African Folk Tales

I was excited this week to tell a few African Folk Tales in celebration of Black History Month. I explained to the kids in storytime that many parents tell stories to their children that teach lessons in fun ways. I challenged them to tell me the moral of each story when we finished the following books:

 

 

I told the story of "Head Body Legs" using the flannel board, where children had to put the pieces together as they are read in the story, and then rearrange them correctly in the end. We moved around to this song from http://www.trlib.org/BirthTo5/Pages/StoriesRhymes.aspx

If You're a (  ) & You Know It
If you’re an elephant & you know it, stomp your feet,
If you’re an elephant & you know it, stomp your feet,
If you’re an elephant & you know it, then you really ought to show it,
If you’re an elephant & you know it, stomp your feet.
Repeat:
Parrot…flap your wings
Crocodile…snap your jaws
Monkey…turn around
Lion…roar out loud

For our craft, we made the little red mouse from Mabela the Clever using the instructions from the DLTK website.

Groundhog Day

Yesterday was Groundhog Day, hooray! Centering a storytime around groundhogs at first seemed daunting, but I was able to find some good choices that both told a story and helped the children learn what Groundhog Day is all about.

I read three books in this storytime:

 

I created a flannel board called "Five Groundhogs" using a rhyme from the DLTK Groundhog resource page. I used clip art as a model for the groundhogs, then drew each one and cut it out of tan foam. My craft was a groundhog cup puppet. Children cut out pre-made groundhog shapes and taped them to a popsicle stick, that you poke through the bottom of a cup. I added gift basket paper shreds for visual appeal. Viola!