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Pea Storytime

Three Little Peas by Marine Rivoal,  2014, Enchanted Lion Books

I don't usually (ever?) post about storytime, but I do a LOT of them.  Yesterday, however, I had so much fun that I thought I'd share.

• The color of the day was green.
• The letter of the day was P, which led to the fun question of the day - "What letter does "pea" start with? (Sometimes I crack myself up.)
• My welcome sign read, "Welcome to storytime. I'm hap-pea to see you!"

These are the books and activities I shared:

Three Little Peas is a beautiful book that adds an opportunity to discuss (at a very basic level) flora and fauna and the growing process.The illustrations are gentle and lovely and invite discovery - what else is underground with those two little peas?  We followed this up with the song (complete with motions), "Oats, Peas, Beans, and Barley Grow."  If you don't like to sing, Raffi can do it for you.

Little Pea by Amy Krause Rosenthal, 2015, Chronicle Books

Amy Krause Rosenthal's books are so much fun. Rather than read Little Pea, I showed the TumbleBooks version instead. It was a great way to show off one of the library's online resources. Parents and kids enjoyed it.  We followed it up with the fingerplay, "Five Fat Peas."

Pease Porridge Hot illustrated by Paige Billin-Frye, 2011, Child's World

There are many book versions of "Pease Porridge Hot."  This one, illustrated by Paige Billin-Frye is small for reading to a large group, but it worked fine because the illustrations are simple. We had a good laugh over whether or not one would eat soup that's "nine days old!"  We followed it up with a simplified version of the classic clapping rhyme.  If you don't know the clapping sequence, it's included in the book.


I had planned to bring in fresh peas to share with the kids, too, but I left my bag of snow peas at home.  Good thing - there were more kids than I had peas.

Update: 
Shortly after I had finished storytime, a patron came to the desk and wanted a book, but couldn't remember the name of it.  He described the story and I knew it.  It was another wonderful pea book: The Pea Blossom by Amy Lowry Poole, Holiday House, 2005.  Funny how that happens.

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In early 2012 I decided I wanted to create a Sensory Storytime at my branch. After watching a few webinars, making contact with the Autism Society of Central Virginia, and talking with local teachers I began to design my program. I decided it would run in three week sessions on Saturdays and that I would offer it quarterly. It was designed for children on the spectrum ages of 3-6 years. I checked out our copy of The Out-Of-Sync Child Has Fun by Kranowitz and selected a variety of activities that I thought would work. Our Friends bought us awesome play items including no spill toddler bubbles.

Our first Sensory Storytime was in October 2012. I was blown away by the response! The most phenomenal part for me was watching parents talk with each other while their children played after storytime. They were all dealing with similar struggles and it was obviously a relief to talk with people who understood completely.

The October and February sessions were incredibly well attended. I followed up each session with a survey and got nothing but positive feedback from my families.  I ran this program for a full year and each session had fewer and fewer participants.  In October 2014 I could no longer justify the amount of time I dedicated to this program due to little to no attendance.

Soon after I made this hard decision I met Jessica who is a social worker for our county’s early intervention. She agreed to spend some time with me to revamp this program and evaluate why it had fizzled. We decided that the best idea would be to try to offer a weekly inclusive storytime with a sensory focus, open to any child between the ages of 1-5 years. Each program would have a presenter, an assistant and a representative of early intervention. We launched this program in January 2016.

This format has been very successful and feels more sustainable. Sensory Storytime’s goal is to be a welcoming, encouraging and supportive program that is smaller and more adaptive than other storytimes. Our group has been a mix of regulars, children who don’t thrive in other storytimes and children being served by early intervention. Having two other adults in the room to help parents and children navigate the program and troubleshoot issues has been immeasurably valuable.

Erin Lovelace works as a Children’s Librarian in Virginia and is a member of the Library Service to Special Population Children and their Caregivers committee.

The post Sensory Storytime Progression appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Are you ready to energize your storytimes with dancing that goes beyond movement songs? Are you ready to dare to use your body to motivate caregivers while promoting children’s developmental needs for coordination, balance and gross motor skills?

Our library expanded the role of our storytimes into a program that offers more than reading books, nursery rhymes and singing songs. We introduced Dance Time to teach children basic dance steps while listening to an age appropriate song.

There is so much librarians can do to enhance the library experience through dancing. Dancing provides opportunities for adults and children to learn to:

• Follow the beats of the song with their feet and or hands
• Balance their body parts
• Coordinate their body movements

Additional benefits of dancing include:

• Improve muscle tone
• Reduce anxiety
• Increase ability to feel comfortable about oneself

Although dancing is a natural channel of expression for many cultures, children from other cultures, including some that are predominant in the United Stated, are hardly exposed to it. In some cultures, babies are exposed to music and dancing from birth, with moms dancing around holding their babies in their arms regularly. Soon baby and mommy-and-baby dancing transforms into a semi dancing lesson with caregivers holding and moving their toddles’ hands and arms while following the beats of a song. As the child’s motor skills develop, the caregiver will now focus on simple steps using the child’s legs and feet. Dance will continue be part of the child’s life in elementary school where different dances are taught in music class.

Coming from a culture where this type of exposure to dance is widespread, in my work as a Youth Services Librarian, I noticed that lack of coordinated body movements following a rhythmic patterns in children attending our programs. Naturally, this observation changes depending on the cultural background of clients.

As a result of my observations, I supplemented our storytimes with a portion of the program called Dance Time. During Dance Time, children and caregivers are encouraged to dance to a tune following three basic dance steps that are reinforced at every storytime. When I introduced Dance Time for the first time, many children and parents were reluctant to follow me. However, after a couple months of Dance Time, these same clients appeared more relaxed and moved happily following the beat of the music.

Music is contagious and is an excellent tool to uplift spirits and transform a library program into a lifelong learning experience. Many librarians already use children’s songs during storytime. However, have you offered a “dance activity” or “movement song” to invigorate your programs? Let us know about it in the comments below.

If you feel ready to dare, try the following dance songs in your storytime:

• Palo, palo Music Together. Palo, Palo. [Arranged and adapted by Gerry Dignan and K. Guilmartin]. Music Together: Bringing harmony Home [CD]. Princeton NJ: (2007)
• El baile del perrito (Wilfrido Vargas)

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Our guest blogger today is Kathia Ibacache. Kathia is a Youth Services Librarian at Simi Valley Public Library. She has worked as a music teacher and Early Music Performer and earned a MLIS from San José State University and a DMA from the University of Southern California. She loves to read realistic fiction and horror stories and has a special place in her heart for film music.

Please note that as a guest post, the views expressed here do not represent the official position of ALA or ALSC.

If you’d like to write a guest post for the ALSC Blog, please contact Mary Voors, ALSC Blog manager, at [email protected].

The post Dare to Dance: Introducing Dance Movements and Music into your Storytimes appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Storytime is a learning environment and we all have lessons learned — including librarians. While I am a better storytime librarian than when I started, I am still far from perfect. And I’ve learned a lot about what kinds of books and materials work best for me in storytime. But in order to do that, I had to make some mistakes.

Five Storytime Lessons Learned

Never Repeating Themes
At my first library, I never repeated storytime themes. I figured I had to get five years worth of themes since I was primarily doing an all-ages storytime and my youngest patrons would age out in five years. That led to some great creative themes, but it also meant shelving dinosaurs storytime for FIVE YEARS. And besides, repetition is great for kids.

