This was also my first preschool storytime of the school year, so I'm going to spend a bit of time on this one.
Ahh, that first preschool storytime. They never come the first week of preschool, because everyone's still adjusting to the shock of getting dropped off by mom* and then STAYING THERE for several hours, WHILE MOM GOES SOMEWHERE ELSE. I don't personally observe much of the first week, but I picture it being like a combination of an efficient trauma ward and an adorable children's tv show, with teachers flipping back and forth between crisis management and cheerful songs about colors. I stopped in on Wednesday at the Head Start that first week to ask the director if they'd be coming, and just as I thought, the answer was "nooo, we think we'll start next week, if that's okay."
That's okay. So it's actually week 2 of preschool that the new classes shuffle in. They are new to walking in line, so they go a little like prisoners, prisoners emblazoned with stickers on their shirts that say "Great Job!" They wobble, fall out of place, and are nudged back into line. Some are crying. Many look terrified. The rest look confused. And there's always one who appears completely oblivious to everything that is going on and is just bopping along happily and yelling and grinning and eventually has to be the teacher's sitting buddy.
I set up the room carefully for preschool story time. It's a process I honed last year, when the months from March-June were my first at the library and working with the Head Start, which is two doors down from us, inside our big abandoned mall. (Yes--it's a long story.)
- I roll up the rugs and put them away. They are decorative rugs, and seem like the ideal story time setting with their huge colorful fish and letters and numbers. However, after watching kids pushing each other incessantly, I realized that they were all trying to fit on the rug, which is not possible with such a large group. So now I roll up the rugs. Much better.
- I place a line of masking tape on the floor, in front of where I sit, to give them an expectation of where they will sit.
- I put my chair out, and my story time easel with all the books on it, and my props hidden behind.
- I move the tables out of the way and put a circle of chairs in the back for the teachers and other adults.
- I get out my number signs--the HS has classrooms 1, 2, 3, and 4, and to make dismissal time easy, I put numbers out corresponding to the classes that are attending, and then tell kids at the end to line up by their number and I will give each one a sticker. Sounds a little complicated, but I don't think you want to know about the chaos and trauma that ensued with each story time dismissal before I put this in place. Inevitably one kid would jump up to hug me..... and then TWENTY kids would jump up to hug me. And all run at me at once. And TRAMPLE each other. Seriously. A couple times they, no joke, almost knocked me off and I would have taken out at least two behind me if I'd gone down. I had to create some kind of process so we wouldn't have any story time dismissal trampling deaths. It actually works really well.
I do two story times for the HS, since they have so many kids-- two classrooms at 10:30, two at 11.
At 10:30 on the dot the wobbly line breached the front door of the library and snaked and sniffled its way back to me. I welcomed them, and directed them to the line on the floor. They sat all over the place. I went around telling each kid "let's move your body so that you are sitting on this side of the line," etc, until they were all in a semblance of group audience seating. This took about five minutes.
Some of the kids know me from last year, and they wave and smile and shout "Hi Miss Amy!!" This makes me feel great. Awwws.
The new ones have no such comfort or familiarity. They stare at me with a mixture of nervousness and the dullness that comes with resigning oneself to a crazy new reality, a stage in the process of accepting that Mom Is Not Here.
"Good morning, everyone!" I say with a glowing, nurturing smile. A child in the front row immediately bursts into tears. I take a hand and lead the child to teacher while assuring everyone that it's okay to feel sad or nervous, everyone does sometimes. "Maybe he misses his mom!" one cries. "Yes, and that's okay," I say. Another in the front row yells triumphantly "I'm not crying!" "That's great" is my reply. I just want to start story time now, okay. "I'm a big boy, and big boys don't cry!" he adds. "Well, sometimes they do," I say. "Sometimes big boys need to cry." Sink in, Life Lesson.
And finally we can start. I begin by singing their own version of what I call the sit-down-and-shut-up song. It involves lyrics around eyes watching, ears listening, etc. I will sometimes have to sing this upwards of five times during a half hour story time.
I kept the finger plays minimal for this one; most kids don't know them yet, so we need to ease in. After Jiggle Joggle Jee, we did "Here Comes the Choo Choo Train," which went over well. And we sang "Rock-a-Bye Baby," which was also a hit.
Jiggle Joggle Jee: the first reaction was a yell from a child in front, "this is a baby book!" I ignored him. Soon he was enraptured like the rest. Oh, they liked this one. Immediately I had kids repeating the "loky smoky stoky" refrain. Lots of smiling faces as this one wrapped up. One good reason, with my group, to choose a beginning book with a fun nonsensical refrain like this is that a good number of the kids don't speak English yet, having only spoken Spanish at home with their families. It's easy for those kids to repeat fun sounds with the others.
The Baby in the Hat: this was a surprising hit. The baby-in-hat image seemed to rivet a large number of the kids right away. "He's in a hat!" "Baby in a hat!" "He fell out the window!" Okay, it's a female baby, but whatevs. Moving along. The story is actually pretty easy to follow, despite the old-fashioned setting and characters, and they loved hearing that the boy fell off a bridge and into a ship. They loved the pirates! And they liked shouting "ahoy matey!" with the pictures. And at the end of the book, after the couple gets married, there's a picture where the two are on a ship and the baby is behind them, clinging to a rope and flying in the wind--they LOVED that. "The baby's flying!" One little boy, doe-eyed stare and all, said "baby in the hat" at random through the rest of story time. So, the one I was unsure of actually went over *great.* This one's going on my regular story time roster.
Baby Goes Beep: total win. I read the sounds, then pointed to them and had them repeat "beep beep, beep beep" etc. It took a while for them to get it but they did with teachers' help. By the end of the book, they got the repetition part and were smiling.
We finished up, sang our goodbye song, and got in line. Everyone got a sticker. No, you don't get to choose your color, you get what you get. And we'll see you next week.
I was really happy with this as a first story time. The kids were into it, and most left smiling. Next week will be a bigger challenge, as I delve into my childhood beyond birth and explore my bond with my older sister. Of course, they won't know that. But I will. And so will you, dear reader.
See you next time...
--Miss Amy
*In my library's neighborhood, yes, it's almost always mom. I see very few dads with young children. A lot of the moms are single. Sometimes I'll say to a preschooler something about "your mom or dad," and when I do 90% of the time I get a response of either "I don't have a dad" or "my daddy's dead." Guh.
