Oceans!
Storytime theme: Oceans and ocean creatures
Books used:
Following Papa's Song by Gianna Mariano
Following Papa's Song follows the migration of a young humpback whale, Little Blue, and his father, Papa. Little Blue is full of questions and curiosity about his watery surroundings, and about the yearly journey that he and his kind make every year. His wise Papa teaches Little Blue about the magical songs that humpback whales sing in order to communicate and to keep track of each other during their migration. Little Blue's curiosity gets the best of him when when he wanders away from Papa in order to go in search of what lies in the dark depths of the ocean. Though Little Blue becomes alarmed when he realizes that he has wandered away from his father, he remembers what Papa said about the song of the humpbacks, and he is ultimately reunited with his father once again when he follows his Papa's song back to safety. This gorgeously illustrated book is great to use for an ocean-themed storytime program as you really get the feeling of being immersed deep in the ocean amongst the humpbacks. In the future I might pair this story with some recordings of humpback whale songs since they are an important part of the story, and most likely our young listeners haven't heard these before.
Swimmy by Leo Lionni
It it hard to believe that Swimmy was first published way back in 1963, because it's timeless story and illustrations fit right into place in today's modern picture book collections. I was first introduced to this book during my storytime training by one of my good friends, and I immediately fell in love with the imaginative depictions of the wonders of the deep beautifully crafted by Leo Lionni. The story of Swimmy, a little black fish, is not necessarily one that hasn't been told before and it isn't overly complex, but that is the beauty of it. Swimmy's brothers and sisters, little red fish, are suddenly eaten up by a much larger fish. Swimmy is sad, but is soon cheered up as he wanders the sea and experiences its wondrous marvels. He comes across another school of little red fish, not unlike his own family members, but they hide in the seaweed because they are scared of being eaten by the big, hungry fish. Swimmy devises a plan for the little red fish to organize themselves in such a way that they look like a big fish, and together they are able to scare away the big fish who is tricked by their formation. There is a definite theme of "stronger in numbers" present in this story that I think is a good one for our young listeners to learn, and one that I think is often amiss in today's modern world. I love to share this story with my storytime participants, and I marvel along with my listeners of all the beauty that the ocean can hold.
Hooray for Fish! by Lucy Cousins
Hooray for Fish! is a wonderful book to share during ocean storytime, especially with a younger crowd because the story isn't overly complex, and the illustrations are big, bold, and bright. I especially like using this book for reading aloud because it is physically a lot bigger than the standard size picture book, so it is easy for storytime participants to see the pages, even when I'm presenting to a bigger crowd. The story follows a fish around the ocean, where we encounter all kinds of fish, both real and made-up. There are a lot of opportunities to encourage attention and participation built-in to the story, for example counting how many fish are on the page together, or asking what color different fish are. I was a bit wary about using this book with some of the older kids of my storytime, but I was surprised that they still enjoyed the book, despite the story being a little simplistic for them.
I'm the Biggest Thing in the Ocean by Kevin Sherry
As I mentioned previously, I usually get the opportunity to re-present a planned storytime program 2 or 3 weeks in a row, because I get a different visiting group of preschoolers who are bussed to my library from local Head Starts in the area each week. I originally didn't present this story during my first week of storytime, but did get the chance to do so during the second week because it was requested by my group. The story follows a big squid, who proudly proclaims that he is the biggest thing in the ocean, and then spends the rest of the story travelling around the ocean and pointing out all the different creatures he is bigger than. This book has a surprise ending when the big squid is eaten by an even larger shark! It turns out the squid isn't the biggest thing in the ocean, but his hubris doesn't stop him from declaring that he is the biggest thing in the shark's stomach. The story is pretty short and can feel a tad repetitive as squid goes around naming all the ocean creatures he is bigger than, but I find there are still some good opportunities for participation in the story which helps to enrich its brevity. Getting the comedic timing down for the surprise ending is also important when reading the story aloud, so I recommend practicing reading it at least a few times before actually presenting it to get it down.
