I asked the children who regularly come to storytime to give me suggestions for what they wanted me to read and one of the topics they said was animal themed.
Books we read
Polar Bear’s Underwear by Tupera Tupera (toddler and preschool)
Actual Size by Steve Jenkins (toddler and preschool)
Click, Clack, Quackity-Quack by Doreen Cronin (preschool)
Do You See my Tail by Anita Bijsterbosch (toddler and preschool)
Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr/Eric Carl (baby)
Moo, Baa, La La La by Sandra Boynton (toddler and baby)
Songs we sang
Freeze Dance from Cocomelon
Old MacDonald
Old MacDonald had a farm
e i e i o
And on his farm he had some cows
e i e i o
With a moo-moo here
And a moo-moo there
Here a moo, there a moo
Everywhere a moo-moo
Old MacDonald had a farm
e i e i o
Credit: childhood
For Old MacDonald, I printed images of five different animals, laminated them, and hot glued them to popsicle sticks. Each kid got a set of animals and when we sang the song I asked which animal they wanted to do next and then we held them up and made them dance. It was really fun and they enjoyed it.
Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear
Teddy bear, teddy bear turn around
Teddy bear, teddy bear touch the ground
Teddy bear, teddy bear reach up high
Teddy bear, teddy bear touch the sky
Teddy bear, teddy bear find your nose
Teddy bear, teddy bear touch your toes
Teddy bear, teddy bear find your knees
Teddy bear, teddy bear sit down please
Credit: King County library system
Flannel Activity
Five Little Owls
Five little owls sitting in a tree
One flew away, now how many do you see?
One, two, three, four…
Credit: Adapted from Storytime Katie
Early Literacy tip
Imitation- like in the Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear activity- is one of the earliest forms of interactions for children and it allows them to coordinate actions with another person. It teaches children language by building vocabulary and is good for brain development.
Signs and Spanish Words
Animal in Spanish is animal and the sign can be found here.
Dog in Spanish is perro and the sign can be found here.
How it went
The Actual Size book is one of my new storytime favorites and I plan on finding more like it. The kids loved coming up and putting their hand on the page to compare how big the animal or insect is compared to their hand. They loved it!
Polar Bear’s Underwear is one of my favorite storytime books too because it always gets giggles since we are talking about underwear. I am reading it at a winter event I have coming up this weekend because it’s so fun and popular with the kids. They also love guessing books so the Do you see my tail one was a fun one for toddlers and preschoolers, though the preschoolers were better able to guess the animals.
The flannel was really fun and they love coming up to grab the owls as the owl flies away and making it fly to their spot on the storytime rug. They also really enjoyed using the animal props and I think it helped the toddlers identify the animals because the parents helped them choose the right ones and they got to practice their animal sounds before we sang each verse.
Super fun storytime theme and I am glad my kiddos suggested it!