A welcome or hello song is the first song you sing at storytime. It is your first impression, your introduction, your tool for setting the tone of your program. Repeated every week, it creates a comforting routine for families. By starting with a song families have a chance to settle in and get sorted before you jump into the first story. The more I think about it, the more important it is to pick a welcome song that pulls its weight.
So let’s share!
I recently attended an Early Childhood Investigations webinar and learned a new one that I am excited to try out. It’s a new-to-me tune, easy to adapt with different verses, and I just love the message behind it. It’s called We’ve Been Waiting For You by Tom Hunter, Bev Bos, and Michael Leeman.
My old standby that I come back to again and again is Well Hello Everybody, Can You Touch Your Nose? By changing the action you can use it with any age – touch your toes with babies, clap your hands with toddlers, jump up high with preschoolers, or beep your belly with any age. You can also sing as many verses as you need. Still have families coming through the door? Just extend this song. End with “Well hello everybody, can you sit back down?” to transition into your first story.
What are your favourite welcome or hello songs? Feel free to share the lyrics or video links in the comments!
Good Morning to you
Good morning to you
We’re all in our places
With smiles on our faces
Oh this is our way
On library day!
I love that, Bonnie! Is there a particular tune?
This one is a classic! Here are two variations:
https://youtu.be/0tS3P54AQak
https://youtu.be/cUl0UB6F5l4?si=lC7Rc1_RH5Cy3w4v
We use When I Woke up Today by the Laurie Berkner Band-HOORAY!
That’s a beautiful song you found, Lindsey! I may add that in as a parachute song.
I love “we clap and say hello, we clap and say hello, with our friends at story time we clap and say hello.”
I also make a few announcements and then we do this one, which the audience seems to love:
Dance your fingers up
Dance your fingers down
Dance your fingers in and out, all around the town
Dance them on your shoulders,
Dance them on your head
Dance them on your tippy toes
Then put them to bed
I love discussing the songs we use and what works best!!
Thank you for sharing “Dance Your Fingers Up!” I am always looking for good transition songs and this one would work perfectly right before a story.
I like “Hi, Hello, and How Are You?” to the tune of “London Bridge is Falling Down.” I think I got the first verse from jbrary (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aj4d6MLhJcE) and for a while I just used that. But then I wrote a second verse so I could tie in some social-emotional learning and pair it with some flannel faces.
Are you happy?
Are you sad?
Are you scared?
Are you mad?
Are you happy, sad, scared, mad?
How are you today?
Then we talk about times we’ve felt those different feelings, make faces, and I encourage the kids to tell their grown-up how they feel right now (and the grown-up to tell their kiddos how they’re doing, too). Depending on the crowd, I might talk a bit about how we might feel any of these feelings during storytime: happy if we’re having run, sad when something ends, scared if its our first time, or mad if something doesn’t go the way we want it to. I started doing this during virtual storytimes in Covid, and I got some grateful feedback from parents who said that their kids felt really seen when we acknowledged that they might be feeling scared or angry because of pandemic conditions. Now I use it regularly.
Then I close with a matching goodbye song, “Bye, Goodbye, and See you Soon”
Bye, goodbye, and see you soon,
See you soon,
See you soon,
Bye, goodbye, and see you soon,
Have a lovely day!
That’s lovely, Marissa. I especially like how you encourage both the kids and the caregivers to share their feelings. It’s all about the modeling.
We use “The More We Get Together” á la Raffi, and after the first verse we continue “..and Teresa’s friends are Alice’s friends and Alice’s friends are Graham’s friends…” with the adults supplying the child’s name just in time.
We also love “Hello, Hello” which is great because it gives the kids the chance to develop and show off their skills: https://supersimple.com/song/hello-hello/. We say” stretch out wide” instead of “turn around”, since our kids are pretty young.
