Green for St. Patrick's Day - A Storytime Outline

I managed to squeak in a St. Patrick's Day and the color Green storytime theme this year. This holiday, as with a lot of holidays with the exception of Halloween and Thanksgiving, are hard to do without repeating all the read-able books and songs and rhymes. This is was a great success and I'm already planning next year's (look out for rainbow colors!)! This week is Spring Break for our ISD, and I got a good number of new little faces to meet, which was a lot of fun too!

T = Toddlers Storytime
P = Preschool Storytime

BOOKS
Big Frog Can't Fit In written and illus. by Mo Willems (T) 
We have this as a special storytime-use-only book to read because it's a pop-up book extraordinaire!

Good Luck Bear written and illus. by Greg Foley (T, P)
A great simple book that includes the hunt for a four leaf clover.

Green Wilma, Frog in Space written and illus. by Tedd Arnold (P) 
One little girl asked, "How does a frog get into space????".  What a good question! This will tell you how!

Green Shamrocks written by Eve Bunting and Illus. by Joelle Dreidemy (P) 
This is one of the very, veerrrrry, few St. Patrick's Day books that exists and can be read in storytime! Thank you Eve Bunting!

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.


Five Green and Speckled Frogs (T)
Five green and speckled frogs
Sitting on a hollow log
Eating the most delicious bugs.
Yum, yum!

One frog jumped into the pool
Where it was nice and cool.
Then there were four green and speckled frogs.

Repeat, counting down

One green and speckled frog
Sitting on a speckled log
Eating the most delicious bugs
Yum, yum!

It  jumped into the pool
Where it was nice and cool
Then there were no green and speckled frogs.
Source: DLTK

Five Green Shamrocks (T, P)
Five green shamrocks growing outdoors,
Somebody picked one and that left four.

Four green shamrocks green as they can be,
Somebody picked one and that left three.

Three green shamrocks playing peek-a-boo,
Somebody picked one and that left two.

Two green shamrocks nodding in the sun,
Somebody picked one and that left one.

One green shamrock ready for some St. Patrick's Day fun,
Somebody picked it and that left none!
Source: Narrating Tales of Preschool Storytime

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.

ACTIVITY

Five Green and Speckled Frogs (T)
This was one of the first few flannel boards that I created in my beginning year as a Children's Librarian. It was nice to roll the log out and set some frogs on there.

Five Green Shamrocks (T, P)
A simple flannel board for the rhyme. Five shamrocks made with a die cut. I did make more so that I could easily repeat the rhyme a few times so that each child had the opportunity to come up to the board at least once to pick a shamrock off the board.

ACTIVITY

What is Green? (T, P)
To tie into the green portion of the programs I asked the kids what was green. They named things like grass, trees, plants, flowers, my storytime wall (yes, one of them is a wonderful shade of green). Inspired by Mel at Mel's Desk (who did this for a July 4th theme, which is an awesome idea, and had mentioned St. Patrick's Day at the end of the post) I used my die cut roller to make animals and other things (such as a Christmas Tree) out of green felt! The kids loved shouting out their guesses!

CRAFT

Textured Shamrocks (T)
The Toddlers got to take a shamrock, created by my handy-dandy die cut machine, and paste it into a sheet of paper. They then were allowed to tear up a lighter green color paper and glue the bits onto their shamrock. Crayons, as always, were available to decorate their paper to their hearts content. I saw their coloring as abstract rainbows to tie into this theme.

Shamrock Necklaces with Lucky Gold (P)
I took more of the aforementioned shamrock shapes and took a hole punch to them. The children had to take a green color length of yarn and thread it through the holes to make a necklace. Afterwards they got to clue on shiny gold sequins to their shamrock for some extra luck! I love it! This was inspired by

PICTURES

Shamrock Necklace with Lucky Gold,
Preschool Craft, created by Dorothy WP-CC, 2012

What is Green? flannel board, inspired by Mel's Desk,
created by Dorothy WP-CC, 2012

MORE BOOKS
Go Away, Big Green Monster! written and illus. by Ed Emberley (T, P)
Lizette's Green Sock written and illus. by Catharina Valckx (P)
Green Wilma written and illus. by Tedd Arnold (P)