Book of the Month: Down by the Cool of the Pool

Down by the Cool of the Pool by Tony Mitton

 

It's April! According to the calendar and the daffodils in my front yard, spring is here. There are so many fun things in this tale. The photos are bright and hilarious. The text is not only catchy, but is written in a way that reminds you of ripples in the water.

 

"Down by the pool

in the cool of the day.

Frog cried, "Wheeeee!

Can you dance like me?"

 

Duck came to see.

I can dance too.

But not like you.

I can flap."

 

"So Duck went "flap"

and Frog cried, "Wheeeee!

Can you dance like me?"

 

Down by the cool of the pool.

 

And you can only imagine the fun that ensues as Pig, Sheep, Cat, Dog, and many more animals join in the dance. I'm not sure I can even read this one sitting still! It seems perfect for busy toddlers, active preschoolers, and curious kindergartners!

 

Just like Why Mosquitoes Buzz in Peoples Ears and The Lion and the Mouse, this is a fun way to learn about onomatopoeia; the examples are endless: whooop, wheeeee, plop, splash, and many more!

 

What is your favorite silly story?

Book of the Month: Jacob O'Reilly Wants a Pet by Lynne Rickards

I often spend time in my local library or book store where I am surrounded by mountains of good selections. But what gets me most excited is when I find a treasure in an unexpected place. I took a trip to my local Ollie's Bargain Outlet to get some things to redecorate the bedroom. Every time I go to Ollie's, I peek at the children's books. Usually I will see a few familiar classics, a lot of cool activity books, some mediocre stories, and every now and again I find a pretty cool gem like Jacob O'Reilly Wants a Pet. I've had the book for a little more than a week and I've already read it to my niece 5 times! Trust me, you won't be disappointed if you add this one to your library.

So, Jacob really wants a pet: "He asked for a dog but Dad didn't want fleas. He tried for a cat, but the fur made Mom sneeze. He went through a list of small rodents for sale, but the very idea turned Mom and Dad pale." Finally, he starts a pet sitting business and ends up with  four dogs, five hamsters, six cats, one mouse, a python, two donkeys, five sheep , one horse, rabbits, hares, and zebra. You will be surprised at the pet Jacob finally chooses in the end!

Related Activities:

• In the book Jake refers to some animals that may not make good pets (like a walrus and an emu). Make a list of animals and discuss why they would (or would not) make a good pet. Draw some funny pictures of how it would be to take care of some pets (like a walrus in the bathtub!).
• Make a graph similar to this one  and talk about the number and types of pets the students have.
• Visit a local veterinarian's office.
• Have children bring in photos of their pets and make a class collage.
• Paint pet rocks.
• Sort pets by herbivores and carnivores.

BOOK OF THE MONTH: Bugs! Bugs! Bugs!

BOOK OF THE MONTH:

Love them or hate them, bugs are back! Many children are fascinated by at least one type of bug and now that the warm weather has come, it is the perfect time to have children become entomologists!

Creepy Crawly Activities:

1. Look on You Tube (or other video sites) for bug cams. I found this one with just a few seconds so I'm sure there are a ton more!
2. Google the web for diagrams of insects and learn the names and purpose of each part. Here are a few:
• Grasshopper
• Honeybee
• Fly
3. Keep a Bug Journal for one week. Each day the children go outside and find one insect to observe. They can draw or write about their observations in their journal. Encourage children to look in different places - in the soil, on the ground, in the air - and write down where they found their insects. Make a class graph of the places everyone found their insects.
4. The Good List: Make a list of all of the GOOD things insects do for our environment.
5. Provide children clay and collage materials and encourage chilren to create their own bug and allow them to give their bug a name.
6. Yes or No: Provide children with pictures of various animals and insects (print them from the web and laminate them if you want to keep them for a while). Label one basket "Insects" and the other "Not Insects" and allow children to sort the pictures. This is also a great quiet time activity for those children who don't nap very long!

