This storytime was presented on December 20, so of course we had to do a tribute to the upcoming season — Winter!


Books We Shared

 

Our books today featured animals that normally hibernate during winter – a frog and a bear.  We began with Froggy Gets Dressed by Jonathan London, illustrated by Frank Remkiewicz.  In this silly story Froggy wakes up in the middle of winter to see that it is snowing.  Even though he’s supposed to sleep until spring, he can’t wait to play in the snow.  But getting dressed for the cold is harder than it looks!  Next we read Sleep, Big Bear, Sleep! by Maureen Wright, illustrated by Will Hillenbrand.  Big Bear is tired, and Old Man Winter keeps whispering for him to go to sleep.  But Big Bear doesn’t hear very well, and ends up doing some strange activities before Old Man Winter finds a way to capture his attention.


Flannelboard Stories

The Penguin Went Over the Iceberg
Penguin Went Over the Iceberg Flannelboard
(to tune of: “The Bear Went Over the Mountain”)

The penguin went over the iceberg
The penguin went over the iceberg
The penguin went over the iceberg
to see what he could see.
But all that he could see
But all that he could see
was the other side of the iceberg
The other side of the iceberg
The other side of the iceberg
was all that he could see.

Snowball, Snowball
Snowball Snowball Flannelboard 1 cropped Snowball Snowball Flannelboard 2 cropped

Snowball, snowball
cold and round!
Behind which mitten
can you be found?
Are you behind the color mitten?

To play this flannelboard game you hide the snowball behind a mitten before you start.  Then you recite the name of each color in the poem and see if you can find it.  You can also let your child select which mitten they would like to look under first.

 


Movements

Try these fun rhymes at home with your child!

Cute Little Snowman
A cute little snowman                   (hold up left fist for snowman)
Had a carrot nose                        (stick out pointer finger on fist to make nose, if you want)
Along came a rabbit                     (hold up 2 fingers of right hand to make a rabbit)
And what do you suppose?
That hungry little rabbit                (move the right hand closer to the left hand)
Looking for his lunch
Ate that snowman’s carrot nose
nibble, nibble, crunch.                (lightly pinch left pointer finger or fist with right hand)

 

The Winter Pokey
(to the tune of “The Hokey Pokey”)

You put your right mitten in
You put your right mitten out
You put your right mitten in
And you shake it all about.
You do the winter pokey
And you turn yourself about
That’s what it’s all about (BRRR! BRRR!)

Other verses:
– Left mitten
– Right boot
– Left boot
– winter hat (head)
– snow suit (whole body)


Movie We Watched

We celebrated winter with the classic story The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats.  This gentle story gets the mood of snowfall and the excitement of a snow covered day just right.
 


Continue the Fun

Still want more Winter stories?  Celebrate the season with these stories at your Pasadena Public Library branch:
   

 

Children’s Room Storytime 12/20/2014