Lack of Inclusive Books
Whoa, have I made this mistake more than once! I used to do holiday storytimes because that was what had always been done. And I stopped doing that in 2012 after realizing that I was excluding patrons from storytime. I used to love using Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes by Mem Fox until I had a storytime friend who did not have ten fingers and ten toes. I didn’t double-check to make sure that I had non-traditional families represented until Mommy and Mama brought their child to storytime. Inclusive storytimes make everyone feel welcome.

No Recorded Music
I didn’t use recorded music in my storytimes until 2014. I have a decent singing voice and mostly sang a capella. I knew who Jim Gill was, but couldn’t sing any songs by him. Until a grandmother said to me that her grandchild really missed the music that Miss J used. Also: using recorded music frees me up to dance crazily with the kids and model that behavior for caregivers.

Using a Floor Easel in Toddler Storytime
At my current library, I used a floor easel flannelboard since that’s what I was familiar with. Big mistake. The toddlers wound up all around the board petting it and ignoring me. I switched to tabletop easel the next week to avoid the toddler swarm. Make adjustments week to week; don’t wait until the problem becomes familiar to patrons.

Not Knowing When to Stop
There are days when it’s better to just close the book. I knew that. I just couldn’t always come to terms with it. Now I am an absolute pro at saying, “Grown-ups, it seems like our little ones want to get up and move. We can do an activity now and we can read another time.” Having those speeches memorized is really helpful and makes storytime flow naturally.

I could go on (not laying down expectations, reading a book that I didn’t love, not knowing how to get caregivers involved, doing difficult product crafts, no early literacy tips, forgetting to double-check that my book is in good condition) but I feel like I’ve already laid out enough mistakes for one day.

I don’t beat myself up over any of these, by the way. It’s all part of learning. But I do constantly and continuously try to improve. Part of that is realizing that it might be time for a change for the betterment of storytime and a better user experience for my patrons.

How about you? Have you made any changes to storytime? Do you have lessons learned?

– Katie Salo
Early Literacy Librarian
Indian Prairie Public Library
http://storytimekatie.com

The post Lessons Learned from Storytime appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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It's been a while since I've done a picture book roundup.  Here are three that struck my fancy:

Kind. This boy is the best!

Have you seen Elephant? 

Written and illustrated by David Barrow.
Gecko Press, 2016

A kind young boy plays hide-and-seek with his elephant friend and takes care to keep the game going, despite the fact that his friend is a very poor hider! Have you seen Elephant? is bright and cheerful and funny, and above all - kind. This is the first book I've seen from Gecko Press and the first by David Barrow. I love it!





Confined? Can the colortamer catch them all?

Swatch: The Girl Who Loved Color

Written and illustrated by Julia Denos
Balzer Bray, 2016

Bright, bold, and expressive, Swatch is a color tamer - trapping and using colors in the most fantastic of ways. A bold and fearless artist, no color had escaped her artistic eye ... no color but one,

"Morning came, and there it was, fast fading and fierce, the King of All Yellows, blooming in the sidewalk crack in spite of the shadows. Swatch was ready .... At last, Yellowest Yellow would be hers."

Or would it?

This is the first book that Julia Denos has written as well as illustrated. I would love this book even if my favorite color were not the hero of the story!


Find. Where is that cat?

Spot, the Cat 

Illustrated by Henry Cole
Little Simon, 2016

A beautifully detailed, wordless book - more than just a seek-and-find, it follows the path of an adventurous cat in the city and the boy who wants to find him. Join the young boy and search the city for Spot, the cat.

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In the early days of our Libros y Cuentos bilingual storytime, I would try and integrate some language apps into the program. With a small group, apps such as Bunny Fun: Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes fit well with our Parts of the Body lesson. At the time it was a challenge to discover usable apps for storytime that were also good enough to recommend to parents. Thankfully developers have produced more options for kids interested in language learning via a tablet. Below are apps that are well designed, easy to navigate, and full of interactive ways to grasp definitions, pronunciation, and even a new alphabet are key.

Kids Learn Mandarin

This free game-based app takes players on a journey around China with Pei Pei the Panda. The digital curriculum includes word games, Chinese character tracing, and a badge earning option for tracking progress. Kids will learn a total of 240 Mandarin words, and will have English prompts for every word learned. A paid premium version is available for more progressive lessons.

The Very Hungry Caterpiller & Friends First Words

Recognizable illustrations will appeal to children learning their first words in English, Spanish, French, and German. Designed as a 3D pop-up book, each page features themed lessons with 4 to 5 objects introducing new words. The ease of use and interactivity makes this a great choice for preschoolers. It also has the potential to work well during storytime.

Endless Spanish

Possibly one of the most entertaining and popular series of apps in our children’s room, Originator Inc. has introduced a new Spanish language offering, with hopefully more languages on the horizon. A cast of monster characters reinforces pronunciation, spelling, and new definitions in a hilarious and engaging way. Two modes are available for total Spanish immersion, as well as English translation. It’s hard to believe that the Endless Spanish app is free!

Rosetta Stone Lingo Letter Sounds

A KAPi Award winner, the key to this app is the speech recognition tool similar to the one used in their core language learning software. Emphasizes pronunciation for young speakers which determines the rewards for tracking progress. The parenting corner allows adults to move beyond single-syllable words to more advanced vocabulary, as well as checking pronunciation accuracy. Yet another free app from a reputable global language-learning company.

Learn Japanese by MindSnacks

Recommended by both Apple and USA Today, this Japanese language app is  well-designed, and complex enough for both older kids and adults to enjoy. Over 50 lessons to introduce vocabulary visually, highlighting both Kana and Kanji characters. The voice pronunciation is clear enough to reinforce sounds for beginners. Learners are prompted to move up in levels by playing a variety of fun interactive games based on themed lessons. MindSnacks also offers apps to teach Italian, Spanish, French, German, Mandarin, and Portuguese.

These apps are just a few suggestions for providing additional language-learning resources to young patrons. Load them up on your iPads, or include them as digital recommendations for your library’s website.

Visit the Digital Media Resources page to find out more about navigating your way through the evolving digital landscape.

The post Language Apps Pour Les Enfants appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Do you share poems at your story time? Have you danced to a poem?  Pretended you were a fish writing a poem in the ocean? Or maybe you crunched and munched along with a noisy food poem?While yelling out words and acting out the poem, poetry at story time incorporates the Early Literacy Skills and encourages families to be silly together.  Add one or two poems to your story time theme each week.

Poetry Pocket Song: (Tune: Old MacDonald Had a Farm)
Here’s my poetry pocket with something inside.
What could it be?
I’ll open it up and take a look.
Tell me what you see?
(Possible felt items: A Pizza!  A Penguin!  A Ball! A Fish! A Kite!)

How it works: 
Sing the poetry pocket song, at the end of the song pull out a felt shape, have everyone yell out what it is, (It’s a kite!).  Then share the title of the poetry book and author.  Have everyone stand up.  Are you ready?  Explain what the movement or word they will say then read the poem.  For example: In the book Lullaby & Kisses Sweet: Poems to Love with Your Baby Selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins, read the poem, ‘Up in the Air’ by J. Patrick Lewis, have everyone act out each object-A leaf, a kite, a ball, a bird, a cloud and a swing.  “A bird on a the wing,” (flap your arms and fly like a bird).  Depending on the poem have everyone repeat the words after you or act out the poem while you’re reading it.
Read the poem twice.

