We're closed today, so our "Storytime" was on Monday instead, with a special local guest banjo player. The program was sponsored by a grant from the county, gotten by a local music-appreciation and education society. They selected the main book, and I chose the others to fit the theme, and we had a nice musical interlude in our regular storytime program.
Here Comes Grandma!
Janet Lord, illustrated by Julie Paschkis
ISBN: 0805076662
Vibrant exaggerated environments and an old-fashioned paisley folk-tale grandmother.
I purposefully picked VERY short stories to go along with our feature book this week, because the program involved stopping for a song several times through the book, and that makes it right on the cusp of too long for my tiny kids. This story shares the same plotline and vibrant feeling, but is very short, very snappy, and gets the idea of the storytime across quickly while the late-comers are still filing in.
Banjo Granny
Sara Martin Busse & Jacqueline Briggs Martin, illustrated by Barry Root
ISBN: 9780618336036
Sweet homespun watercolors contrast Granny's epic trek with Owen's idyllic life at home.
Banjo Granny has heard she has a new bluegrass loving banjo desiring grandson, and she packs up her trusty banjo and heads over to see him, across a river, over a mountain, and through a desert. The story begins with "Owen's Song" which we actually sang and learned the end as a group, and then Granny uses the song to soothe the rough turbulent river, to settle the high steep mountain, and tame the wild hot desert - so we sang the song three more times for each of those scenarios - and each time we flip back to little Owen who is impatiently waiting on Granny to arrive. Once she does, we got one more repeat of the song, and then the story concludes pretty quickly after that. I did a coloring sheet with a picture of a banjo and some basic history and construction/playing information, and we called it a success!
Our last story was again a quick one, just to get the kids back into the usual routine after the oddness of having a musical book (and such a very long one) in the middle of the program.
Nana in the City
Lauren Castillo
ISBN: 9780544104433
Blocky wood-print-ish looking scenes full of color and weight show a city in two different lights.
Our narrator is visiting the "busy and loud and scary" city where his Nana lives, and he is not pleased. Nanas should not be in scary places like that. But Nana assures him that the city is extraordinary instead of scary, and he dons a cape (knitted by Nana overnight) and ventures out for her to show him the lovely city she knows. A really good story, and an excellent difference to most which show grandparents in suburbs or country settings, or have all of the characters as city natives. A good simple reminder that visits go both ways, and that people live happily in all sorts of places. Also, very very short, and very clear and easy to read.
No comments:
Post a Comment