Hello! – Toddler Storytime

With our first Toddler Storytime of the Winter 2017 session, we all said Hello! to one another and Hello! during all the stories we read. It was a great way to kick off what is sure to be a wonderful ten weeks.

Books We Shared

There are lots of different ways to say Hello, and we started our storytime learning all about how different animals say it with the book Say Hello Like This! by Mary Murphy. With fun small pages that flip over, this is a great story for practicing all types of animal sounds!

After learning all about how animals say hello, it made sense to take a trip around the world and learn the different ways people say hello, too! So that’s exactly what we did with the help of our second book How Hippo Says Hello! by Abigail Samoun, illustrated by Sarah Watts. In fact, we practiced our Hellos in eight different languages!

Flannel Board Story

Can We Find?

Idea take from Sunflower Storytime, who found it at storytime katie. The bear and bird puppets are from ArtFelt.

This is a fun guessing game. First, hide 3 friends under three different color houses. Then sing the song:

(to the tune of “Do You Know the Muffin Man?”)
Can we find the brown bear
brown bear, brown bear?
Can we find the brown bear?
We want to say “Hello”!

Have your child pick a color house and see if that friend is underneath! Then look for other friends in the other houses. We played this with a brown bear, a red bird, and a gray mouse.

Counting Song Flannelboard

10 Hands

Counting time, it’s counting time
So let’s all sing a simple rhyme

Ten little hands here we go
Let’s all count them as I put them in rows.
1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10

Ten little hands, again we go
Now let’s count them nice and slow
1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10

Ten little hands, in neat rows
Let’s count them as away they go
1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10

Video We Watched

“Hello Little Cat” from Baby’s First-Word Stories: Pets

One day, Iggy is woken up by a strange noise. What can that be outside her window?

Rhymes & Bounces & Songs We Shared without Music

We sing a lot of songs during storytime! You’ll find lyrics to those songs without music here.

Welcome Song
(to the tune of: “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”)
Welcome, welcome everyone
Now we’re here let’s have some fun.
First we clap our hands just so
Then we bend and touch our toes
Welcome, welcome everyone
Now we’re here let’s have some fun.

Open Shut Them
Open, shut them. (Spread fingers wide, then close into fists)
Open, shut them. (Spread fingers wide, then close into fists)
Give a little clap, clap, clap. (Clap hands on “clap”)
Open, shut them. (Spread fingers wide, then close into fists)
Open, shut them. (Spread fingers wide, then close into fists)
Place them in your lap, lap, lap (Pat lap with hands on “lap”)
Creep them, crawl them (creep fingers up stomach to chin)
Creep them, crawl them (creep fingers up stomach to chin)
Right up to your chin, chin, chin (tap chin with hands on “chin”)
Open up your little mouth (open mouth wide and pretend to put fingers in)
But do not let them in! (Hide hands behind your back quickly)

For a video of me (Jennifer) doing this rhyme, watch the video below

The Itsy Bitsy Spider
The itsy bitsy spider (L shape with both hands. Place thumb of one hand on forefinger of the other)
went up the water spout. (“walk” your fingers up thumb to forefinger, alternating.)
Down came the rain and (wiggle fingers and bring then downward)
Washed the spider out. (make baseball “safe” motion)
Out came the sun and (hands above head in a circle)
and dried up all the rain. (hands out at side of body)
And the itsy bitsy spider (L shape with both hands. Place thumb of one hand on forefinger of the other)
went up the spout again. (“walk” your fingers up thumb to forefinger, alternating.)

Storytime’s Over
Hands up high! (Put your hands in air)
Now give a big sigh (sigh and bring hands down)
Our storytime’s over
So wave bye-bye (wave)