Supplies:  Felt board (big or small), Big felt pocket shape-any color, multiple felt objects and children’s poetry books.

Sheila Grier, Librarian at Deschutes Public Library created a big blue felt poetry pocket for me.  The song is originally from Heather McNeil, Public Services Manager-Here’s my bag with something inside. (I switched it to here’s my poetry pocket with something inside.)  Thank you Sheila and Heather!

Some of the children in your audience might be hearing the word poetry for the first time.  Invite parents/guardians and more to explore the poetry section after story time.  Create several mini-displays during the month of April highlighting poetry books to read at home for ages 0-5.

Explore Poetry Paige’s Pocket Story Time book list on Rifflebooks.

The following photos are a collection of my favorite poetry books, each flannel object matches up with a poem that invites interaction-making poetry come alive.

Hopefully, you will be inspired to find your own favorites, yell out new words, and develop new ways to make poems jump out of books.

A few past ALSC Poetry Paige blog posts.

• Poetry Ideas
• Poetry Blogs
• School Poems

Please share your favorite poems for story time in the comments below.

Paige Bentley-Flannery is a Community Librarian at Deschutes Public Library. For over fifteen years–from Seattle Art Museum to the New York Public Library to the Deschutes Public Library-Paige’s passion and creative style for art, poetry and literature have been combined with instructing, planning, and providing information. Paige is currently serving on the ALSC Notable Children’s Book Committee, 2015 – 2017. She is a former Chair of the ALSC Digital Content Task Force and member of the ALSC Great Websites Committee.

The post Poetry Paige’s Pocket appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Their eyes were bright and twinkling. Their faces were tilted up from their place on the carpeted floor! All fifteen of the four-year-old children sat transfixed in their places and thoroughly enthralled with the speaker as she shared the poem, The Three Little Kittens! It was her expressions and the nuances of her voice that captured their full attention. As I watched the children’s faces, I mentally made a note to plan some follow-up activities. At that moment, I discovered the love of storytelling and the magic of holding children’s interest. I heard Ms. Carol Reinhardt, the librarian; introduce the book, The Snowy Day. As I look back, I realize that those memories were over twenty years ago when I owned a preschool center. Yet, it seems like yesterday as I reflect on the importance of storytime.

As part of the weekly curriculum, the children’s teacher and I took them to the local library for storytime. The parents provided a library card that I kept in my office. Each Tuesday, we headed to the library in the center’s van. The children learned the routine quickly. First, they experienced stories and activities and then they selected books to check out.

The library had a designated room for storytime. It was attractive and equipped with easels, puppets, sentence strips, flannel board, etc. Upon entering this special room, the children found a space on the floor and quietly sat with their legs crossed anticipating the arrival of Ms. Reinhardt. Usually, she planned a theme-based assembly. During one of the weeks in February, she selected snow as her topic. On this particular day, she entered the room in a toboggan, scarf, and mittens. The children were mesmerized by her appearance! Once she began reading, her intonation and excitement kept the children fixed on the pages of her book. At the end of the first story, Ms. Reinhardt involved the children in a song, a movement activity, and a finger play. I’m sure that she kept this pace to keep even the most hyper-active child from becoming restless. I can almost hear her reading, “crunch, crunch, crunch, his feet sank in the snow.”

After storytime ended each week, the children went into the larger area where the books are stored. With fifteen four-year-old children, it did not take long for us to decide that we could not turn them loose in an organized library. Ms. Reinhardt’s solution was to gather around fifty books to display on several tables. The hands-on approach worked. I wish you could have seen the children turning pages and studying the illustrations. However, some children became more discriminatory about their needs. “I want a dinosaur book,” Carson indicated. We made every effort to accommodate. The children walked out of the library each Tuesday with their books in hand and a satisfactory smile on their faces.

The library visits were much more than a great activity each week. It provided ongoing benefits that rippled through the entire center and beyond. The rewards were immeasurable! The children began displaying many school readiness skills such as improving their vocabulary, pointing out words and letters, developing fine and large motor skills, decision making, following directions, taking care of borrowed property, and many more. Through their experiences, they became more consciousness of print. They began pointing out new words that they recognized each week. And more importantly, they developed a love for books.

With the library’s influence, the children’s interest in books catapulted the teachers, and family members to ramp-up their literacy practices. The preschool center became saturated with literacy experiences. The teachers began discussing authors, illustrators, genres, and ways to better share books. Their deliveries were more animated with modulated voices. I could clearly see the influence that Ms. Reinhardt’s storytime was making on the teachers.

With two new books going home each week, parents, grandparents, and guardians were reading books over and over. “How many times am I going to have to read Owl Moon,” one parent asked, jokingly?

It’s been years since that special time working directly with young children. The majority of my career was spent teaching early childhood education at the college level. While I can cite theories on literacy, I know first-hand that librarians, teachers, and parents that read books aloud to young children are encouraging them to get hooked on the enjoyment of reading. Book exposure enables young children to develop a love of books. Therefore, these children become good readers which are one of the keys to a successful student. Beyond that, loving books and reading are the attributes of life-long learning.

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Our guest blogger today is Wanda Wyont. Wanda has worked in the field of education over twenty five years in many diverse backgrounds. Her teaching experiences range from preschool to college age. She has written and published numerous articles and papers on children’s issues. As an experienced storyteller, Wanda encourages children to become good readers and writers. Wanda Wyont is the author of the recently published book, Barkley’s Great Escape. 

Please note that as a guest post, the views expressed here do not represent the official position of ALA or ALSC.

If you’d like to write a guest post for the ALSC Blog, please contact Mary Voors, ALSC Blog manager, at [email protected].

The post Storytime at the Library appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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The best part of my week is Toddlin’ Tales, when I have a room full (usually 50 plus) of excited, active, curious toddlers and their parent, nanny, or grandparent. As you well know, their enthusiasm is delightful, their antics hilarious, and their adoration of the reader endearing. You also know that the child’s attention can flit from their plastic container of Cheerios to Daddy’s belt buckle in a nano second. A brief moment later she wants to demonstrate how well she can twirl, then tumble to a fall, followed by checking out her neighbor’s supply of bunny crackers. And then back to Daddy, for a reassuring hug and a glance at the librarian to see if anything interesting is going on at the front of the room.

“Look! There’s a puppet dog! He’s silly! He wants me to clap my hands and sing. Oh, I like that song. I can sing, too. “Storytime is here. Give a great big cheer. Yeah!” That’s my favorite part because I get to throw my hands up in the air and yell really loud. “Now quietly. Listen and see.” I like that part, too, when I put my hands by my ears and then around my eyes. “Storytime is here.” Now what is she going to do?”