Scuba Bunnies by Christine Loomis, illustrated by Ora Eitan
Scuba Bunnies tells the story of a family of curious young rabbits who want to know what lies under the ocean's waves. They strap into their scuba gear, say goodbye to their Mama, and dive deep into the water to embark on a watery adventure. During their time way down deep in the water, they encounter a variety of ocean creatures, discover a sunken pirate ship, and befriend a school of dolphins. After a long day exploring the ocean and its mysteries, the scuba bunnies make their way home to Mama, and quickly fall asleep to dreams of their underwater adventures. This is a story written in rhyme, so I find that its flowing language has a natural appeal to listeners. I really liked this fantastical story about deep diving bunnies, and it was a bit hit with my storytime attendees.
Hello, Baby Beluga by Darrin Lunde, illustrated by Patricia J. Wynne
I didn't actually read through all of this book during my storytime, but rather only flipped through a few pages of it to introduce my storytime attendees to beluga whales. I wanted to provide this introduction because this is the first week I've played a song on my soprano ukulele during storytime. Since I chose the song "Baby Beluga" by Raffi I wanted to provide a few visuals before I actually presented the song. This book is actually shelved in the nonfiction collection in my library, but it's beautiful and realistic illustrations and the interesting factual information provided about beluga whales would make it a fitting addition for any preschool or toddler storytime. The book is presented in a question-answer format, but what I liked most about it were the cute pictures of the young beluga whale.
Activities:
Song: Baby Beluga
So I've owned a Kala soprano ukulele for about a year and a half now, but I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I've only started seriously trying to learn to play it in the past couple of months. I've played a few musical instruments in the past, piano and clarinet, and while I own a banjo that is still back in California at my parent's home, I haven't had much experience playing any sort of stringed instrument before. The nice thing about the ukulele is that you can play a bunch of children's song with just a basic knowledge of a few chords. That isn't to say that learning it hasn't been a challenge for me, strumming especially has been difficult because while ukulele tabs for songs are pretty easy to find online, strumming patterns are a little more tricky to master. Nonetheless, I set out to learn at least one song to play during a storytime program. I really like all of Raffi's songs, and I've always had a special place in my heart for Baby Beluga, so I decided that this would be the first song I'd really try to learn.
Though my playing still needs a lot of work, and I'm still learning different strumming patterns, my storytime attendees really loved the added element of the ukulele. I made the "mistake" of playing the song after the first book I read, and after each subsequent book that I read for this ocean-themed program I had constant requests to "play another song on my little guitar." I'm far from the best singer (no really, I'm awful and before storytime I had never sung in front of anyone before, ever) and ukulele player- but I've learned that kids are a forgiving crowd and as long as you show up with enthusiasm, they will treat you like a rockstar.
The ukulele tabs that I used for Baby Beluga are these from ultimate-guitar.com The song only uses a handful of chords- C, G, G7, F, & D. My strum pattern is mostly made up from what I thought sounded good for the song. My ukulele is the Kala KA-15S from the Satin Mahogany Series.
Without further ado, here is a video that I made of me playing Baby Beluga on my ukulele:
Flannelboard: 1-2-3-4-5, Once I Caught a Fish Alive
This song usually only includes catching one ocean creature, a fish, but I found this version from TopMarks that included additional stanzas about other types of ocean dwellers. I thought this song would pair well with some visual elements so I created these felt pieces for the different creatures:
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, Once I Caught a Fish Alive
(I like this version of the song, if you haven't heard it before)
One, two, three, four, five,
Once I caught a fish alive.
Six, seven, eight, nine, ten,
Then I let it go again.
Why did you let it go?
Because it bit my finger so.
Which finger did it bite?
This little finger on the right.
One, two, three, four, five,
Once I caught a crab alive.
Six, seven, eight, nine, ten,
Then I let it go again.
Why did you let it go?
Because it bit my finger so.
Which finger did it bite?
This little finger on the right.
One, two, three, four, five,
Once I caught an eel alive.
Six, seven, eight, nine, ten,
Then I let it go again.
Why did you let it go?
Because it bit my finger so.
Which finger did it bite?
This little finger on the right.
One, two, three, four, five,
Once I caught an octopus alive.
Six, seven, eight, nine, ten,
Then I let it go again.
Why did you let it go?
Because it bit my finger so.
Which finger did it bite?
This little finger on the right.
