Bear Storytime 10/2/19

Today’s storytime was about bears.  The books I chose were There’s a Bear on My Chair by Ross Collins, and Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr.

I started with our opening song, then brought out my bear friend, Honey.  Honey showed us the letter he’d brought – B – and pictures of words that start with B.  He’d also brought us a poem!

Fuzzy Wuzzy
Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear.
Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair.
Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn’t very fuzzy, was he?

Then we read our first book, There’s a Bear in My Chair.  I just find this book to be delightful.  Who knew there were so many words that rhymed with bear???  Then we stood up and sang If You’re a Bear and You Know It.

If you’re a panda bear and you know it, clap your paws
If you’re a polar bear and you know it, show your teeth
If you’re a grizzly bear and you know it, growl real loud
Credit: https://storytimekatie.com/2011/01/13/bears-2/

Then we did a flannel and song, The Bear Went over the Mountain.
The bear went over the mountain,
The bear went over the mountain,
The bear went over the mountain,
To see what he could see.
And all that he could see,
And all that he could see,
Was the other side of the mountain,
The other side of the mountain.
The other side of the mountain, was all that he could see.

Verses – Different Locations
The bear swam over the river…
The bear tromped over the ice floe…

When I asked the kiddos what other things the bear could go over, one of them loudly announced “A chair!”  And what would he see on the other side of a chair?  “A mouse!”  Exactly right!  Then, we read our last book, Brown Bear, Brown Bear.

We did another flannel, Six Teddy Bears, which is a shortened version of Ten Teddy Bears.

Six teddy bears, sleeping in the bed.
Three at the foot and three at the head.
One little bear said, “This bed is too full!”
So he grabbed the blanket and started to pull!
He pulled and pulled, and pulled some more
Till one little teddy went boom to the floor!
(Count down)
One little teddy, sleeping in the bed,
None at the foot, and one at the head.
One little teddy said, “This bed is NOT full”
So he put out a paw and started to pull!
He pulled and pulled, and pulled some more
Until five little teddies were off of the floor.

The children helped me by pretending to pull and pull the blankets, and telling me which teddy had fallen off the bed.

Then I had everyone stand up, and had the grownups all move their chairs around the floor.  I told all the children to find their grownup because we were going to do some dancing.  I asked if anyone had an extra child they would like to loan me for a dance partner, and one little boy hurried up.  So we danced to Dancing with Bears.

1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3 Dancing with bears
1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3 Dancing round chairs
1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3 that’s what we’ll do
1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3 Dancing with you.
Credit: jbrary

This was the first time I had done this, and it really went well.  The little boy I danced with was very serious about it, and afterward thanked me for dancing with him and gave me a hug.  Aww!

Now, true confessions time.  I was VERY frustrated during this storytime, because I had two women talking to each other the whole time, despite all my instructions otherwise, and despite all of my efforts to involve them in the storytime.  It’s just so incredibly rude, not only to me, but to the other people around them who were trying to listen.  Just wanted to express some of my frustration here.  It’s become a rare thing in my storytimes for this sort of thing to happen, and I guess I’d just thought that I had conquered it.  Oh, well.