Keeping a wiggle of toddlers (you know, like a business of ferrets) focused on storytime can be a challenge, but it is easily remedied with one word—participation. Find every opportunity to actively involve their bodies and voices and most will happily jump, roar, shake, hiss, tiptoe, blow a kiss, and whatever else you invite them to do. Here are four tips on participation opportunities that have been successful for me:

• Be silly! For a recent program on monsters I knew I had to choose carefully so as not to cause undue stress and fear. We began with “Going on a Monster Hunt,” which I do as a call and answer, so they were involved with the repeating chant, as well as the actions. When we found the monster in the cave, he was fuzzy, had 3 googly eyes and made a silly sound that made them giggle before we ran back home and repeated all the actions at high speed. Then I read Tickle Monster by Edouard Manceau. Whenever the tickling occurred we wiggled our fingers at the illustration and flapped our tongue between our lips, making that sound one makes that I can’t possibly figure out how to spell but sounds something like the noise Jerry the mouse would have made, with his thumb in his ears and his fingers wiggling, to harass Tom the cat. The result—total participation, no fear, and several wanting to check out the book after storytime.
• Read! Any time a book has a repeating phrase I invite them to “read” it with me while I point out the words. For instance, “I can’t sleep here,” in The Very Lazy Ladybug by Isobel Finn, and “Puff, puff, toot, toot, thrump, thrump, peep, peep, grump, grump, mew, mew, flip flop, bump, bump, off we go,” along with actions, in Down By the Station by Will Hillenbrand. Sometimes it requires moving a few words around so that the same pattern is used, and they get the cue they need to join in. When the story is finished we clap and I congratulate them on “reading” with me, so they get the connection between the words I pointed to and the words we spoke.
• Action! If you find yourself interpreting the words with a wiggle or a stomp, then include the children. Some stories are obvious, such as Down By the Cool of the Pool by Tony Mitton or I Got the Rhythm by Connie Schofield-Morrison. Others require ingenuity, such as having them walk along with Grumpy Bird in Grumpy Bird by Jeremy Tankard, or looking right and left, hand horizontal above the eyes, to find a moose in Looking for a Moose by Phyllis Root. One of my favorites is Funny Face by Nicola Smee, and watching the expressions on their faces for the different feelings. Anger is hi-larious!
• In-betweens. After every story, get the children up and moving to a rhyme or song. Not just a finger rhyme, but an actual stand-up-and-move-your-body action. After. Every. Story.

When a child is vocally or physically involved with the stories, songs and rhymes at storytime he’ll be more likely to remember and repeat the story (vocabulary and narrative skills), ask for the book to check out (print motivation), begin to comprehend how print works (print awareness), and retain whatever other early literacy skill you were slyly presenting, such as letter or rhyming knowledge. Plus he’s following directions and learning to wait, both of which are important social skills for kindergarten readiness. And you’re role modeling for caregivers ways they can have fun with books at home.

“What’s she doing now? Oh, I love that book! We get to dance when she reads that book, and I am very good at dancing. I liked singing with Pete the Cat in the other book, too. I want to take him home so Daddy can read it to me tonight. And tomorrow. And every day, every day, every day. Yeah, Pete!”

What are your favorite books for participation?

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Heather is a Public Services Manager for Deschutes Public Library in Bend, OR, where she supervises Youth, School, Latino and Impact Services.  She has been presenting storytimes for over 35 years and they remain the best part of each week.  She is also a professional storyteller, and the author of Read, Rhyme and Romp: Early Literacy Skills and Activities for Librarians, Teachers and Parents.  You can reach her at [email protected].

Please note that as a guest post, the views expressed here do not represent the official position of ALA or ALSC.

If you’d like to write a guest post for the ALSC Blog, please contact Mary Voors, ALSC Blog manager, at [email protected].

The post Toddler Participation appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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The weather outside may be frightful (or it may not, depending on where you live!), but it’s always a great time to cozy up for storytime. There are TONS of great ideas for winter storytime and here are some of my favorites:

Books:

• Bear Snores On by Karma Wilson, illustrated by Jane Chapman (Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2002). This is a great rhyming book about hibernation.
• Blizzard by John Rocco (Disney-Hyperion, 2014). I use this one for slightly older kids and they love the idea of school being closed for days (and the fold-out map through the snow).
• Froggy Gets Dressed by Jonathan London (Puffin Books, 1992). The pattern and humor in this book lend themselves well to storytelling, so this makes a great felt story, too!
• A Hat for Minerva Louise by Janet Morgan Stoeke (Dutton Children’s Books, 1994). Silly Minerva Louise wanders out into the snow and gets everything mixed up! This one is sure to get children laughing.
• Red Sled by Lita Judge (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2011). This wordless book shows what happens to a red sled left out at night. There’s plenty of opportunity to encourage talking in your storytime as you discover what happens together.
• Red Sled by Patricia Thomas (Boyds Mills Press, 2008). This story-poem is almost completely made up of rhyming words, making this a great choice for developing phonemic awareness.
• Snow by Uri Schulevitz (Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 1998). This book perfectly captures what it feels like to wait for and hope for and finally get SNOW!
• Snow Rabbit, Spring Rabbit by Il Sung Na (Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2011). This book talks about what many different animals do in winter. There are some great STEM connections  to make here.
• Snowballs by Lois Ehlert (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1995). This book lends itself really well to a cheap, creative craft: decorate your own snowmen with leftover bits and pieces from your craft cabinets or cupboards.
• Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner, illustrated by Mark Buehner (Dial Books, 2002). Bouncy rhyming text answers the question: What DO snowmen do at night?
• The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats (Puffin Books, 1962). This book is a classic for a reason. That experience of exploring a snow-covered world and Keats’s gorgeous artwork continue to captivate young audiences.
• Soup Day by Melissa Iwai (Henry Holt BYR, 2010). On a winter’s day, a girl and her mother buy the ingredients and make soup. This is a cozy, yummy book.
• Supertruck by Stephen Savage (Roaring Brook Press, 2015). When a terrible blizzard hits the city, one truck comes to the rescue. This will pull in all your littles who love things that go.

Thanks to the following Twitter librarians who helped me compile this list!: @annavalley, @hollystorckpost, @itsmissmeg, @lizinthelibrary, @lizpatanders, @lmulvenna, @MelissaZD, @misskubelik, @MrsHendReads, @mytweendom, @rockinlibrarian,  @SharonGrover2, @storytimekatie

Flannel Stories/Rhymes/Activities:

Build a Snowman. There are infinite variations of this that you could try with felt OR with your imagination. Get kids talking by asking them for suggestions of what your snowman needs. Ideas: eyes, nose, mouth, arms, buttons, scarf, hat… what else could you put on a snowman? (Answer: anything! Everything!)

Matching Mittens. We adapted this prop from Miss Mary Liberry’s Sorting Socks game. This is a great activity to talk about colors & same/different.

Snowman Colors. We adapted this felt from Melissa Depper’s Red, White, and Blue felt. We have used this structure for several enjoyable felts!

• Don’t miss Flannel Friday’s Pinterest board for winter flannel stories and rhymes!

Songs:

• If You’re Happy When it Snows, Clap Your Hands
• Jbrary has an AWESOME Winter Storytime playlist of songs and rhymes.
• “Saw a Snowflake” – adapted from the song “Saw a Leaf” from Jean Warren’s page. I use this one with scarves and we float and twirl our scarves like flying snowflakes.
• “Toss Your Scarves” by Jean Warren. This song to the tune of “Jingle Bells” is a fun way to incorporate scarves into your storytime and practice gross motor skills.

More resources!

You can find more Winter Storytime plans on the following sites:

• GreenBean TeenQueen – Winter Storytime
• Jbrary – Winter Storytime
• Mel’s Desk – Baby Storytime: Winter & Snow
• Perry Public Library – Winter Themes
• Storytime Katie – Winter!
• Storytime Secrets – Winter Storytime
• Sturdy for Common Things – Winter Storytime
• Sunflower Storytime – several winter-themed storytimes
• What Happens in Storytime – Winter Wear

What are YOUR favorite books, songs, and activities to use for winter storytimes?

