“If you’re a panda bear and you know it, clap your paws. We would sing this song together, once or twice through. If we were reading about bears, we would stand up after the story and the story discussion (What happened in the story? Which animal was your favorite? How did the bear solve his problem?). But we repeated the same Bear fingerplays, flannel board songs, and/or active songs (depending on time) every week during that month! I chose a different book for storytime each week. I figured out that I could choose a theme for the month, like Bears. I feel like this was the most magical thing I learned about PreK Library Lessons: repetition is good! Yes! Our young students learn new vocabulary by repetition, especially with movement. Plus it lets them talk and wiggle a bit, which is developmentally appropriate for four-year olds! Repeated Activities They feel like real readers when they participate in telling the story. Preview your storytime books to find a song or phrase that students can repeat with you. There are several other books in the series: Cows to the Rescue, Duck to the Rescue, and Pigs to the Rescue. I don’t know why this is so much fun for prek library time, but our students LOVED to repeat “chickens to the rescue!” in a library yell (also known as a whisper yell or a mouse shout). Throughout the book, the phrase “chickens to the rescue!” is repeated, as the chickens save the humans from silly situations. If you don’t know the songs already, you can find them on YouTube and practice ahead of time.Īnother favorite Pre-K book is Chickens to the Rescue, by John Himmelman. Then everyone can sing and participate with confidence. Students love to sing “I love my white shoes” together! (You can see how we acted out this story, as a fun library dance party!) Some students won’t “catch on” to the lyrics until the end of the book, so we just read it again. We love the Pete the Cat books (the large, picture books) because they have a chorus that we can sing together. It needs to have an interactive component, so they can talk or sing instead of being absolutely silent. It can’t be too long, because it’s hard for your students to sit still. If you’ve ever read a story to preK in your library, you know the importance of choosing the right book. School is a very new experience to them, and we have to calmly, consistently show them the way, week after week. This takes clear, simple instructions and repetition. “Are you sitting like Pete?” Sometimes I can even point to a student and point to the poster, without stopping the story, and they understand what I’m communicating.īefore you can have any success at sharing a story, you must help your preK students learn how to sit and listen. Legs criss cross, hands in lap, eyes looking forward, and his mouth is closed so tight you can’t even see it! After several weeks of singing the song and talking about how Pete is sitting, we develop a shorthand. I drew Pete the Cat to look like a listening student. So, I sing “eyes on who?” and they respond “eyes on you!” But with preK, we sing “eyes on you, eyes on you.” So this is what we sing for PreK, all together: With Kindergarten students, we sing a call and response for each line. We sing the song to the tune of Frere Jacques, repeating each line. I kept it propped on the storytime easel, ready to go. I made my own poster for our sit-down song. Sing the same song every single time they come to sit on the storytime carpet. Sing a song to get them settled on the storytime carpet. Establish a RoutineĪll students thrive on the security of routines, but our youngest students even more so. The first thing I did was to constantly remind myself that THESE CHILDREN HAVE ONLY BEEN ALIVE FOR 48 MONTHS! There are so many things that preK students are still learning, and much patience is required. Hi, friends! Do you teach PreK Library Lessons? Although those little learners overwhelmed me at first, here’s how I learned to effectively teach these amazing, energetic young humans!
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