Books, Story, Action!

As you might know this month is Moving it in May here at We are Happy Playing and I've been doing a lot of thinking about how to incorporate more movement into our daily lives and schedule. Since the post about children and yoga, we have made yoga a regular activity that we do after kindergarten using the Cosmic Kids' videos on YouTube and the I am Love yoga app on the tablet as part of our bedtime routine.

A daily activity we participate in as a family is story time, so I've been looking for ideas that would make story time not just a time to sit and listen, but a time where we can get active while enjoying a story. Immediately I thought about acting out what is written in the story, but what books would lend themselves to this type of activity? Luckily we had two such books sitting on our shelf!

The first one is  We are Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen.

 

The story is of a brave family that go out to hunt a bear. In order to get to the bear's hideout they find they need to go through a series of environmental conditions such as long swishy grass, squishy mud and a snow storm. As the family go through these different places there is great opportunity for children to use their bodies to act out the actions. Hands waving like swishy grass, stomping through gooey mud etc. 

Here are some photos of my little one, her cousin and their  interpretation of the book.

 Swishing through long grass.. Swishy Swashy

 

Stomping through thick oozy mud!

Apparently this is how these two monkeys feel one moves through the river, splash splosh. Not by waddling through it but swimming across it.

And we must not forget to hide under the covers when the bear chases us home.

 Just a little note, in looking for images of the book for this post, I came across this video which actually shows the author performing the story. How crazy random is that!? So I decided to share. While this is kinds cute and quaint, I do love the more energetic version my daughter came up with!

The second book we had on the shelf was Panda Bear Panda Bear What do You See? by Bill Martin Jr and illustrated by the wonderful Eric Carle.

In this book a series of animals are asked what they can see, with each responding with the name of another animal and the action they are performing. See pictures below.

"Water buffalo, water buffalo what do you see? I see a spider monkey swinging by me." 

"Blue herring, blue herring what do you see? I see a prairie dog digging by me. "

It's pretty obvious to see why this book makes a great story for children to move to. Simply ask the children to act out the different things the animals are doing as you go through the book.

As you may or may not know there are other books in this series with the first being Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do You See? and Polar Bear, Polar Bear what do You Hear? While these two books focus on colours and sounds, there is no reason why children couldn't be encouraged to act like the various animals in the story, especially with the second one slithering like a snake while you hiss like one would be a wonderful physical experience for any child.

If you are looking for other books with animals that children can pretend to be try Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell and Animal Moves by Dawn Apperley. Both books are simple and children can act out the animals featured in both books.

Where the Wild Things Are  by Maurice Sendak are also lends itself beautifully to being acted out by children.Pretending to sail across the sea, stomping and growling like a wild thing all part of the fun you can have with is story.

Whilst this is just a handful of books that lend themselves well to being acted out through movement I am sure there are many more and we plan on finding those over the next month or more. Maybe you yourself have some that you know of? If you do we would love to hear from you in the comments section.

Until next time happy story time and happy playing.