— Abby Johnson, Youth Services Manager
New Albany-Floyd County Public Library
New Albany, IN
http://www.abbythelibrarian.com

The post Bundle Up for Storytime appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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I’ve written some thoughts on storytime schedules before. While I didn’t have any answers, ultimately I ended the blog with how I was willing to change my storytime schedules to benefit my patrons. This month, I made a list of the decisions the library has made after considering our patrons needs/requests. There are more than listed (especially when the library shares its two programming rooms with a variety of inside and outside groups), but these are the things that patrons frequently thank us for:

• Having a combination of both registration storytimes and drop-in storytimes. All of the events with the small circle “R” are registration. The others are drop-ins.
• Providing each age group with at least two day choices during the week. We do our best to alternate this between M/W/F and T/R because of preschool options.
• Scheduling our “on our own” preschool storytime (Junior Genius) at the same time as toddler storytime (Talented Toddlers) for parents who have kids in each age group. Parents drop off their preschooler and go with their toddler to storytime.
• Having a preschool storytime (Discovery!) in the afternoon for those who do morning preschool every day.
• Planning weekend and evening programs. (Our Monday night community outreach storytimes weren’t showing up in Evanced — I’ll have to check that in the morning.)

And my newest thank-you:

• For finally creating a “siblings welcome” storytime (Super Siblings) for parents who have a toddler and a newborn/baby. Just today I had a mom chase me down in the library to tell me how happy she is that this storytime is happening!

So, how do you balance storytime schedules? Have you or your library made changes to the storytime schedules because of specific patron requests or needs? I’d love to hear about it in the comments!

– Katie Salo
Early Literacy Librarian
Indian Prairie Public Library
http://storytimekatie.com

The post Storytime Schedules appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Each year, hundreds of new holiday books are printed. Many are trite, forced, or pedantic—but not these gems.  Here are my five new favorites. Readjoice! 

  If you have trouble viewing the slideshow, visit it on Riffle.
Featured books:

• A Homemade Together Christmas
• Oskar and the Eight Blessings
• Me and My Dragon: Christmas Spirit
• Too Many Toys!
• Miracle on 133rd Street

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I’ve written before about taking storytime breaks and so have some of my fabulous ALSC colleagues. We’ve just started our winter storytime break and will be off until the week after Midwinter in January. Each day I find myself explaining to another parent or caregiver that storytime is on a break.

But why take storytime breaks?

Storytime breaks serve a lot of great purposes. I have two favorites, the first being that storytime breaks give me time to brainstorm and create new things. I’ve written grants during storytime breaks, created new programs, developed new circulating materials, and re-organized collections.

This past week I had the pleasure of seeing several large scale projects completed and now available for our patrons to use.

1000 Books Display
Our 1000 Books program was launched in September (during another storytime break!) and this month saw a new advancement for this passive program. We received partnership funding from the Darien Rotary Club to fund the first 300 kids to complete the passive program. Additionally, the Darien Women’s Club helped us purchase this beautiful display. Each month we’ll feature a suggested title for kids to read who are participating in the 1000 Books program. Along with the suggested book, I’ve also created a recommendation booklist. This month’s featured book is Row, Row, Row Your Boat by Jane Cabrera and the booklist is all about song books. I am in love with the picture frames that showcase our book. Also: the graphics and signs from our Marketing Department.

Book Bundles
I was finally able to put out our newest circulating kits: Book Bundles & Parenting Packs! These were funded by a Target early literacy grant. All of the work that went into these kits was done during storytime breaks, including purchasing all materials and developing the activity sheets/resource guides found inside each bundle or pack. Book Bundles are aimed at ages 2-6 and have books, puzzles, manipulatives, and more in twelve different topics like ABCs, 123s, Colors, and Shapes. I should also mention that all of the LeapFrog kits were developed during a storytime break in the summer of 2014.

Parent/Teacher Collection
This one, I confess, I worked on during this past storytime session. But it was finally completed and ready to roll out when our storytime break began. Our Parent/Teacher collection is now organized by subject instead of Dewey decimal/fiction. This means that all of our picture books are integrated with their subjects. This also means that hopefully families going through tough times will be able to browse for their own materials rather than ask a librarian about a sensitive subject. (Although we’re always willing to help!) I spent much of my off storytime time shifting shelves. The red totes at the bottom are the Parenting Packs I mentioned before. These are geared towards caregivers to use with children and include topics like Potty Training, Staying in the Hospital, and New Baby in the House.

So, what’s next during this storytime break? Creating a Language Learners area, purchasing new Playaway Launchpads, working on a monthly early literacy calendar for 2016, partnering with a local preschool for our first preschool fair, and of course, preparing for the next storytime session.

I leave you with this quote, one that my boss sent to me after a particularly stressful summer reading had just ended:

Think about it: Humans are the only creatures in nature that resist the pattern of ebb and flow. We want the sun to shine all night, and when it doesn’t, we create cities that never sleep. Seeking a continuous energetic and emotional high, we use everything from exciting parties to illegal chemicals. But natural ebbs — the darkness between days, the emptiness between fill-ups, the fallow time between growing seasons — are the necessary complements of upbeats. They hold a message for us. If you listen at your life’s low points, you’ll hear it, too. It’s just one simple, blessed word: Rest.
— Martha Beck

Will you join me in taking storytime breaks? What can you do for your patrons to fill the time?

– Katie Salo
Early Literacy Librarian
Indian Prairie Public Library
http://storytimekatie.com

The post Why Take Storytime Breaks? appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Over the past few months, my library has partnered with a local resource center that provides early intervention and lifelong support to individuals with a variety of developmental disabilities, including cerebral palsy and autism spectrum disorders.  The resource center originally reached out to us looking for a librarian to read a few stories to their clients. I knew a sensory storytime would be a great fit, but in their experience, visits to offsite locations were rarely successful.  Any activity we planned would have to take place at their location.  So I took my sensory storytime on the road, and got a chance to really put my skills to the test.

I’m fairly new to sensory storytimes.  Before this, I had incorporated concepts into my regular programming, and made real efforts to make those programs universally designed, but I certainly wasn’t actively promoting this. Partnering with the resource center gave me the opportunity to refine my skills and try new activities.  My first visit wasn’t without hiccups. For example, sign-up sheets and library card applications became problematic due to HIPAA and patient privacy concerns.  We also ended up with a lot more kids in attendance than we were expecting. But in the end, like Pete the Cat taught us in our story that day, “it’s all good.”

In taking these special programs out into the community, we’ve found that children and their caregivers can have a library experience in an environment that is comfortable for them, surrounded by people they trust. Plus, our partner organization has developed a better understanding of what we can offer.  It has inspired other collaborations, with new programs and training for children’s librarians in the works.

There is a lot of information on the ALSC Blog to help you prepare sensory and special needs storytimes. I found Ashley’s Waring’s Sensory Storytime Tips and Jill Hutchison’s overview of Renee Grassi’s Beyond Sensory Storytime presentation to be particularly useful posts for providing information and talking points for communicating with the center’s directors and staff.  In addition, an ALSC course I took this spring taught by Kate Todd, Children with Disabilities in the Library, was an amazing resource, and I recommend it for anyone interested in creating more inclusive library programs, or reaching out to children with disabilities in clinical settings.

