Dancing has always been one of my favorite things. I love taking classes on it, and I love just bopping around to my favorite songs. And the best thing about doing a story time for 2s and 3s? They loooove to dance! So as far as I was concerned, a dancing theme was a pretty obvious choice.
I kicked off our story time with Giraffes Can't Dance by Giles Andreae. I was a little bit worried it would be too long a story, but I shouldn't have been. The kids were enchanted, and so were their parents. Sometimes it really is all about a great story, and Giraffes Can't Dance is one of my favorites.
Our second story was Is Everybody Ready for Fun?by Jan Thomas. I made this one as silly as I possibly could. Every time the cows announced, "It's time to..." I had everyone get up and jump, wiggle, and dance with me. (Side note: Definitely a good thing I saved my longest book for the first one. I don't know if they would've been able to sit still for it following this one.)
And finally, our third book was Dancing Feet by Lindsey Craig. I like the repetition in this one, as well as the guessing game element, but my audience was getting a wee bit wiggly by this point, so we ended it a couple pages earlier. They had fun calling out the names of each animal though!
This story time was one I actually wished had lasted a little bit longer - I had tons of dances I wanted to do with the kids, but not enough time to get to all of them. We did, of course, do Tooty Ta by Dr. Jean, which was a big hit. I also did Shake Your Sillies Out by The Wiggles on Tuesday, and Silly Dance Contest by Jim Gill with my Wednesday group. (Full disclosure - I'd meant to do Silly Dance Contest both days, but accidentally skipped ahead to the wrong track on Tuesday. Still - I had fun, the kids had fun, and I think the parents got a kick out of watching us!)
Awhile ago, I also found a song called The Monster Stomp on someone's blog. I think I ended up tracking it down to SurLaLune Storytime, but if that's incorrect, please let me know! The rhyme was a bit short for my tastes, so I expanded it, and ended up with this:
The Monster Stomp
If you want to be a monster,
Now's your chance!
'Cause everybody's doing
The monster dance!
You just stamp your feet,
Wave your arms around.
Stretch 'em up, stretch 'em up,
Then put them on the ground.
Give a roar (ROAR)
And clap your paws,
Bend your knees,
Then show your claws.
Stick out your tongue,
Then wobble your lips.
Jump up real high,
And shake those hips!
Now wiggle, wiggle, wiggle,
Like ants are in your pants.
'Cause that's how we do
The monster dance!
I also made this little guy to go along with my lyric poster. His name is Melvin, and I kind of love him.
Last but not least, for our craft we made... drum roll please... dance fans!
My original thought had been to make ribbon dancers (ie, dowel rods with ribbons on the end) but the cost was somewhat prohibitive. These were much cheaper and had the added bonus of being SUPER easy to make. I cut the basic shape out of cardstock, then set out Bingo markers and strips of ribbon and crepe paper. I recommend taping the ribbons before doing any markering, since Bingo markers have a tendency to leave big splotches of paint if dabbed too enthusiastically. All in all, quick, easy, and lots of fun!
Overall, the dance theme was a winner, I think. I'd love to do it again and take the chance to do some of the dances we didn't get a chance to this time!
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