Where The Wild Things Are

Thursdays story time was based on one of my favorite children's books Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak which I am sure we are all familiar. I love this book because when doing it with small children you can really have a great time when the wild rumpus begins. That being said, let me tell you that I was not overly inspired yesterday when I went to do the music but could not figure out how to use the CD player. Anyway, I think the kids had a good time. As far as ECRR, this book is important because there is very little text and children have to use their imaginations to guess what is going on in the story based on the pictures. That is why every time I use this book with kids, I have use the scene in the middle to dance, swing from tree to tree and have a parade. This will give them a connection to what is going on during the "silent" pages. Also, I always try to talk to them at the end of the story to get their interpretations about what they thought was going on. Was it a dream? Did Max really do to the land of the wild things? Preschoolers might be young, but they are not too young that you can't discuss plot with them.

For the rest of the program, we read books about other "wild things" such as wild animals. I had the children to act like monkeys, tigers, alligators, birds, and snakes. One of the things that I have been doing with the story times is allowing someone different to pick out a book that they might want to read. Most of the children are too young to read, but they see the pretty covers and will let me read it to the group. This has been good because each week I have the kids asking me to pick out a book. This week, a little girl who is normally very shy selected something that she found of interest. I was glad to see her come out of her little shell. It tells me that story times are not lost on her.

I ended the program by giving each child a bookmark with a zoo animal on it that was left over from some other program. I told the kids that it is no use having a bookmark without a book and invited everyone to come upstairs. Several of the little girls sat down on the floor in front of me and asked me to read another story after others had left. We talked about crazy pets and I was able to hear about fingernail polish, a fish, some crazy dogs and how a snake would make a good pet (the mom didn't agree).