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Brooke Sheets is a Children’s Librarian at Los Angeles Public Library’s Children’s Literature Department and is writing this post for the Early Childhood Programs and Services Committee.

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My library had a concert last week with Charlie Hope, winner of the Juno Award for Children’s Album of the Year. We had over 200 in attendance and it was a magical experience. Charlie’s beautiful voice and interactive songs delighted the audience of young children and parents. Afterward, she told me it was one of her all-time best audiences. She was impressed that our parents were so attentive and happy to join in the singing and dancing with their kids.

It got me to wondering: what helps children and parents focus and get the most enjoyment and learning benefit from a musical performance or storytime? I think establishing practices in your storytimes that encourage everyone to pay attention is the key.
Here are my top techniques for helping adults, as well as kids, stay engaged during programs:

• Ask adults to silence their cell phones and tuck them away during storytime. I explain briefly that parents are role models for their children and that when parents are focused on the program it helps children focus, too. Paying attention takes practice, and that’s one of the important things we’re helping our children do in storytime–practice paying attention.
• Ask adults to save conversation with nearby adults until after storytime. We put out books to browse after storytime and this is always an opportunity for parents to socialize–an essential part of our programs, too.
• Use techniques that encourage parent participation. Early literacy consultant Saroj Ghoting recommends giving parents a specific part in a story. For instance, I read Pete the Cat and his Four Groovy Buttons in my two-year-old storytime recently and had the parents alone say the refrain “Did Pete cry? Goodness no. Buttons come and buttons go.” When adults have a role in the story, they know they need to listen and be ready to ham up their part!

• Use rhythm and rhyme to engage everyone in the action. Singing books works like a charm. I find this is especially true with songs that lots of parents know and love like If You’re Happy and You Know It or The Wheels on the Bus. The versions by Jane Cabrera make terrific storytime books, for instance, because the bright and heavily-outlined illustrations carry so well in a group.
• Count. To introduce a song or rhyme I often say, “I’m going to count: 1, 2, 3, go, and then we will sing (or say) it all together.” I then count clearly, showing my fingers. Even if parents are chatting during the “1”, everyone is usually on board by the time I get to “go”.
• Calm and re-focus the group when you need to with simple breathing exercises, such as this one: ask everyone to pick an imaginary flower, then slowly breathe in its nice smell and blow out on its petals. Or ask everyone to take a big breath, hold it for a few moments, and then slowly let it out. These quick exercises help everyone relax and get ready to listen again.
• Whisper. If you feel you’re losing the group, drop your voice briefly to a whisper. Everybody loves a secret!
• Puppets are engaging for all ages. I took ALSC’s Storytelling with Puppets course and learned a lot about presenting stories and songs using puppets. Instructor Steven Engelfried’s YouTube channel has lots of great stories to get you started or enhance what you’re already doing.

We know how much children benefit when their parents are engaged in storytime: when parents listen to the stories and songs they have something to talk to their children about when the event is over, and those conversations lead to an enriched vocabulary and a better understanding of the stories and their meaning for the child. And as Jim Gill points out, when adults join in the music play the child learns more from the experience. Perhaps most importantly, your event becomes an opportunity for parents and children to connect and create joyful memories at the library!

What do you do to help children and adults stay engaged during storytime?

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Our guest blogger today is Sharon McClintock. Sharon is a Youth Services Librarian at the City of Mountain View Public Library  in Mountain View, CA. Sharon can be reached at sharon.mcclintock@mountainview.gov.

Please note that as a guest post, the views expressed here do not represent the official position of ALA or ALSC.

If you’d like to write a guest post for the ALSC Blog, please contact Mary Voors, ALSC Blog manager, at [email protected].

The post Engaging Adults in Storytime appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Flannel Friday is a weekly roundup of posts about storytime and flannelboard ideas. You can visit the website here.

Librarian confession time-I am not a crafty librarian. Crafts for me mean fingerprints or play-dough. I wish I could knit cute puppets to use in storytime, but if I'm lucky, I can make an ok paper bag puppet. And my flannels just aren't pretty-so I rarely make them. (I'm more of a print it off from Kizclub and use magnets type of librarian!)

But I wanted a way to tell Buddy and the Bunnies by Bob Shea so that the kids knew who was talking. I'm reading the book, puppets weren't going to work. And since this is one of our state picture book award nominees, I'm planning on reading it a few times. In the past, the kids have had trouble knowing which character was speaking. So I made Buddy and Bunnies. While reading, I'll point to each character and move them on the flannel board to help the kids visualize who's speaking.

So here's my Buddy and Bunnies:

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So you want to train someone to do storytime? I’m here to tell you all the secrets of storytime training.

Okay. There aren’t really any secrets. But I will tell you how my library developed and successfully implemented a storytime (and programming!) training plan. I would incredibly remiss if I didn’t mention how much of this was designed and supported by my immediate supervisor and the rest of the members of the Kids and Teens department. You know who you are — thanks!!

Storytime Training Plan (in four parts)

Training Meeting
Since we were training two staff members (who haven’t previously done storytime), my supervisor asked me to write a storytime planning guide and present it at our monthly staff meeting. I had written a similar guide when I left my previous job. I just updated it with new relevant posts to read and current library storytime procedures. I included a wide variety of blog posts for new staff to read since everyone has their own storytime style.

Observation
Then, we sent our newest co-workers out to see a storytime performed by one of our veterans! This was an awesome chance for them to see how a provider interacts with parents and caregivers and adapts to the crowd’s needs. They also had to watch my YOLO Presentation entitled Early Lit 101. These building blocks helped prepare them to write their own storytime plans for the next step.

Performing & Feedback
Here’s where we really got into the training. Each new staff member presented a storytime to four librarians. And the librarians acted the part of true children to simulate the storytime experience. That included me running around my supervisor while she was on her phone during Toddler Storytime and also involved me taking my shoe off to show my teacher in Preschool Storytime. I’d like to think that we also broke the ice and became less scary while acting like kids. Afterwards, the librarians filled out a rubric and we had a meeting with each new staff member to discuss positives and areas to work on. I’m willing to bet that a puppet was an easier audience than us though!

More Observation & Planning
And that brings me to where our new staff members are now. They are currently observing at least three more storytimes in our fall session. They are also planning (but not performing) a seven week session of any programming — storytimes or otherwise — that they would like to do. And they have assigned storytime classes for our winter storytime session.

I’m really excited to see where our newest staff members will go! They’ve already proven themselves to be incredibly up to the challenge and I am so thankful that they have been open to learning storytime — I truly work in a wonderful library.

How do you train new staff members on storytime? Do you have any tricks of the trade for storytime training? Let me know in the comments!

[Oh, and if you want to see the Quick Guide to Storytime, please shoot me an email at simplykatie (at) gmail (dot) com. Thanks!]

– Katie Salo
Early Literacy Librarian
Indian Prairie Public Library
http://storytimekatie.com

The post Storytime Training Bootcamp Guide appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Picture this: a small, sunny room full of wriggling little babies, more than a dozen of them. A few are perched on laps, bouncing and babbling. Some are toddling, others are dancing, and there’s a daddy patiently rocking his wailing newborn.