To make these pieces I've been using a new technique. First, I find a free clipart image online that I like. Then I save the image file to my iPad. Next, I take a sheet of freezer paper, place it over the screen of my iPad, and then trace the image onto the nonplastic side of the freezer paper. I then cut around the traced image, and then iron the paper scrap (plastic side down) onto a piece of felt on a low setting (I mostly use eco-felt, which is made of acrylic and will melt if the iron is too hot). Lastly, I cut out the felt using the traced image as my guide.
Some pieces do take a little bit of creativity as far as layering. You can see this in the blue and pink fish that I created above. In order to give it some contrast, I traced the fish fins separately on the freezer paper, and ironed them to a different colored piece of felt than what I used for the fish's blue body piece. Previous to this, I had been just tracing with a pen directly onto the felt using a variety of sourced images (clipart, hand sketched, from books, etc.), but I find this technique to save a lot of time and the results are crisper and cleaner. I found this tutorial from Juggling with Kids to be a good introduction to using freezer paper to create flannelboard pieces.
I used the following clipart images to create pieces for this flannelboard:
Flannelboard: Five Little Jellyfish
I used the above outlined technique to create 5 different colored jellyfish to go with a short little rhyme. This is the clipart image that I used to create the outline for my jellyfish.
The inspiration for this flannelboard is from Nikarella's blog, Narrating Tales of Preschool Storytime, where she posted her own Five Little Jellyfish flannelboard pieces. What I like about this rhyme is that you can easily change the colors of the jellyfish in it to match the pieces you've created.
Five Little Jellyfish
5 little jellyfish swimming by the shore, the yellow one got lost and that left 4.
4 little jellyfish swimming in the sea, the blue one swam far, far away and that left 3.
3 little jellyfish in the ocean so blue, the purple one took a seahorse ride and that left 2.
2 little jellyfish swimming in the sun, the orange one took a dive and that left 1.
1 little green jellyfish swimming all alone, it was time for him to go home and that left none!
Action Song: Row, Row, Row Your Boat
Row, Row, Row Your Boat is a traditional English nursery rhyme and children's song that has been around in its current form since the late 1800s. I like to include a variety of songs and rhymes during my storytime programs so that my attendees can sing along to some familiar favorites such as this one, while also learning some unfamiliar new classics.
An issue that I find with other similar traditional nursery rhymes and children's songs are that they are usually a bit short in nature for storytime, so I like it when a rhyme lends itself to being added to. Additionally, I like to sing Row, Row, Row Your Boat as an action song, where we all pretend to row our imaginary boats. I find this action element helps to enrich the song we all know so well and make it a little more exciting.
For this song, we begin with the standard rhyme, and I've added the adverbs "slowly" and "quickly" in place of "gently" to two additional verses of the song to lengthen its overall playtime. We also adjust our rowing actions to mimic the different action adverbs. You could even add more adverbs in place of "gently" to increase the length of the song too. I find it fun to exaggerate the "slowly" and "quickly" parts, not only rowing more quickly and slowly, but also singing the song at a pace to match these speeds.
Row, Row, Row Your Boat
(while rowing at a normal speed)
Row, row, row your boat,
gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily,
life is but a dream.
(while rowing at a slow speed)
Row, row, row your boat,
slowly down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily,
life is but a dream.
(while rowing at a fast speed)
Row, row, row your boat,
quickly down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily,
life is but a dream.
Craft activity: Shark teeth and Octopus paper bag puppets
I did two different crafts for this storytime, since I presented it for a couple of weeks to different groups.
The first craft was a shark-themed craft. I printed and cut out this shark template from the Harris County Public Library website. I also pre-cut out shark teeth from pieces of white paper, since we don't usually have enough time after storytime for everyone to cut out their own. I let the kids color their sharks with brown or gray crayons, and then we glued everything to sheets of blue paper to create a nice scene. I also used our die cut machine to cut out small goldfish to put in the shark's mouth, but most of the kids just ended up gluing them next to the shark.
The second craft is an octopus-themed craft. I printed out this free octopus paper bag puppet template from Scholastic printables. The kids colored them and then glued the halves to a paper bag. This craft definitely took a lot less time and effort to complete & prep than the shark craft, but I think everyone had lots of fun making both crafts.
