"Not a Flannel" Friday: Penguins, Penguins, Everywhere!

It is finally time for some Penguin Fun at my Family Storytime so I thought I would share some of the fun with you, too.

I actually have several penguin activities to share.
Let's start with a playful rhyme that allows you to use ordinal numbers with your little ones, as well as counting up and counting down with a little help from our cute black and white friends.

Five Little Penguins 



Five little penguins,

As happy as could be,

Standing on a rock, 

Looking out at sea.

Crash! Went the waves,

Oh, what a din!

Said the first little penguin,

"Shall we all jump in?"

Said the second little penguin,

"The water's like ice."

Said the third little penguin,

"That's not so nice."

Said the fourth little penguin,

"Let's bask in the sun."

Said the fifth little penguin,

"Hey, that's no fun!"

So the five little penguins

Take a leap and dive 

And splash into the water,

1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5.

Three seconds later, 

Out they all pop.

And stand once again

Atop the big rock.

5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1.

Yay!

Our second activity is a good one to use with a simple penguin puppet. It is easy to make a puppet for each child by photocopying a small penguin, cutting it out, and taping it to a popsicle stick. 

Or if you have a Ellison diecut machine and a penguin diecut, it is even easier to make a puppet for each storytime friend. ;-)

This activity allows you to demonstrate positional words with even the youngest storytime participants ~ just have the adult do the motions with the puppet for their child.

The Penguins

The penguins are here; the penguins are there.

The penguins, the penguins are everywhere.

The penguins are up; the penguins are down.

The penguins, the penguins are all around.

The penguins are in; the penguins are out.

The penguins, the penguins are all about.

The penguins are low; the penguins are high.

The penguins, the penguins all say "goodbye"!

Another activity that I use with my Penguins, Penguins, Everywhere storytime is the flannel set that I shared a few weeks ago: 

There Was a Little Penguin
(Click on the title for a link to my post.)

For our craft, we made Adorable Penguin Hats so that the children could pretend to be penguins and waddle around in our last two activities.

Adorable Penguin

I'm a little penguin

Black and white,

Short and wobbly,

An adorable sight!

I can't fly at all,

But I love to swim.

So I'll waddle to the water 

And dive right in!

For this rhyme, I teach the sign for penguin, black, and white. We also do motions for "short and wobbly", "fly", "swim", "waddle", and "dive". This particular activity gets numerous requests for repeating it. I usually plan to do it 2 to 3 times. The repetition will help the little ones remember the rhyme so that they can continue to "be penguins" at home. I also send home a flyer with the words and I post them on my library's Facebook page for easy accessibility.

Our last rhyme was also fun to do together with lots more waddling and diving.

Penguin Cheer

I like fishies.
Yes, I do!
When I want fishies,
Here's what I do.
One, two, three...
SPLASH!

And finally, here is a picture of one of my storytime friends in her Adorable Penguin Hat. 

She is so precious!

HAPPY READING TOGETHER!

Here’s Flannel Friday information for this week:

This week’s Flannel Friday roundup is hosted by Katie.

Round up archives and host schedule is at So Tomorrow.

Visually scan all the Flannel Friday posts at Pinterest.

Talk about storytime and flannelboards at the Flannel Friday Facebook Page. Be sure to checkout my Flannel Friday Comment Challenge on the facebook page. This is the fourth week and I am offering an incentitive!

Follow Flannel Friday on Twitter with the #flannelfriday hashtag. (You don’t have to be on Twitter to check this out.)

And, last but not least, if you’re a contributor, there is an awesome blog button from Melissa and you can grab it from the right hand menu at Mel’s Desk!

Storytime Fun: It is Snowing All Around!

Here is my very first STORYTIME post. I hope you enjoy it!

IT IS SNOWING!

IT IS SNOWING!

ALL AROUND!
ALL AROUND!

Snowing in Florida?!!??! 

Some of you might be asking why I would do a Snow Storytime at a library in Florida?!?!!

My answer is: WHY NOT?

We don't need real snow to enjoy a story or two about it ~ just like inland states don't need to have the ocean and the beach to enjoy an ocean-themed storytime. If ~ like me ~ you live in a place where it doesn't usually snow, then I suggest you use your imagination and be creative! 

Want to see what we do here in Florida?

I start my Storytimes in the same way each week with the same songs and activities. (In a future post, I will share what we do and why.) 

But once the introduction is over, it is time for something NEW!

For this storytime, we started with a fingerplay and a song (with hand motions).

Two Little Snowflakes

Way up high In the Winter sky,

(Point up)

Two little snowflakes caught my eye.