We also use “Everybody Have a Seat” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pR8g3yQYVVs); when we do storytimes outside we say “ground” instead of “floor” and then we rhyme “Wave to everybody, look all around” instead of “Not on the celing…”
And recently, if we had a small group, we’ve tried “Jack is here today, Jack is here today, everybody give a cheer ‘cuz Jack is here: Hooray!…Emma’s here today…” to the tune of The Farmer in the Dell. This one takes a little longer, but kids get to hear their names a few times, which they like.
Oh, I really like the simplicity of the Super Simple Songs one (hence the name haha!). Any song where I can add in more verses as families arrive late is a win for me.
I have a song that comes from a Librarian in a small town I worked with and I’ve never seen this song around in other Libraries (yet) so it may have been her own creation. The song (“Let’s All Go to Storytime!”) is
sung to “In the Hall of the Mountain King.” You sing it three times with the kids; first very slowly, then at a normal pace, then very fast! It gets everyone’s attention and participating right away!
Lyrics:
Let’s all go to storytime! (clap to song)
Storytime!
Storytime!
Let’s all go to storytime.
We’ll have some fun today,
Yay! (throw hands up in the air)
So fun! What a great tune to start storytime. I can totally see how that would set the tone for participation and energy.
I love “Hello/Goodbye, Friends” w/ ASL for prek and “We Wave Hello/Goodbye Like This” or “This is the Way We Wave Hello/Goodbye” for babies and toddlers. Joanie Leeds “Hello Everyone” (“City Kid!” album) is so much fun with preschoolers!
I’ll have to check out the Joanie Leeds song. I used to do a few of hers with a parachute.
I use “Hello Friends” with ASL and one of the other librarians in my system uses “The More We Get Together” with ASL.
This is one of my favourites, too! I love teaching the sign for friends, and it’s my go-to term for referring to everyone I meet, anyway. We’re all friends at the library! 🙂
You chose one of my personal favorite albums to highlight in this blogspot. I had the gift of being friends with Bev Bos and Tom Hunter. Bev was a wonderful mentor in my early days as a preschool story person.
This week I’ll be telling at the Murphys’ Preschool Library storytime in Murphys, CA. Once a month I get the joy of being with these sweet families. We’ll be doing songs and stories about night time animals and the coming of Winter.
Oh wow, that’s so cool! I am just discovering their music and I can tell they must have helped so many people sing more with children. I hope you have a great time at storytime this month!
I came to your blog today because I wanted to change up my welcome song!
I love doing “Well Hello Everybody, Can You Touch Your Nose?” It is my favorite because I’ll ask my kiddos what they want to do after we touch our nose, then our toes. Our group loves to “rock a guitar” by playing the air guitar and feeling like super stars.
We’ve been doing it for a couple years now, and I’d like to find another song to add in to the rotation.
Thank you for your blog and all of the lovely ideas!
Have you tried Bread and Butter Marmalade and Jam? The kids at my story time love it! You can find the lyrics on Jbrary 🙂
I will try that one out! Thank you!
Love Bread and Butter! It’s a wonderful go-to and teaches the littles their opposites too. Ending with “nice” helps to settle everyone down, then I like to do a freezing game called Wiggle, Wiggle, Stop.
Whoa, what a happy coincidence! I am totally stealing “rock a guitar” as a new verse. There are so many good ideas here in the comments. I hope you find a new one you love!
I use “When Cows Get Up in the Morning,” which I learned from your YouTube channel, and I break out the puppets! My cow puppet visits every week to say hello to all my friends, followed by two other animal puppets–I’ll try to pick one that makes an appearance in the books we’re reading today, if possible. And then we finish by singing, “When friends get up in the morning, we always say hello!” and wave to everyone in the room. 🙂 It’s always fun and the kids looooove my cow puppet. Thanks for introducing me to such a fun song!
That’s awesome, Ellie. I love starting with puppets too – they draw the kids in like nothing else. It would be fun to dress up the cow in different outfits each week to really create a character.