Creepy Crawly Links:

• Bug Theme 
• San Diego Zoo Kids: Insects
• Insects at Enchanted Learning
• National Geographic: Bugs
• National Geograppic Kids: Bugs
• Sci4Kids: Insects
• Insect Sounds
• Bug Crafts
• AntBoys Bug World

More Creepy Crawly Books:


   



Special Thank You:
Over one year ago, I received a product review request from EZ Socks. Before we could test the socks, using my then-2-year old niece, I had to take a break from blogging. My niece has just turned four and is quite the pro now at putting on her socks. I am sorry that I didn't get to give a fair review of EZ Socks but I hope that my readers check them out: http://www.ezsox.com/

And the Winner Is...

Congratulations to Heidi Grange at Geo Librarian! She commented on Literacy Challenges of At Risk Boys and her comment number was randomly selected at Random.org. Heidi will win these two books:

Two Book Give Away: Animalogy and Hey Diddle Diddle

Early elementary-aged children will enjoy this rhyming and catchy tale about the food chain. A beetle is eaten by a snake. The snake is eaten by a hawk: He snatched that snake right off the ground. Gobbled him up without a sound and sang, "Hey diddle diddle - I don't ask why I've got feathers to help me fly." The book has a "For Creative Minds" section in the back that includes 4 pages of additional activities such as "Herbivore or Carnivore," "Predator or Prey" and many more. Even more related activities and links are found at the Sylvan Dell Publishing Website.

Animalogy is a book of, what else? Animal analogies of course! Beaver is to build as spider is to spin. Reptile is to snake, as insect is to bee.  The detail in the illustrations is captivating. This is a great book to teach analogies as well as animal behavior. The book may also be helpful for young ESL students trying to learn the concept of analogies. The book concludes with a 6 page activity guide that extends the learning presented in the story. Sylvan Dell Publishing also has a free 48 page Teaching Guide available.

Here is how you enter to win these two books:

Go to this blog post, Literacy Challenges of At-Risk Boys, and answer one or both of the following questions by November 5, 2011.

1. What are your communities doing to address the specific needs of at-risk learners? 
2. What reading programs or other resources do you know of that cater to the interest of boys?

One winner will be randomly selected to win BOTH books using www.random.org.

BOOK OF THE MONTH: No Thumpin', No Bumpin', No Rumpus Tonight!

This is a book I used to read to my kindergarten class. It must be out of print because Amazon only has collectible and used copies.  In this funny story, Benjamin and Elephant fix a birthday breakfast for Benjamin's mother and you can imagine that despite their attempts NOT to wake mom, there was a lot of thumpin', bumpin, and rumpus. But Benjamin and Elephant manage to clean up everything just before Mom is ready for breakfast. The rhyming text and vivid pictures make this book enjoyable for children. This book looks hard to come by, so if you find a copy, please enjoy it! It's a funny story that I think you will read again and again.

Here are some supporting activities for this story:

• Real vs Pretend: Compare real elephants with Elephant in this story. Make a list on chart paper or on a Venn Diagram to compare/contrast. Have children list ways that they can tell that this is FICTION and not FACT. Four and five year olds are capable of learning the difference.
• Recipes: Have children dictate a recipe that they would make for their mother or father. The children can also illustrate their recipes. And if  you are interested in fundraising, you can take these "recipes" and bind them into books for the parents to purchase.
• Learn the difference between African and Asian elephants. Although there are several differences, the one that most preschoolers will remember is that African elephants have bigger ears.
• Elephant Appreciation Day is on September 22. Who knew?
• Make orange juice: In the story, Benjamin and Elephant take a messy approach to making orange juice by playing baseball with the oranges before squeezing them. But preschoolers will enjoy using a plain old plastic juicer to squeeze oranges into orange juice!
• Read Moses Supposes His Toeses Are Roses: And 7 Other Silly Old Rhymes, also by Nancy Patz.

BOOK OF THE MONTH: Who's in the Forest?

Who's in the Forest? by Phillis Gershator is a great book for toddlers. It's rhyming text and peek-a-boo holes make it a great interactive book for young ones. "Who's in the forest, dark and deep? Foxes on the prowl - creep, creep, creep." The collage/patchwork style illustrations are also eye catching and very engaging.