(Hold both hands above head)

Down to the ground they fell without a sound.

(Wiggle hands downward, then put finger to lips)

Before very long it was snowing all around.

(Swirl hands around everywhere)

It is Snowing!

(Sung to: "Frere Jacques")

It is snowing!

It is snowing!

(Swirl hands)

All around.

All around.

(Move hands in larger and larger swirls)

Soft and quiet snowflakes,

Soft and quiet snowflakes,

(Put finger to lips)

Fall to the ground. 

Fall to the ground.

(Wiggle hands downward)

Next, we read one of our snowman books: 

All You Need for a Snowman

After the story, I passed out snowflakes (diecut from white construction paper and glued to blue circles) for a couple of creative movement activities. 

Snowflakes, Snowflakes

Snowflakes, snowflakes,

Dance around.

Snowflakes, snowflakes,

Touch the ground.

Snowflakes, snowflakes,

In the air.

Snowflakes, snowflakes,

Everywhere!

The children were allowed to dance and twirl with their snowflakes as much or as little as they wanted. Then we moved on to a more detailed, creative movement activity that required the children to use their listening skills.

Snowflake, Snowflake, Dance with Me

Snowflake, Snowflake, fancy free.

Snowflake, Snowflake, dance with me.

Touch my head, then my toes,

Land on my nose where the cold wind blows.

Snowflake, Snowflake, turn around.

Snowflake, Snowflake, touch the ground.

Snowflake, Snowflake, fancy free.

Snowflake, Snowflake, dance with me.

Touch my elbow, then my shoulder.

Land on my chin where it's a little bit colder.

Snowflake, Snowflake, turn around.

Snowflake, Snowflake, touch the ground.

Snowflake, Snowflake, fancy free.

Snowflake, Snowflake, dance with me.

Touch my ear, then my knees.

Snowflake, I'm about to freeze!

Snowflake, Snowflake, turn around.

Snowflake, Snowflake, land the ground.

The children were now sitting and ready for another story. You could share another book here but I had a magnetic board adaptation of one of our favorite books that I shared at this time. The original book is Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? written by Bill Martin. My magnetic board version is:

 Snowflakes, Snowflakes, What Do You See?

Snowflakes, Snowflakes, what do you see?

We see three, white snowballs down below us.

Snowballs, snowballs, what do you see?

We see two blueberries right on us.

Blueberries, blueberries, what do you see?

We see an orange carrot right below us.

Orange carrot, orange carrot, what do you see?

I see five red cherries down below me.

Red cherries, red cherries, what do you see?

We see a purple scarf down below us.

Purple scarf, purple scarf, what do you see?

I see three, yellow stars down below me.

Yellow stars, yellow stars, what do you see?

We see two, brown branches up above us.

Brown branches, brown branches, what do you see?

We see two, green mittens right on top of us.

Green mittens, green mittens, what do you see?

We see a black hat up above us.

Black hat, black hat, what do you see?

I see lots of children right in front of me.

Children, children, what do you see?

(This is where I encourage the children to say everything with me 

in the order that we added them to the board.)

We see:

Two pretty snowflakes

Three white snowballs

Two blue berries

One orange carrot

Five red cherries

One purple scarf

Three yellow stars

Two brown branches

Two green mittens

and

One black hat.

We see a snowman right in front of us! 

Happy Snow Day!

With our snowman built, we went right into a fun fingerplay/magnetic story.

Chubby Little Snowman

A chubby little snowman

Had a carrot nose.

Along came a bunny,

And what do you suppose?

That hungry little bunny

Was looking for some lunch.

He ate the snowman's nose!

Nibble, nibble, CRUNCH!

I usually finish my storytimes the same way each time. This gives the children some consistency just like at the beginning of the storytime.

We form a circle and sing "The More We Get Together". Then we do our goodbyes with My Hands Say, "Thank You".

Most of the time, we share a snack and we either do a "sit-down craft" or I give the families a "take-home craft" to help extend the learning fun into their homes. (I will be sharing some of our crafts soon.)

Snack this week was a "Snowball Cookie". In the past I have given them "Snowman Cookies" or "Yummy Snow" (shaved ice with or without lemonade syrup). I will try to add a picture of the cookies soon.

Whew! Sharing Storytimes is a little more involved than I thought! 

I feel like my post is too long but I also feel like I left things out! 

What do you think? Too long? Should I break my Storytimes up into smaller parts and make multiple posts? Maybe a separate post for the songs and for the magnetic board story? 

I'm not sure...

Well. that's it until my next post. As always,

HAPPY READING TOGETHER!