books and puppet from today

Today’s theme was food, and all the kids got to hold shaker eggs. I did more books than usual. But even with the distraction of the eggs and more than the usual amount of reading, the group did very well! And I just had to share those books. Some themes suggest so many good books I just can’t pick only three!

We sang “Clap Your Hands” and then I did a puppet show narrating the classic book The Little Mouse, The Red, Ripe Strawberry and the Big, Hungry Bear by Don and Audrey Wood. I used a puppet for the mouse and the kids helped me trick the mouse and convince him that there really is a big, hungry bear going tromp, tromp, tromp on big, hungry feet.

When I previously performed this puppet show for a toddler group I recorded it. Here it is:

We read Little Pea by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and illustrated by Jen Corace. It turns out peas are picky eaters too, only they aren’t told to “eat all their vegetables“!

We sang a song called “Pea Soup” which I learned from Miss Jennifer’s storytimes blog:

(hold hand up with all five fingers extended)
1 little pea jumped into the pot (fold one finger down)
And waited for the soup to get hot.
2 little peas jumped into the pot (fold one finger down)
And waited for the soup to get hot.
3 little peas jumped into the pot (fold one finger down)
And waited for the soup to get hot.
4 little peas jumped into the pot (fold one finger down)
And waited for the soup to get hot.
5 little peas jumped into the pot (fold one finger down)
And waited for the soup to get hot.
Finally the soup got so very hot
All the little peas jumped out of the pot. (quickly open hand and extend all fingers.)
(Source: https://jeninthelibrary.com/2014/01/18/soup-preschool-storytime/ )

Our 2nd book was Everyone Loves Bacon by Kelly DiPucchio and Eric Wight. Bacon is becoming the “toast of the town,” and as a result is starting to get very full of himself

I gave the kids some pieces of felt cut in all different shapes and colors to represent diced veggies and cheese. Then we told a story about a boy whose dad was trying to introduce him to new veggies and got him to eat them in the form of the pizza. The kids helped make the pizza.

picky pete

I got the idea from a bilingual flannelboard story by a librarian named Katie at her blog Es divertido hablar dos idiomas.

Our 3rd book was Crunch by Carolina Rabei. It’s about a guinea pig who loves his food but has an opportunity to find something even better than lettuce, carrots or celery–friendship.

We sang a song called “Stir, Stir, Stir the Soup” which I found on Miss Jennifer’s blog at https://jeninthelibrary.com/2014/01/18/soup-preschool-storytime.

food toys 2

Stir, Stir, Stir the Soup
(To tune of “Row, Row, Row Your Boat”)
Stir, stir, stir the soup
Stir it all day long.
Add some (insert food name here),
Take a taste (slurrrp!)
Soup will make us strong. (flex arm)

I had fun adding strange ingredients like bologna and Swiss cheese and orange juice!

We danced and shook our shaker eggs to a wonderful, Rumba-like rendition of “Apples and Bananas” by Ladybug Music (Patricia Maertens) from the album Summer Songs vol. 1. If the shaker eggs distracted kids here and there during storytime, it was worth it for the great music we made during that song!

We watched a short film based on the book Pete’s a Pizza by William Stieg. The story is really cute, about a dad who cheers his son up by making him into a pizza–rolling him, kneading him, sprinkling him with “cheese,” and tickling him.

We read a FOURTH book (like I said, this Food storytime made me kinda greedy!) which I think was enjoyed by everyone: Yummy Yucky by Leslie Patricelli. I see the library copy is currently missing which is a shame–it’s one of my favorites. A real hoot! It’s what I call a board book for the whole family–not just for babies.

Want to do some more food themed songs at home? Try Little Miss Muffet and Little Jack Horner! I didn’t have time to get to those.

Little Miss Muffet
sat on her tuffet
eating her curds and whey.
Along came a spider
who sat down beside her
and frightened Miss Muffet away.

Little Jack Horner
sat in the corner
eating his Christmas pie.
He stuck in his thumb,
and pulled out a plum–
and he said, “What a good boy am I!”

I always thought those songs weren’t very fair to the girls…

Here are some other yummy reads:

Don’t forget to mark this as your reading minutes for summer reading! I think everyone got a good 30 minutes of being read to today. Thanks for coming!