Preschool Valentine's Day

On February 5, we did Valentine's Day with the 4 & 5 year olds. This is always a fun program!

Our most popular stories were:
Guess how much I love you by Sam McBratney

  The day it rained hearts by Felicia Bond

We also did a couple of Valentine "Skip to My Lou" songs and danced to Hap Palmer's "Rock and Roll Freeze Dance":

The children also made hearts showing something that they love:

 

This is such an easy project to do at home!
Start with a heart shape drawn on the paper. Have your child draw a picture of someone or something that she loves. Then help her write "I love ..." If she can form letters, let her write it herself. Otherwise, be sure to point out what you are writing and use her words. Finish up by coloring and cutting out the heart. If your child is old enough to cut safely without hurting herself, let her. It's valuable practice and helps to develop those crucial fine motor skills! It won't be smooth at first, but that adds to the charm of a child's art project. The project also works on writing skills and talking (or narrative) skills as you talk about what is being drawn.

We also used the DVD of "The Pigs' Wedding" for our video of the day.

The programs keep going this week:

Thursday, February 14 at 10:30am: Toddler Time for children ages 2-3 and a caregiver. Celebrate Valentine's Day at the library!

Friday, February 15 at 10:30 or 11:30am: Mother Goose on the Loose for children from birth to 35 months and a caregiver.

Shopping at the Library

At our last Preschool Story Hour, the children enjoyed shopping books. We took a shopping trip, choosing from a board of food and then the children had the chance to fill their own shopping carts, but choosing items from the sales papers. It was fun to see what caught their eyes and to hear their reasons for their "purchases"! Most of them chose toys, but a few made sure to include treats for their pets and some food.

This shopping craft would be easy (and fun!) to do at home together, too. This time of year, our mailboxes overflow with sales papers and catalogs. Let your child "shop" the papers and talk about their choices. Another twist could be to have your child find items on your shopping list. This one simple activity can work on so many levels. Cutting out the pictures works on fine motor development, which helps in writing. Seeing a shopping list connected to the pictures works on Print Awareness. Talking about the purchases helps to develop narrative skills. And the fact that they're playing a game reinforces the fact that learning can be fun!

Check out these books that we shared during storytime:

Llama Llama mad at mama by Anna Dewdney

To market, to market by Anne Miranda