Spooktactular Stories (Preschool and Two's)

Preschool Storytime:

Opening: Big Books

Book: I am Bat (Volunteer doing ASL)

Fingerplay/Flannel: Five Little Monsters Jumping on the Bed

Book/Flannel: Tickle Monster

Action: Halloween Movement Cards

Fingerplay/Flannel: Trick or Treat

Knock, knock, trick or treat

Who is that hiding behind the sheet? 

Credit: This was a bulletin board idea that I saw on pinterest. I wanted to make it into a flannelboard. I made characters that the preschoolers would hopefully recognize. I had Piggie, Elephant, Pete the Cat and a friendly lion hiding under the sheets.

Today was our party, so we didn't have a craft. The parents brought food and we played games after storytime. Our games was a box knockdown, ring toss and bowling. I've provided pictures below of my knockdown game. For that, I put two different things on each side of the boxes, hoping that the preschoolers would understand to match the items up correctly. Thankfully they did and had so much fun with it! They love stacking and knocking the boxes down, so I wanted to make this more challenging for them. I also had pumpkins on each side of the boxes spelling out "orange" and then numbers counting from 1 to 6.

Extra Read-Alouds:

Time for Two’s Storytime:

Opening: Big Books

Fingerplay: “If You Want to Hear a Story”

Book: Little Blue Truck’s Halloween

Fingerplay: Five Little Monsters Jumping on the Bed

Book: Where Is Baby’s Pumpkin? 

Fingerplay/Flannel: Hiding Game with Pumpkin

Pumpkin, pumpkin, where can you be?

Let’s find you on the count of three!

Extra Books:

Pumpkin Party 2019

It's that time of year again....Halloween!!!!!!!  Well, almost anyway.  Monday we had our annual pumpkin party, with wonderful attendance!  110 kids and 90 adults!  Below are pictures of our crafts and games.  I didn't get a picture of our food, sorry about that.

1.) Skeleton Popsicle Stick Craft
Credit: Glued To My Crafts

2.) Cat Scrapbook Paper Craft
Credit: ?? I can't find my link to this fabulous cat, so if it's yours, please let me know!

3.) Eyeball Popsicle Stick Craft
Credit: Glued To My Crafts

4.) Spider Doorknob Hanger Craft

Credit: I believe this came from a kit bought a craft store.

5.) Bat Scrapbook Paper Craft
Credit: Oriental Trading

6.) Monster Craft
Credit: I apologize, the link for this craft isn't working properly.

7.) Haunted House Craft
Credit: ?? There are so many versions of this online, I honestly can't tell you exactly where I found this.  I apologize, if this is your fabulous creation, please tell me!

8.) Ghost Bowling Pins Game 
This game was setup outside, which was a little rough bowling on our sidewalk, but we made it work!



9.) Witch Ring Toss
This was an outside game also, and from what I heard the kids loved it!




10.) Games
I didn't get a picture of my other games, but we also had a tic-tac-toe game setup outside.  For the X and O's I made letters on the computer that looked liked bones.
Inside we had Halloween bingo and Halloween musical chairs.

11.) Food
We served up mini-cupcakes, which worked out fabulous, except for one thing.  I never imagined how much icing it would take to frost that many cupcakes!  I might seriously rethink this for next year.
We also served three pans of brownies, two brain jello molds, a family size bag of plain chips, three rice krispie snakes and candy corn.
Plus....we had our popcorn machine going the whole time, serving popcorn.
Shew....I'm tired!  The only food I'm aware that we had left was a little bit of popcorn and a handful of brownies.

K is for Kitchen Time! Pizza Time!

Preschool Storytime:

Opening: Big Books

Book: Pete the Cat and the Perfect Pizza Party

*As Pete the Cat is making his pizza, all of his friends wants to add something to the pizza. I wanted to make a flannel for this, so I've attached a picture of what mine turned out like. I ended up cutting out all the pieces out of construction paper and then laminating them, to make them sturdier. The preschoolers loved seeing my gross and silly pizza!

Fingerplay: 

Pizza man, pizza man, turn around

Pizza man, pizza man, touch the ground

Pizza man, pizza man, jump up high

Pizza man, pizza man, touch the sky

Pizza man, pizza man do you like cheese?

Pizza man, pizza man slap your knees!

Pizza man, pizza man, turn around

Pizza man, pizza man, sit back down!

Book: Ding Dong! Gorilla! (Have volunteer deliver pizza, but have the box be empty like the portrays.)

*I was hoping the preschoolers would have enjoyed this book more than they did, but this is still a really funny book to read aloud.

Fingerplay/Flannel: Little Snake Hiding Game

Credit: Storytime in the Stacks

Action: Pizza Toppings

*For this I have two flannel pizzas and I will hand out pizza toppings. Sometimes I will call out for particular pizza toppings or instead of that I'll just ask the kids to come up and put their toppings up all at once. It just depends on the size of my crowd on that day.