I use this in every program! I love sneaking in a few unusual puppets here and there – when dinosaurs get up in the morning, when crocodiles get up in the morning…anything to get a giggle. 🙂
Me too! we have done penguins (Skaaaaaaark!), Unicorns (neigh with a hair flip) and a few other weird animals. I printed off a bunch of animals and stuck them on craft sticks and the kids choose one as they come into storytime, then we sing for each animal. They love it!
We do “When Gators Get Up in the Morning” because we have an awesome alligator puppet, and also because the kids love going “chomp, chomp, chomp”!
I love doing the trilingual “Hello Friends/Hola Amigos” with ASL that I originally got from your blog! We do 2x in English/2x in Spanish with ASL on both, and then the matching goodbye song as well at the end. After a couple of months, we started having babies who started signing “friends” at me every time they came into the library!
The cutest thing ever! Good to know that one translates easily to other languages.
Can you share the words for the Spanish version? And any other great Spanish story time suggestions? I’m working on creating an all Spanish story time and welcome any ideas!
Hello! I worked with several of our native Spanish speaker librarians here to come up with the following translation:
¡Hola amigos!
¡Hola amigos!
¡Hola amigos!
¡Es hora de saludar!
It’s not a perfect one-to-one translation, but “saludar” fits better syllabically than “decir hola”, which is also why we skipped the definite article where you would normally say “es la hora”. I’m definitely not a bilingual storytime expert, but would recommend this resource started by one of my colleagues who is! https://www.bibliocuentos.com/
Gracias! This is awesome! I have been doing a monthly Spanish Storytime for many years now, so I’m always looking for new songs and activities.
I learned this song from a mentor librarian, so my apologies for not knowing the source. I’ve only used it with a smaller storytime group (5-10 kids), but my mentor used it even with 20-30 kids. Kids enjoy hearing their names, and a parent once commented to me that the name song made her feel especially welcome. I like learning regulars’ names, too. We clap along, 8 claps per line.
Welcome, welcome, everyone, now you’re here let’s have some fun!
Welcome, welcome, [child’s name], now you’re here let’s have some fun!
Yes, I love when I can incorporate names! In the past when I have big groups I will go around before storytime and get a few “volunteers” who are okay with being named in the song. You can even write the names on a whiteboard to model the early literacy practice of writing, plus it helps me remember them.
Here’s one we sing especially when we’re trying to get the attention of talking parents and bustling kids to be aware that storytime is beginning. I learned it from my predecessor many years ago and I’m sorry I don’t know it’s source. We/we’re/we’ll can be changed to I/I’m/I’ll
Well we like to sing hello, hello,
Hello, how do you do?
Well we like to sing hello, hello,
To you and you and you.
Welcome friends, welcome friends
To storytime time today.
We’re glad you’re here so we’ll give a cheer,
Hoory, hooray, hooray!
I love the positive energy in this one. Maybe one day fate will align and I’ll get to hear it in person 🙂
My hello song these days is Clap everybody and say hello, by Kathy Reid Neiman. I ask kids about the weather after the first verse.
Clap everybody and say hello.
No matter what the weather.
Add actions to verses: jump, wiggle, dance, etc.
Another really fun hello song that I learned not too long ago is Say Hello, by Stephanie Leavell. I highly recommend Stephanie’s Instagram and You Tube accounts for new songs!
Say hello from your head to your toes
Say hello from your head to your toes
Say hello from your head to your toes
‘Cause it’s time to say hello
Say hello with your ________
Say hello with your ________
Say hello with your ________
‘Cause it’s time to say hello
Oh my gosh, I LOVE it!!! I subscribed to her channel. This might be the winner winner chicken dinner 🙂
For my baby/toddler (small group)
Good morning, good morning
Good Morning to YOU!
Goodmorning [Child’s Name]
Good morning to you!
Repeat with all littles in the storytime.
Usually we’re at 5-10 kids, but we’ve had some summer sessions get close to 20.
All ages/preschool uses “Open Shut Them” as a the opening song.
Thanks for sharing, Maggie! I also love to do “Open Shut Them” as part of my welcome song mix.
