Program: Family Storytime

It's that time again! After an all-too-brief hiatus, storytimes are back in full swing at my library and I had the privilege of hosting the first Saturday morning Family Storytime! Here's what we did!

Welcome - this is where I say hello to everyone in storytime, introduce myself and provide some gentle reminders (turn off your phones, keep out of our floor-to-ceiling blinds, and have fun!).

Opening rhyme: "My Hands" - well, I don't actually know what this is called, but it's my new opening rhyme! After the summer session ended, I knew I couldn't do Open Shut Them again without wanting to scream. So I searched around and found this new rhyme to do.

"Sometimes my hands are at my side.
Sometimes behind my back they hide.
Sometimes I wiggle my fingers so,
Shake them fast, shake them slow.
Sometimes my hands go CLAP CLAP CLAP
Then I lay them in my lap.
Now they're quiet as can be
Because it's storytime you see."

I love it! I think it went over really well, too. I'm so happy to have a new opening - hopefully it's a while before I get sick of this one.

Book: Jack's House by Karen Magnuson Beil, illustrated by Mike Wohnoutka - our theme this week was building and construction. I have to admit that I was less than enthusiastic for this theme - I'm excellent at building things, but I don't really find it that interesting. Plus, as I started trying to find books to fit the theme, they all seemed too redundant for me. So, I started off with this one because it was the most different of the bunch. It's that same old rhyme "The House that Jack Built" but with a new twist - did Jack really build the house? Or did he hire a bunch of people to do it for him? I thought the kids would love the clever little ending, but it seemed to go over most of their heads.

Song: "She'll Be Riding a Bulldozer" - I found this in a Rob Reid book of storytimes and loved it immediately. Apparently, our other branches have a flannel to go along with it, but I didn't find it in time to make that work, so I just sang it. This is "She'll Be Comin' Round the Mountain" with construction vehicles thrown it - lots of fun! It would have been better if the kids knew the words, but they caught on after a while and managed to do all the actions with me.

Book: Builder Goose: It's Construction Rhyme Time! By Boni Ashburn, illustrated by Sergio Di Giorgi - This is basically a collection of Mother Goose rhymes that have been altered to fit the construction theme. I thought they were clever and I thought kids might have fun figuring out which rhymes had been changed, but this did not work well at all in the storytime setting. I'd only read a few before the kids started to get antsy and I ended up skipping a few to get to the end.

Song: "Silly Dance Contest" by Jim Gill - I could not find my Hap Palmer CD with "Bluegrass Jamboree" on it, so I went back to the old favorite for this storytime. We really needed to get our wiggles out today, especially after our last book, so we danced our silliest!

Flannel: Build a House - we had a few different flannel options this week but most of them were geared toward counting. As I am predisposed to not liking flannel stories, I tried to pick something a bit more interesting. This is a simple rhyming story of the steps it takes to build a house. The kids seemed ambivalent about it.

Book: The Construction Crew by Lynn Meltzer, illustrated by Carrie Eko-Burgess - this is a new construction themed book with easy rhyming text. It follows a construction crew as they build a new house for a family. The kids really got into this one, finishing the rhymes with the various vehicles and tools used in the construction. I thought it might be a bit too simple for family storytime, but it seemed to be a big hit.

Closing: "Wave Goodbye" by Rob Reid - YOU GUYS! I think I finally have it memorized! It only took me six months but I did it without looking at my paper! YAY!

And that was our construction storytime! What books would you share?