Flannel Friday: Dog’s Colorful Day

Last week I wrote about how I plan a storytime session.  This week, I want to show in more detail how I retold the book Dog’s Colorful Day by Emma Dodd.

The first way was through a felt story. We already had the dog and the bathtub in my library’s felt story collection, but I wanted to make it a more complete retelling.  If you’ve never made the dog before, here is a great printable pattern.  Now ya’ll know I’m not the craftiest of children’s librarians.  When charged with making my own felt story, I opt for the super simple.  This one was super easy to make, I promise! I free-handed all of these pieces. They aren’t perfect, but kids don’t care and a little imagination never hurt anyone.  I made new spots to match the colours of the felt pieces.  I was inspired a lot by this version I found on Etsy.

The items are:  a chocolate bar, grass, orange juice, a beach ball and a puddle, a marker, a bee, a can of paint, a jar of jam, and an ice cream cone. I’m particularly proud of the bee.

When I did this felt story in storytime I used this AMAZING script to invite the children to participate by name.  First I passed out the spots to the kids who volunteered.  Amazingly, there were no tears, no complaints from anyone who didn’t get a spot.  As I told the story, each child would come up and place the spot on Dog and we’d all clap for them.  It took longer than the usual felt story, but it was so wonderful.  The kids were quite pleased with themselves, even the toddlers.  Not only did it celebrate turn taking, it also got the kids involved in the storytelling.  The script has some great ideas for adapting this story to smaller or larger groups too.

The second way we retold the story was through the use of a puppet.  I found a big, shaggy, mostly white dog puppet.  Then I cut out and stuck on velcro stickers.  To the other half of the velcro sticker I attached coloured pieces of felt.

During storytime, I passed out the velcro felt pieces before starting the story with the kids.  This time, I wanted to adapt it even further so I had the kids tell me what dog might have stepped on or rolled in or walked underneath in order to get each colour.  Some of them remembered the items from the original story, but others came up with things like green apples, blueberries, leaves, and the sun.  We also waited until the very end of the story to count all of dog’s spots since it was hard to see them all at the same time.  For his bath, I decorated a shipping tote with some bubbles.

I loved challenging myself to tell a story in three ways over the course of three storytimes.  I highly recommend trying this out with your storytime groups.

Thanks to Shawn at Read, Rhyme and Sing for hosting this week’s Flannel Friday!  Check out her blog for the full round-up this Friday, and check out the Flannel Friday website for information on how you can participate.