And there she is at the center of it all, in one hand a colorful picture book opened to a page covered with romping animals, in the other hand a furry Brown Bear puppet.

“Brown Bear, Brown Bear, what do you see?” she asks. Her face is animated and her voice undulates excitedly as she looks around the room, making eye contact with as many big and little eyes as she can. “I seeee . . .” She turns the page with a flourish, her face filled with anticipation as parents lean forward and some kids pause perfectly still. “A Yellow Duck looking at me!”

A Yellow Duck puppet seamlessly appears, and she makes it do a funny dance while she deftly moves the book, held by Brown Bear, so that everyone in the room can see the pictures. A few parents cheer, some of the babies smile and squeal, one starts to cry because the Yellow Duck startled her, and a little guy bursts out in giggles and rolls on the floor in delight.

What is this joyful, whimsical, topsy-turvy place where babies and families can celebrate the enchantment of language in all its rhyming, rhythmic, and rollicking glory? It’s the local library, of course! And the magician at the center of all the fun is the magnificent, multitasking, multitalented children’s librarian.

There’s been a lot of excitement among children’s literacy enthusiasts this year since the most influential group of children’s doctors in the country, the American Academy of Pediatrics, made a public recommendation of great importance in June 2014. It’s no surprise that the pediatricians’ group gives guidance on such things as what to feed babies and how much sleep they need. The big news is that the AAP came out publicly to strongly recommend that parents read to their babies — right from the very beginning.

So reading to babies and children is right up there with feeding them fruits and veggies! This was a groundbreaking announcement for many parents and some literacy advocates, but no surprise to children’s librarians — they invented baby storytime! These experts have known for eons about the benefits of reading aloud to children, and have been working tirelessly to inspire families to begin their own literacy-centered routine right from babyhood.

Now two new studies have added even more support to this idea. The first, published in August in the AAP’s journal Pediatrics, looked closely at the brains of young children who were read to and those who were not. The children who had been exposed to regular storytime showed significantly greater brain development, which directly correlated with the amount of time each child was read to. Then, the August issue of Psychological Science reported a study showing that children who are read to regularly develop greater vocabulary and flexibility with language than those who are only spoken to. Apparently the exposure to unfamiliar words in the context of a story especially helps develops the language center in the child’s brain.

We applaud the AAP’s recommendation that families read to their babies as soon as they’re born, and we’d like to go one step further. An abundance of research over the last several years has found that babies already begin to develop the foundations of language during the last trimester of pregnancy — meaning that all the benefits of reading to a newborn can begin even before a baby is born.

Studies find that babies in the womb can hear and recognize speech patterns and rhythms, which develops the language center in the brain and begins to teach the modes and melodies of their primary language. What’s more, babies can actually remember a rhythmic poem or story they heard during the last trimester for up to four weeks after birth, and they show a clear preference for the rhythm and melody of a song or poem heard regularly from the womb.

They also show a preference for their mother’s voice over a stranger’s, and perhaps the most exciting finding for new parents is that newborns are measurably calmed by a familiar, rhythmic story read repeatedly before birth. In addition, taking time out for relaxing, reading, and snuggling with the baby before birth (just as after) produces oxytocin, the “feel-good hormone” that nature created to connect parents with their young, and this also has a positive effect on fetal growth and development.

There are so many reasons to begin bonding with and nurturing babies through reading even during pregnancy, and there’s great practical value as well: Reading aloud is a skill to be learned and practiced (just ask a librarian!).

While starting a storytime routine from birth is a lovely idea, the reality is that most parents have not actually read a book aloud in a very long time, if ever. With the best intentions they pick up that beautiful picture book given to them at the baby shower, but they might find that the unfamiliar text doesn’t roll off the tongue quite as expected, and reading aloud to their little one doesn’t come so naturally after all.

At the same time, new mothers and fathers may be overwhelmed by the responsibility of taking care of this new little being in their charge. They want to do everything right and will follow the AAP’s suggestions to the best of their ability, so now “read to baby” will probably be on many to-do lists. But as they juggle feeding times, a sleep schedule, diaper changing, and a multitude of other new jobs, “read to baby” might understandably be sacrificed.

If expectant parents begin storytime before the baby is born, it gives them lots of time to practice and get comfortable with reading aloud, and to choose books they love and are excited to share with that unseen listener. Because the research shows that babies in utero love verse that is repeated, parents can practice to their heart’s content, knowing their baby will only become more familiar with and responsive to the language of the poem or story.

By beginning a storytime routine before baby is born, moms and dads will grow to love this sacred time of day. Plus, experts say reading a story at bedtime helps babies both before and after birth wind down and get ready for sleep. So expectant parents can even use in utero storytime to condition their baby to get sleepy at bedtime!

Best of all, when their baby is born and hears the familiar story for the first time outside the womb, he really will listen. It might be the one thing that stops him from fussing! The parents will see for themselves that the time they spent reading before birth has borne the most magical fruit, and they’ll be all the more eager to continue that routine, for years to come.

And when it comes time to introduce baby to story hour at the local library, and that wonder-working children’s librarian realizes that these parents have already shared with their child the joy of getting lost in story, she’ll be thrilled to know she hasn’t cornered the market on read-aloud fun.

Who knows? Prenatal story hour might be a new addition to her calendar!

(Licensing for photos purchased by guest blogger from 123rf.com)

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Susan Lupone Stonis and Jacqueline Boyle are the co-author/illustrators of Can’t Wait to Show You: A Celebration for Mothers-to-Be, the first book specially designed to read to babies before and after birth, and winner of the Mom’s Choice Awards Gold Award. For lots more information and tips on reading aloud to babies in utero, please visit The Reading Womb blog.

Please note that as a guest post, the views expressed here do not represent the official position of ALA or ALSC.

If you’d like to write a guest post for the ALSC Blog, please contact Mary Voors, ALSC Blog manager, at [email protected].

The post Storytime Magic Starts Before Birth appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Each year, I try to do something new for Hispanic Heritage Month at the library.

This year, I fell in love with Susan Middleton Elya's, Little Roja Riding Hood (Putnam, 2014), so I based a program around that title.  We had a fun time retelling the classic story as we knew it, recreating it with felt board pieces,  reading Susan Middleton Elya's version, using the globe to find Spanish-speaking countries, playing a game of Color, Colorcito, and finally some free play with the felt board pieces and a rojo coloring page.

Below is a slide show with reviews of other bilingual favorites that I've used for storytime.  I also have a list of fun preschool songs, music, and activities for Hispanic Heritage Month.  Feel free to ask me about them.  If you have trouble seeing the slideshow, you can access it on Riffle. [https://read.rifflebooks.com/list/181065]
 

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I've presented over 3,000 storytimes for kids since the mid-70s and it's given me a long-eye view into the always vibrant early literacy adventure that is "storytime". Today's presentation includes some of my experience but also, more recently, that of colleagues at libraries I've worked in as well from those around the country and across the border (*waves*).

The following list of resources shared at the workshop is just the tip - the very tip - of the iceberg in creating strong storytime content. It contains lots of links that help readers explore further into more blogs, websites and research supporting our role as early literacy gurus for our communities.  Have fun exploring!