My go-to is Emily Arrow’s “Books, Books” song which is beautiful, short, and easy to incorporate movements into. I also love Laurie Berkner’s “These Are My Glasses”. It’s a little longer but so much fun!
I love Emily Arrow! I’ll have to check this one out as I don’t know it yet.
I love singing Well, Hello Everybody Can You Touch Your Nose!
I often end up singing two songs as I have lots of late comers and want them to feel welcome and also because I have trouble only choosing one song. I often start with Well, Hello and then this is the 2nd song I sing:
Hello, Hello Let’s Play that Game
Hello, Hello What’s your name?
Hello _____ Jump Up High
Turn-a-round and say goodbye!
(tap thighs and clap hands to count of 7)
I will usually go first and then if it is a large group I replace the blank with kids, adults, then everyone. I find this models for the parents that we want them to play, sing, have fun with their kids! If it’s a small group and the kids seem comfortable with performing in front of others we’ll go around and sing with each person’s name.
I learned it from a wonderful colleague and it is such a fun movement hello song and also introduces turn taking and waiting.
Claire, I love this!
I am all for a welcome song that gets those wiggles out and includes the adults with them.
These are all wonderful! It’s so nice to have some more Hello song options. I was in the mood for something different for our fall storytime cycle, so I used the Addams Family theme song to make something different for my toddler groups:
Hello, friends! (pat pat)
Hello, friends! (pat pat)
Hello, friends! Hello, friends! Hello, friends! (pat pat)
Let’s wave for all our friends
Let’s clap for all our friends
Let’s stomp for all our friends
And start our storytime!
Hello, friends! (pat pat)
Hello, friends! (pat pat)
Hello, friends! Hello, friends! Hello, friends! (pat pat)
We do a goodbye version, as well, and we use the ASL signs for hello, goodbye, start, and end. My coworker uses it for her family storytime, and she has them either snap the regular way or use a little crab claw type snap, which I thought was such a good idea.
I LOVE this. Tunes are so hard for me to remember but this one will definitely stick in my brain. Attaching things to background knowledge for the win!
I usually use Hello It’s Story time Today. It goes to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
Hello, hello, it’s story time today
Hello, hello, we’re on our way
We’ll clap our hands and wiggle our toes
Bounce and sing some row, row, rows
Hello, hello, it’s story time today,
We’re so glad you’ve come to play!
I have one that I learned from the lovely librarian Christine at the Maribyrnong library in Australia, through their Youtube storytimes:
Hello, hello!
Can you clap your hands!
Hello, hello!
Can you clap your hands!
Can you reach up high!
Can you touch your toes!
Can you turn around, and say hello!
I would love some suggestions for a good-bye/end of Storytime song/Rhyme.
We have a playlist with hello and goodbye songs with some options. My favourite on this playlist is See You Later, Alligator!
We sing “If You’re Happy and You Know It…” followed by this:
Goodbye Song
Tune: London Bridge
Goodbye, goodbye, We’ll see you soon (with slow, large waving)
See you soon, see you soon
Goodbye, goodbye, We’ll see you soon
On another day!
I also like “Bread and Butter”! and I explain what marmalade is, and that it is Paddington’s favorite food
Another easy one, to the tune of “farmer in the dell” that even the youngest ones at story time can remember (over time) and sing:
Our hands wave hello, our hands wave hello — Every time we see our friends, our hands wave hello! (x2)
And there is a matching closing song
Our hands wave good-bye, our hands wave good-bye — Every time we leave our friends. our hands wave good-bye! (x2)
Oh that’s a perfect one to use with preschool and daycare groups! So easy to catch along and you could do lots of different verses. Thank you for sharing!
I really love Everybody Clap by Nancy Kopman for toddler storytime
I’ve just started adding in songs with my storytime and I’m really appreciating the resources here. I’m learning ukulele and have picked “The More We Get Together” for my welcome song for now, and based on this thread, I just learned the one to the tune of London Bridge! I haven’t had a chance to use it with a group, that’s how new it is for me (and how short of a time I’ve been playing the ukulele)