Flannel: Pizza Toppings

*I don't know if you're familiar with the book "Pete's a Pizza" but throughout the book Pete is turned into a pizza by his dad! At the end of storytime, I like to turn the preschool kids into a pizza, just like Pete! So, I have all my toppings for the pizza cut out of construction paper and I will take the toppings and "sprinkle" them onto the preschoolers. I have included a picture below showing the mess that I have afterwards.

Our craft is a rabbit with his pizza! The inspiration for this was taken from a book called "Pizza Pig". This is a favorite pizza book of mine, but I didn't read it today. The preschoolers glued down the pizza slice, sauce, carrots and rabbit head and ears.

Time for Two’s Storytime:

Opening: Big Books

Book: Hi Pizza Man! (Have puppets deliver pizza slices.)

Fingerplay: 

Pizza man, pizza man, turn around

Pizza man, pizza man, touch the ground

Pizza man, pizza man, jump up high

Pizza man, pizza man, touch the sky

Pizza man, pizza man do you like cheese?

Pizza man, pizza man slap your knees!

Pizza man, pizza man, turn around

Pizza man, pizza man, sit back down!

Fingerplay/Flannel: Little Snake Hiding Game

Credit: Storytime in the Stacks

Book: Wolf’s Coming!

Action: Pizza Toppings

*For this I have two flannel pizzas and I will hand out pizza toppings. Sometimes I will call out for particular pizza toppings or instead of that I'll just ask the kids to come up and put their toppings up all at once. It just depends on the size of my crowd on that day.

Flannel: Pizza Toppings

*I don't know if you're familiar with the book "Pete's a Pizza" but throughout the book Pete is turned into a pizza by his dad! At the end of storytime, I like to turn the two's kids into a pizza, just like Pete! So, I have all my toppings for the pizza cut out of construction paper and I will take the toppings and "sprinkle" them onto the two's.

*The two's did the same craft as the preschoolers, which is pictured at the end of the preschool post above.

Extra Books:

J is for Jack-o-Lantern (Preschool and Two's)

Preschool Storytime:

*I was so excited for our crowd today, we had 45 kids!  Granted, city and county schools were on fall break, so that really made a difference in our crowd.  I really wish we could have this kind of attendance every week, it was fa-boo-lous!

Opening: Big Books

Book: Little Boo (Hold up sign to say “Boo”) 

*I look at this book every year, but never read it during storytime. This year is the first time I've done a storytime that focuses only on pumpkins, so of course I had to read "Little Boo". This book is lengthy, and I was a little apprehensive about reading it to the preschoolers. What I did was everytime Little Boo said "Boo" in the book I held up a sign. Each time I held up my sign that said "Boo" we all screamed BOO! The preschoolers loved screaming boo. This really helped move the book along and many of the preschoolers caught on that Little Boo was changing from a tiny seed to a pumpkin!

Fingerplay/Flannel: Five Little Monsters Jumping on the Bed

Book: Ten Orange Pumpkins

*For this book, I had ten orange pumpkin propped up behind me on the puppet stage. As I read this book, my volunteer would pull a pumpkin down behind me. The preschoolers really got excited seeing each pumpkin disappear behind me, it was so cute!

Action: Halloween Movement Cards

Flannel: Make Jack-O-Lantern

*We've had this story for years at my library, and I like to change it up each time I use it. I just start out with a plain pumpkin up on my flannelboard and ask the preschoolers what it needs to look like a jack-o-lantern. I never put up the traditional triangle eyes and nose first, I always put up something silly. A banana for a nose, or an umbrella! Usually the preschoolers will enjoy telling me I'm wrong but this time they went bonkers! That's what I love, you truly never know just what kind of reaction you will get!

Action: Scarf Dancing

Our craft today features Pete the Cat and what else? Five pumpkins, of course!

Credit: Glued To My Crafts

Extra Books:

Time for Two’s Storytime:

Opening: Big Books

Fingerplay: If You Want to Hear a Story

Book: Whooo’s That?

*This book is really cute, but I didn't open up all the flaps in storytime. Some of them were just a little too spooky for my two's.

Fingerplay/Flannel: Five Little Monsters Jumping on the Bed

Book: Ten Orange Pumpkins

*For this book, I had ten orange pumpkin propped up behind me on the puppet stage. As I read this book, my volunteer would pull a pumpkin down behind me. Normally the two's will get really excited and happy when things disappear behind me. Today they were very reserved and quiet all through storytime.

Action: Halloween Movement Cards

Fingerplay/Flannel: Pumpkin Hiding Game

Action: Scarf Dancing

*The two's did the same craft as the preschoolers, which is pictured above!

Extra Book:

October New Books 2019