Happy Lunar New Year - A Storytime Outline

We celebrated the Lunar New Year in storytime this week! For a "special holiday" type theme this is one that has a good number of books that work, which is exciting! A huge recommendation for Lunar New Year storytimes is to incorporate that year's zodiac animal into the stories, which is what I did for 2012, the Year of the Dragon. Here's what we did!

T = Toddler Storytime
P = Preschool Storytime

BOOKS 
Red is a Dragon written and illus. by Roseanne Thong (T)
This book was great for the children to call out the different colors!

Ten Mice for Tet written by Pegi Deitz Shea and Cynthia Weill, illus. by Ngoc Tran To and embroidery by Viet Dinh
A great counting book that is for celebrating the Vietnamese lunar new year.

There's No Such Thing as a Dragon written and illus. by Jack Kent (P)


This Next New Year written by Janet Wong and illus. by Yangsook Choi (P)
I recommend this book for a Preschool Storytime that has some older preschoolers than younger.

SONGS & RHYMES

Opening Rhyme: Open, Shut Them (T, P)
(follow actions)
Open, shut them
Open, shut them
Give a little clap
Open, shut them
Open, shut them
Lay them in your lap
Creep them, creep them up to your chin
Open your mouth wide, but don't put your fingers in!
Open, shut them
Open, shut them
Give a big clap
Open, shut them
Lay them in your lap. 

Celebrate the New Year (T, P)
Tune: Row, Row, Row Your Boat 
Cheer, cheer, cheer the year,
A new one just begun.
Celebrate with all your friends,
Let's go have some fun!

Clap, clap, clap your hands,
A brand new year is here.
Learning, laughing, singing, clapping,
Through another year.
Source: thebestkidsbooksite.com via Talk Story 

Dragon, Dragon (T)
Tune: Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star
Dragon, dragon, dance around.
Dragon, dragon, touch the ground.
Dragon, dragon, shake your head.
Dragon, dragon, tongue so red. 
Dragon, dragon, stamp your feet.
Dragon, dragon, coming down the street!
Source: thebestkidsbooksite.com via Talk Story 

Five Green Dragons (T)
Five green dragons making such a roar.
One danced away and then there were four.
Four green dragons dancing around a tree.
One danced away and then there were three.
Three green dragons dancing around you.
Once danced away and then there were two.
Two green dragons dancing in the sun.
One danced away and then there were one.
One green dragon having lots of fun.
She danced away and then there were none.
Source: OSM Library Blog 

Five Little Firecrackers (T)
Five little firecrackers standing in a row.
One gets lit and off it goes!
It zips up high with a zoom, zoom, ZOOM!
Here it goes BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!

(repeat until down to one firecracker)

One little firecracker standing all alone.
It gets lit and off it goes!
It zips up high with a zoom, zoom, ZOOM!
Here it goes BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!
Source: HCPL - Kidsite - Story Time 
In addition to the fire crackers I added little yellow starbursts that I had the children place on each firecracker when it goes boom! Even the shy ones eventually wanted to do it!


Closing Rhyme: Touch Your Nose (T, P)
(follow actions)

Touch your nose

Touch your chin

That's the way this game begins

Touch your eyes

Touch your knees

Now pretend you're going to sneeze!

Aaachooooo!

Touch your hair

Touch one ear

Touch your two red lips right here

Touch your elbow where it ends

And that's the way this touch game ends.

FLANNEL BOARDS

Five Green Dragons (T)
See flannel board below!
Five Little Firecrackers (T)
The Legend of the Zodiac Animals story (P)
This was my favorite part of the program. Check out my flannel board for it below!

CRAFT

Year of the Dragon coloring page (T)
Let them color to their hearts content and let them glue on bits of cotton balls for puffs of dragon smoke! Any dragon image would work; however, for toddlers, I picked Activity Village's dragon since it was super cute! (Activity Village link will open as a PDF).

Chinese dragon hand puppets (P)
These were easy folded sheets of construction paper with fun embellishments (eyelashes, googly eyes, teeth, and tongues). This was inspired by Craft Ideas for All.

PICTURES

Here are the pictures of my flannel board!

"The Legend of the Zodiac Animals" flannel board
created by Dorothy, WP-CC, 2012

Five Green Dragons created by Dorothy, WP-CC, 2012

OTHER FUN TIDBITS

If you're looking for more ideas for Lunar New Year, in 2010, I shared red envelopes containing stickers that looked like coins as a way to tie into the story of lucky money.


Need more Lunar New Year book recommendations? Check out my short bibliography post!