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While on vacation, I found myself in a store trying to pick out a movie that my sister, brother-in-law, and I would watch. Since I’ll watch pretty much anything once, I left them in the movie aisle arguing. I walked away only to discover The Ultimate Laurie Berkner Collection on the shelves of the store. I had tried to pre-order the CD a few months ago using our vendor and it wasn’t available. I immediately snatched up it up and tucked it in my basket. It was the best souvenir of my trip!

It took me a long time to enjoy and use children’s music. There are so many benefits to using music, but I have a half-decent voice and got through many years just singing a capella. It took starting my Music & Movement program — Shake, Shimmy, & Dance — to really start investigating recorded music.

Since I’ve passed thirty, I consider classic artists anyone that I listened to as a child. These include: Raffi, Sharon Lois & Bram, Ella Jenkins, Hap Palmer, and Greg & Steve. These are great core artists to be familiar with as you start learning about children’s music. I don’t incorporate a lot of their music into my programs because my programs tend to be a bit more high energy and my patrons prefer a more contemporary sound.

These are the fifteen artists (in no particular order) that I absolutely adore. I recommend checking out their entire catalogs and listening to them immediately. I did include my favorite album in case you’re pressed for time!

1. Jim Gill (Jim Gill Sings the Sneezing Songs & Other Contagious Tunes)
2. Laurie Berkner (Best of the Laurie Berkner Band)
3. Caspar Babypants (More, Please!)
4. Elizabeth Mitchell (Sunny Day)
5. The Learning Groove (Rockin’ Red)
6. Mr. Jon & Friends (Get Your Move On)
7. Wiggleworms (Songs for Wiggleworms & Wiggleworms Love You — I can’t choose one!)
8. Joanie Leeds & the Nightlights (I’m a Rock Star!)
9. Bari Koral Family Rock Band (Rock and Roll Garden)
10. The Wiggles (Hot Poppin’ Popcorn)
11. Laura Doherty (Heartbeat)
12. Aaron Nigel Smith (Let’s Pretend)
13. Carole Peterson Stephens (Polka Dots!)
14. Dreamtree Shakers (Come On a Picnic)
15. Ralph Covert (Welcome to Ralph’s World)

And my top three tips for finding good recorded music:

• Fellow librarians. It seems like a cop-out to say that, but Ally Watkins gave me Joanie Leeds. Storytime Underground introduced me to Mr. Jon & Friends. Jennifer Wharton is the first person I saw using Elizabeth Mitchell’s Sunny Day. Ask on Twitter. Read Angie’s M&M post. Read my lists. Check out Kelsey & Heather’s blog Song Catchers’ Library which is open for contributions.
• ILL. Put titles on hold that sound interesting before investing your library’s money. I know budgets are tight. I have a fabulous library with a healthy budget, but I still want to spend our money in the wisest way that I can. I preview another library’s copy before purchasing our own. If you can’t do this, use Amazon’s song preview or check the artist’s website for YouTube clips.
• Reviews & sales. School Library Journal will often have children’s music reviews. I also use our vendor Midwest Tapes for reviews/sale ranks. In addition to their magazine, they allow me to sort by what’s selling in the area. I’m able to see if I missed a big released from a familiar artist. I’m also able to see what new artists are selling at high numbers.

So that’s my quick primer about recorded music. Did I miss anything or any favorite artist? Let me know in the comments!

– Katie Salo
Early Literacy Librarian
Indian Prairie Public Library
http://storytimekatie.com

The post Recorded Storytime Music: A Primer appeared first on ALSC Blog.

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Fandom Starts Early Storytime Number 1
Fandom Starts Early Storytime Number 2

I've hosted two Fandom Starts Early Geeky Storytimes for kids and I knew it would be the perfect fit for LibraryCon. My previous Fandom storytimes have been OK, but I held them on Friday evenings, which are always a tough time to draw a crowd. Plus, I didn't get the true geeky families I was hoping for and I knew my audience at LibraryCon would appreciate and love a storytime based on fandoms.

I took some things that I've used before and added a few new things for the LibraryCon version. I actually had to adapt and change my plan at the last minute because my crowd ended up being much younger than I anticipated. So here's what we did for Fandom Starts Early LibraryCon!

Opening Song: Hedwig's Theme-I opened the doors had the kids walk in to Hedwig's Theme and welcomed everyone to Fandom Starts Early Storytime. I told the parents that it's fun to introduce their favorite fandoms to their kids and we have lots of great books to help do so. Plus, being a geek is awesome!

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I think I am predisposed to like anything done by Gianna Marino, so I requested an Advance Reader Copy of Night Animals, which is on shelves now.  I was not disappointed.

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• First Grade, Here I Come! by Tony Johnston 

A playfully rambunctious boy plans his first day of first grade, "For show-and-tell, no teddy bears. I'll bring my snake - oh joy! My friends will hold my boa up. (I call him Huggy Boy.)" For this scene, the playful illustrations show the teacher standing atop her desk while the kids hoist Huggy Boy. Cheerful, silly fun!

• Bob and Flo by Rebecca Ashdown

It's Flo's first day at preschool. Not only does she find her missing bucket, she finds a friend. Cute.

• ABC School's for Me! by Susan B. Katz

"Eating snack around the rug, Friends who share a hello hug." A cute, rhyming, and encouraging ABC book. Dad's First Day Mike Wohnoutka Here's a twist on "first day of school" books - it's Oliver's dad who has the first day of school jitters! (Picture Oliver's teacher carrying Oliver's crying dad outside.) "The teacher walked Oliver's dad outside." "Bye, Daddy!" But don't worry ... it all turns out OK.

• Monkey: Not Ready for Kindergarten by Marc Brown

In crayon-inspired illustrations, Marc Brown tells the story of a monkey worried about his first day at school. "What if his teacher doesn't like him? What if he gets on the wrong bus? What if he can't find the bathroom? ..." With time and patient help from his parents and friends, Monkey slowly gets ready for Kindergarten.

• Rosie Goes to Preschool by Karen Katz 

Rosie's not worried about her first day of preschool. In fact, she'll tell you all about it! Happy, simple, and multicultural - this is a classic Karen Katz book.

• Not This Bear: A First Day of School Story by Alyssa Satin Capucilli 

In this story of a bear's first day at school, author Alyssa Satin Capucilli shows that going to school does not mean giving up one's individuality. Bear clings to some familiar things and habits from home, but still fits in and enjoys himself at school. An interesting and reassuring take on "first day at school" books.

• Ally-saurus & the First Day of School by Richard Torrey 

Is there room for a dinosaur girl in a school filled with princess girls? Of course there is! "Taking off her favorite dinosaur pajamas, Ally-saurus dressed in her brand-new first-day-of-school outfit. "Your pants are on backward," said Father. "That's so my dinosaur tail can stick out," explained Ally-saurus. Let's wear our pants the right way," said Father. "ROAR!" said Ally-saurus."

• Eva and Sadie and the Best Classroom EVER! by Jeff Cohen 

Big sister Sadie tries to help Eva get ready for Kindergarten - but teaching her math and reading may not be the best way to help!

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#alaac15 provides space for meetings of all kinds. Although we’re apparently not that “uncommon,” yesterday I attended a meet-up of ukulele-playing librarians at the ALA Networking Uncommons.  We exchanged emails, discussed creating a group FB page and played a few songs.  Perhaps next year, we can have an ALSC session on Using your Uke for Story Time and Outreach. Wouldn’t that be fun?  Check out today’s gatherings at the Networking Uncommons. http://www.alsc.ala.org/blog/

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