stadium. The text at times, was a little too commercial for my taste. The book is a nice introduction to Padres Baseball and the features of our local stadium and it made it easy to discuss what it is like to attend a game with my story time audience.

Dino-Baseball by Lisa Wheeler
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Kids love dinosaurs and kids love baseball - so they adored this rhyming book about the plant eating dinosaurs of the Green Sox vs the carnivores of the Rib-eye Reds, played at Jurassic Park, of course! With colorful illustrations and lots of baseball action (even a team manager who "throws his hat and kicks home plate...he calls the ump a nasty name and gets ejected from the game.) This is a book that appeals to very young kids because of the rhythm and rhyme, dinosaur players and bright, colorful illustrations. Because of the vocabulary and game descriptions it appeals to the adults in the group as well as preschoolers.

Quacky Baseball by Peter Abrahams
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thumby Duckling is nervous about his first game on the Webbies baseball team. The text can be read in an "announcer" voice, which the kids at storytime enjoyed. At several points in the story, "the crowd goes wild" and the kids and their moms provided the cheering crowd noices. The illustrations are bright and colorful and the humorous nature of the pictures and text had both moms and kids laughing out loud.

B Is for Baseball: Running the Bases from A to Z by Chronicle Books
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

We had a ball (no pun intended) with this book at story time. With breathtaking old photos on bright, almost scrapbook like backgrounds, this alphabet book was a big hit with my story time audience. Beginning with "autograph" and going through field positions and famous players and even hot dogs ("One of the favorite snacks found at baseball parks") through "Zinger" ( "A nickname for a grounder") this book is wonderful for all ages.