Monday, October 30, 2017

School-Age Special Event: Halloween

It has been forever since I have posted about a special event I have hosted. Between having Summer Reading performances and special guests, it has been awhile since I have had to plan one of my own special events.

This month we hosted a Halloween party for our school-age kids. My teens helped plan the activities and crafts, similarly to how they helped with our "Peep Fest" last spring. 

To go along with the Halloween-theme, we had the kids trick-or-treat at every station. We handed out paper bags to all the attendees that had a 'passport' stapled to it. The 'passport' listed all of the stations at the event. They received a stamp at every station they visited AND they got to choose a treat to put in their paper bags. 

1. CRAFTS
It went so well having just two crafts at the Peep Fest that I told my teens to plan two crafts for this event as well.

1a. Masks
My teens found some templates of Halloween masks online. If you Google "printable Halloween masks" you will be sure to find plenty! I printed them off on card-stock and the teens cut them out. We used hole punchers to pre-punch the holes and had yarn at that station for parents to tie onto the mask once the kids were done coloring. 

This was a super simple craft for the kids to do and an easy station for the teens to supervise since all the kids had to do was color their masks! It was also a big hit since the kids could easily make their own costume if they did not wear one to the event.

Materials:
*Masks (printed out on card-stock and pre-cut)
*Yarn 
*Markers/crayons

1b. Paper Pumpkins
My teens found a craft paper pumpkin that used strips of orange paper and brass fasteners. 


The teens pre-cut strips of orange paper. I also found a simple leaf image to use and printed those out for the teens to pre-cut prior to the program. Using a hole puncher, we put holes on both ends of the orange paper and the leaves. 

Materials:
*8 strips of orange paper (hole-punched on both ends)
*1 green leaf (hole-punched once)
*2 brass fasteners

You lay the orange strips flat, putting a leaf on one end. Put the brass fasteners through the holes and open the enclosures. Spread out the strips of paper and, voilĂ , you have a pumpkin!

2. ACTIVITIES
We had quite a few activities INCLUDING a station for spooky storytelling!

2a. Witch Hat Ring Toss
My teens had found a version of this ring toss on the Dollar Store Mom blog. It is super cute and easy to replicate. Since we were making it for a bunch of school-age kids, I wanted to to be as heavy-duty as I could make it. We made it with plastic traffic cones that we spray-painted black.


We also had a large display sign from an event that had passed we used as a base that we also spray-painted black. I used paper to make the decorations that adorn the hats.

The display sign was heavy-duty plastic but a piece of thick poster-board would also work. After the spray paint dried, I used a box cutter to poke holes where the traffic cones already had holes on each corner of the base. Then, I used a brass fastener to connect the witch hat firmly to the base. 


Materials:
*3 Plastic traffic cones (spray painted black)
*12 brass fasteners
*Black spray paint
*Poster-board
*Paper


2b. Spooky Bean Bag Toss
Using the black wooden board we already have, I taped spooky headstones and ghosts to it and used it for our spooky bean bag toss.


We also purchased bean bags from Amazon, so we can reuse them at future events.

2c. Spooky Storytelling
My library assistant, Ms. Carol, and I took turns telling spooky stories as one of the stops on our library trick-or-treating event. We used a monster-themed poetry book so that kids could drop in to this station and not have missed any part of the story. The one we used, that was a huge hit, was "Monster Museum" by Marilyn Singer.


2d. Spooky Selfies
We hung up a black sheet near our library's entrance and taped a variety of Halloween-themed items to it to create a selfie station. My teens found printable props from Kristen Duke Photography


I printed the props out on card-stock and we attached the props to Popsicle sticks for the kids to hold up and take selfies with.


Notes:
This was a SUPER fantastic program! The teens had fun seeing all their hard work pay off and all of the kids had a great time. It is so much fun seeing the kids having fun at a program that we put so much work into creating!

Friday, October 27, 2017

School-Age: Rhymes (with Mo Willems)

Who doesn't love Mo Willems? That's rhetorical. Everyone should love him! I found out about one of his new books at a Judy Freeman workshop in the spring and LOVED it! I could NOT wait to share it at one of our programs!

1. Reading
The Mo Willem's book that we read was "Nanette's Baguette". It is brilliantly wonderful (like most of his books)! And now I know 50 different words that rhyme with the word baguette!



2. Discussion
Rhyming can be a little tricky with a wide age group. The younger kids are just beginning to be introduced to the concept of rhyming words but our older kids are pros at rhyming already. I had the kids help me define what rhyming words are -- words that end with the same sound -- and give me some examples.

Then I used three different word endings to fill in the blanks to create the rhyme words.

We used words that end in "__ig", "__ake", and "__og". 

I showed pictures of items in that rhyming word family like a dog or a frog, and we filled in the blank as a group of the missing letters. 

3. Rhyming Bingo
For rhyming BINGO the kids played a BINGO game where they had to find the items on the BINGO card that rhyme with the word I called out. 

I had 11 different rhyme words that I used for the BINGO sheets. Below is a list of the rhyming words and what the corresponding rhyming words that were on the BINGO cards. Each BINGO card had a picture AND the rhyming word in each box:
1. HAT: cat, rat, bat
2. CAR: star, jar
3. RED: bed, head, bread
4. CLAM: jam, ham, lamb, ram
5. TAG: bag, flag, stag
6. BUG: mug, pug, rug, slug
7. FLEA: bee, knee, tree, sea, key, three
8. HOG: dog, frog, log
9. CAN: fan, pan, van, man
10. SHRUB: sub, cub
11. SHEET: feet, treat, meat

I made 8 different rhyming BINGO cards, with the idea that some kids can work together in groups as BINGO teams. The BINGO cards had 25 spaces on them. The free space was a picture of Nanette eating a baguette. Since we had 11 rhyme families featured, many rhyme families had multiple ones on each BINGO sheet.

Here are a few examples of our BINGO cards:



The first time playing the game, I asked the kids to find all the words that rhyme on their board with the word I called out. And we shared them together as a group. I wanted it to be challenging for the older kids but not impossible for the younger ones. We played several rounds and kept working on the different rhyming words each round, mixing up which ones I called out. 

4. Craft
We did a simple craft this week. I had small cut-outs of the character Nanette and clip-art baguette's. I had the kids use glue dots to attach their Nanette's and baguette's to a pair of Popsicle sticks.

The kids could use these to tell their own version of the "Nanette's Baguette" story. I also had the option, if the kids were done playing BINGO and there was plenty of time left at the end of the program, that we could act out the story with our Nanette's and do a reader's theatre-esque activity.



Notes:
I wasn't sure how the reader's theatre activity would go, or if any of the kids would be interested in using their Nanette's on Popsicle sticks. But all the kids LOVED them. One of my more serious regulars, who rarely engages with me, went out of his way to come up to me at the end of the program and tell me his version of "Nanette's Baguette". That was huge! 

Overall the program was a hit and I was so excited to share one of my favorite Mo Willem's books!

Friday, October 20, 2017

School-Age: Giant Squid

This week's topic was inspired by Candace Fleming's new juvenile nonfiction book: "Giant Squid". 

1. Reading
The book, "Giant Squid" by Candace Fleming is a wonderful partnership between Fleming and Eric Rohmann. Rohmann captures the mystery and darkness surrounding the sea creature known as the Giant Squid and Fleming brings it to life with her poetic words.



2. Activity
To demonstrate how GIANT these squids really are, I wanted to give them a way to understand how big 40 feet really is! I cut a string of yarn to about 40 feet and then showed them how long a foot of yarn is using a ruler. 

Then I had my teen helpers pull the string out straight and lay it on the ground. 40 feet may sound big but, when kids can see it with their own eyes, they can truly have a better appreciation for the size of one of these beasts. 

3. Discussion
We played a True/False game about ocean facts and creatures. I found some facts from the "Giant Squid" book - which was a good way to see if they were listening throughout the book. Some of the other facts I found through National Geographic for Kids.

4. Craft
I found a giant squid craft that was originally created to accompany "I'm the Biggest Thing in the Ocean" by Kevin Sherry. I found the template and instructions on the I Heart Crafty Things blog. I made my own squiggly legs on a Publisher document so that I could have an easier time cutting them out prior to the program.

Here's my sample I made before the program this week:

And here are a few that my teens made as examples:



Notes:
The book was a little dark as a read-aloud but the kids certainly got into it. Honestly, some of my favorite weeks are when we are doing something science-related. It was so much fun to see how much the kids know about the ocean and all the deep sea creatures that live in it! 

Friday, October 13, 2017

School-Age: The Potato King

We delved into the history of the potato (and the Potato King) this week at our school-age programs.

1. Reading
We read the book "The Potato King" by Christoph Niemann. It is funny and succinct, and is a wonderful read-aloud! The picture book was actually an afterthought. Niemann had originally created the artwork to accompany his article he wrote for the New York Times blog. Not only is it a great story about a piece of history that is not well-known, but the book (and the article) are art. How neat is it that he created potato stamps to tell the story of the Potato King?!



Niemann's book is about King Frederick (Fritz) of Prussia and it is a legend about how he introduced his people to the potato. There are actually several similar tall-tales regarding other royalty in Europe around the same time period. Was it Fritz or was it another royal king or queen? Who knows? But it does make for a very entertaining tale. 

2. Activity
We had a short discussion about who the Potato King was. I showed them a picture of King Frederick and mentioned that the potato was introduced to Europe in the early 1700's. For a vegetable not having been in Europe very long it sure does show up in TONS of European recipes!

This led into a trivia activity about potatoes. Some of the trivia is in the back of Niemann's book. Other trivia were fun facts I found about the potato. For example, did you know there was a tomato/potato hybrid plant called a 'tomtato'? That was a fun one to share with the kids.

3. Craft
For the craft we stamped with potatoes. I cut out different shapes into halved potatoes prior to the programs. 



Then, we laid out paint on the craft tables and the kids could dip the potatoes into the paint and stamp their paper with the potatoes. 





It was perfect to connect the topic back to the book, since Niemann used potato stamps for the artwork in his book (and the kids enjoyed seeing what shapes appeared when they used the stamps). 


Notes:
Maybe the craft was a bit messier than I usually like BUT it was fun and the stamp was the perfect craft to tie-in to the book. And re-purposing our backlog of library newspapers to cover the tables kept everything as neat as we could be...with paint :)!

Friday, October 6, 2017

School-Age: Names

Starting to think about why you have the name you do or who you might be named after/for, can be a complex topic. But it can also be a fun one for school-age kids to start learning about. 

1. Craft: Name Art
I had my teen helpers use masking tape to create the first initial of the kids names on 8.5x11 card stock as they came into the program. We put newspaper down on our folding tables and had the kids bring their initials over to the tables and begin putting bleeding art tissue paper down over the letters.



If you have never heard of bleeding art tissue paper, it is super neat! Once the kids laid their tissue paper down, we used spray bottles filled with water and spritzed the tissue paper until it was wet. The bleeding art tissue paper begins to bleed color once it is wet which transfer to the paper. 


*Note: Scroll down for the big reveal

2. Reading
I wanted to tie this topic in with the book "Thunder Boy, Jr." by Sherman Alexie. In the book, Thunder Boy Jr. is named after his father. He hates his name because it isn't his own and he dreams up names that he feels would fit him better. Sherman Alexie is a fabulous writer and the book is a wonderful read-aloud. I was so excited to share it at our program this week.



3. Discussion
A. I asked if any of the kids had been named after family members or friends. It was neat to hear who they were named after, if they knew, and why. It was also fun to start getting kids to think about the why behind their names.
B. I asked if they liked their names. If not, what would they prefer their name to be? One kid told me he wanted his name to be "Jeff". It turns out it was a character he liked. 
C. I also asked if any of them knew what their names meant. That led into an activity about the meaning of their names.

4. Activity
I handed out small sheets of paper to all the kids and had them write down their name. Then, as a group, we looked up the meaning of their names. For the most part it was an easy activity to do but, with kids names these days, a few were pieced together of two different names or had been created by their parents. It was fun and the kids loved finding out the meaning of their names.

5. Art Reveal
At the end of the program, after we let the tissue paper bleed for awhile, we came back to take the tissue paper and tape off of the card stock. 

Here's some my teens and I made:


Notes:
It was a little challenging searching for some of the kids names. Not surprisingly, they were not very patient. But, for the larger crowd on Friday, we had 2 baby name books that I had my teens use to search for names. And I used my phone to search for names that might not be as well known.

The kids all loved sharing the meaning of their names. We all had fun learning about one another this week!