Preschool and Toddler Dance Party!

The Library Village decided to dance away our winter blues recently with a Preschool and Toddler Dance Party!  Forty little ones joined us for an hour of dancing and fun!  Can someone say bubble machine?  Oh yes.  We had one of those too. 

We decided to use all prerecorded music for our dance party.  This way we could burn all of the songs to one cd and not have to fumble around between songs.  (By the way, this worked great because we were able to keep the little ones attention throughout the entire program)  We also knew we wanted to use instruments and other fun props so we grouped songs based on the prop with a sprinkling of free dancing in between.  This really helped keep the program moving and allowed us the opportunity to pass out and collect the various props. 

The dance party was divided into two sections, each thirty minutes long.  The first thirty minutes we all danced together to our playlist.  The kids loved all the songs (with the exception of The Fox song.. What!?)  And the ending?  It was magical.  We watched all the little ones sing their hearts out to Let It Go while throwing their scarves into the air.  Wow. 

After all that dancing, we slowed it down for the second half.  We supplied a small snack and juice box to our tiny dancers and offered them the opportunity to make a craft.  We chose paper cup maracas.  They were super simple to make.  Take two paper cups (we had different colored paper cups), fill with some macaroni, and tape together with decorative duct tape.  We also had stickers to add more pizzazz.  Remember I mentioned a bubble machine?  It was the hit of the party!  Poor Miss Kristen was surrounded by little ones, holding the bubble machine, until the cd finally ended.
 

After it was all over, we really couldn't think of how it could've gone any better!  And that is an awesome feeling to have after a program! We are already planning another for in the summer! 

The Playlist:

Clap Your Hands - cd: They Might Be Giants - No!
Shake Your Sillies Out - cd: Raffi - More Singable songs
The Milkshake Song - cd: Songs for Wiggleworms (shakers)
Sugar Ant - cd: Caspar Babypants - Hot Dog! (shakers)
The Freeze - cd: Greg and Steve - Kids in Motion
Bean Bag Rock - cd: Bean Bag Activities and Coordination Skills (bean bags)
Hot Dog! - cd: They Might Be Giants - Here Come the 123s (bean bags)
The Fox (What Does the Fox Say?) - cd: Ylvis
We are the Dinosaurs - cd: The Best of the Laurie Berkner Band (marching)
List of Dances - cd: Jim Gill Makes It Noisy in Boise, Idaho
Thanks A Lot - cd: Raffi - baby Beluga (rainbow scarves)
Let It Go - cd: Frozen Deluxe Edition Soundtrack (rainbow scarves)

Toddler Story Time - We've Got Rhythm!

I have been away from the Library Village for the last month but I am super excited to be back!  Big giant thank yous to all of my co-workers who have fearlessly jumped into Toddler Story Time to cover my weeks away!  I heard nothing but good things about their story time adventures.  It was so good to start back up with story time and see how much some of the little ones have grown (yes two year olds grow in only one month's time!) and see several new faces!

This week we got right down to business and had some seriously musical fun!  After we sang our usual Welcome to Storytime song and our sillies were shaken, I borrowed the action song, If You Want to Read a Story...  from Miss Sue!  We sang this song before each of our three books.  This time we stomped our feet if we wanted to hear the story Dancing Feet by Lindsey Craig.  Great book, but perhaps a few too many animals..  I had to stop midway through the book to rescue my poster off the bulletin board so that may have been the reason we had extra wiggles during this book.

After the story, we sang a shortened version of Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes and played Pat a Cake.   NOW LET THE MUSICAL FUN BEGIN!!  First up: Egg Shakers!

To warm up, we shook our shakers to the song, Where is Shaker?  This is to the tune of Frere Jacques.  I found this great little song in the book 101 Rhythm Instrument Activities for Young Children by Abigal Flesch Connors.  Awesome book, full of great ideas! 

Where is Shaker?
Where is Shaker?  Where is Shaker? (Shaker behind your back)
Here I am!  Here I am! (Bring shaker out and shake it)
How are you today, friend? Very well, I thank you. (Pretend to talk to shaker)
Run away, run away. (Hide shaker behind your back again)
There are other verses as well such as rolling on the floor, tapping on your hand, and shaking on your tummy.  I bet you could make up your own as well!

We used the shakers to sing our ABCs and we shook our shakers for the next installment of If You Want to Read a Story...  The second book was appropriately titled, Shake It Up, Baby! by Karen Katz.  This board book has a built in shaker in the spine.  We followed the instruction given in the story and had a great time shaking! 

After collecting the egg shakers, I used one of my go to quieting rhymes to get all the little ones seated.  I needed their attention in order to explain the rules for our next fun musical instrument, the rhythm sticks!  I've used them once before and it went really well so I was confident it would be great again.  This was quite a bit larger group, so I won't say I wasn't nervous, but with the assistance of many awesome parents, all the little ones used their rhythm sticks for making music only.

I started off with Hap Palmer's song Tap Your Sticks from his cd, Rhythms on Parade.  This song begins with simple instructions to follow such as tapping your sticks in the air and on the floor and rubbing the sticks together.  Then suddenly, it gets advanced!  I explained to the parents before the start of the song that I would be cutting it off at a certain point.  The little ones did fantastic!

We also sang the song This is The Way..., to the tune of Mulberry Bush.  I found this great tapping tune at Ring Sing Play.

This is the Way...
This is the way we tap our sticks, tap our sticks, tap our sticks
This is the way we tap our sticks so early in the morning!
This is the way we rub our sticks, rub our sticks, rub our sticks
This is the way we rub our sticks so early in the morning!
This is the way we tap our knees, tap our knees, tap our knees
This is the way we tap our knees so early in the morning!

Rhythm sticks safely put away, we wiggled our fingers high and low and turned our attention to our last verse of If You Want to Read a Story...  This time we wiggled our nose.  Why you ask?  Because we read Wiggle by Doreen Cronin.  They loved it!  Great illustrations and funny story. 

And that wrapped up our musical story time!  It was a great morning and I think everyone deserved a good nap when we were through.  Or maybe just me..  We are very lucky to have access to such great props to use during our story times.  The little ones love it and I do too!