Forest Activities for Toddlers:

• Collect some forest puppets and allow the children to explore with them. Toddlers will be able to experiment with sounds, words, and practice interacting with others. Some of my favorites are from Folkmanis because they are so lifelike and durable.
• Taking a field trip with toddlers is not always an easy task, so check with your local Department of Natural Resources or your local Zoo to see if they have an outreach program that will bring forest animals to your classroom. Here in Maryland we have Scales and Tales and the Zoo Mobile.
• Add forest animals to block area, sand table, and other areas of the classroom.
• Act out the story with toddlers: 1) Make headbands by pasting a forest animal on a sentence strip; have one for each child. 2) While reading the story, have the children stand up when their animal is called. For example, when you read, "Who's in the forest dark and deep? Birds in the treetops - cheep, cheep, cheep" then the children with bird headbands will stand up and say "cheep, cheep, cheep."
• Cut out animal tracks and contact them to the floor so that the children can follow them. Older toddlers can match the animal tracks with the animals.
• Listen to a CD with sounds of the forest such as Forest Ambiance.
• Make bird feeders! This is one of my favorite bird feeders because it's not too messy, it doesn't involve peanuts or peanut butter, and children get the benefit of fine-motor practice by stringing cheerios onto a pipe cleaner! 

BOOK OF THE DAY: Bring on the Birds by Susan Stockdale

Bring on the Birds by Susan Stockdale.

There are many preschool books about birds, but here is a newly release book that I absolutely LOVE! I cannot stop flipping through this book! The pictures are so vibrant, engaging, and realistic that I imagine kids will want to read again and again. The text is simple, catchy, and informative: "Skimming birds, swimming birds, birds with tails held high. Racing birds, riding birds, birds that never fly." Each page features a different bird and the end of the book includes a child-friendly index with facts about each bird.

Related Activities:

• Read my interview with Susan Stockdale and learn about how the author began her career as an author.
• Visit Susan's website and use the interdisciplinary teacher guide for Bring on the Birds.
• Visit the First School website to find coloring pages, crafts, and bird patterns.
• Visit Enchanted Learning to find more bird facts and background information.
• Learn about birds that are native to your area. If you learn about birds that live in other parts of the world or other parts of the United States, find those places on a map.
•  Cut and laminate different bird pictures. Cut out and laminate several nest patterns. Allow children to sort the pictures in different groups. For example: put all the birds that fly in one nest and all the birds that don't fly in another nest.
• Find reasonably priced binoculars (like these from Discount School Supply) and go bird watching with a small group of children.
• Make a bagel bird feeder (warning: this recipe calls for the use of peanut butter; since many child care centers are peanut free zones, you can try this one from Family Fun).
• Visit National Geographic and National Geographic for Kids sites and find loads of information, videos, and pictures of birds.
• Make a collage using bird seed purchased from a local store.
• Make a memory game: print, cut out, and laminate 2 identical pictures of several types of birds. Allow children to turn the cards face down and try to find matches!
• Make a feather collage or paint with feathers. (visit our friends at Discount School Supply for all kids of feathers!)

Other Bird Books:

Other Books by Susan Stockdale:

BOOK OF THE DAY: A Giraffe and a Half

A Giraffe and a Half by Shel Silverstein

Related Activities:

• Learn about (what else...) giraffes. There are many great links:
• National Geographic For Kids
• San Diego Zoo
• Find a zoo that has a giraffe cam like Kid Zoo, Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, or Marwell Wildlife Center. (Check for times and availability as webcams change often).
• Giraffe webcams, photos and videos.
• Giraffe information from Enchanted Learning and First School.  
• Use a giraffe pattern to make puzzles (cutting the giraffe in 2 pieces to make halves, 3 pieces to make thirds).
•  Make a list of rhyming words used in the book.
• Visit Shel Silverstein's website for great information, printables, and games.
• Make black and white drawings using large paper (water color paper works nicely) and black felt tipped markers.
• Invite someone in to play the flute for your class.
• Create some fraction activities related to the "halves" (ex, during snack time, break cookies in half).
• Read other silly books.
• Mark on a map or globe where giraffes live in Africa.

Other Books By Shel Silverstein:

Other Giraffe Books: