Storytime - Chinese New Year

Toddler

Books: My First Chinese New Year by Karen Katz and Ten Mice for Tet by Pegi Deitz Shea and Cynthia Weill

Songs / Rhymes: “Good Morning”, “Hello, How Are You?”, “Let’s Go Riding”, “Open, Shut Them”, “Chinese New Year”, “If You’re Happy and You Know It”, “Four Red Dragons” on the felt board, “I Wiggle My Fingers”, and “The More We Get Together”.

Craft: Horses for the New Year. Materials: Chinese New Year horses printout (on red paper), gold glitter, crayons, and glue. The toddlers colored in their horses and then covered their pictures in glue. I sprinkled gold glitter over the glue to make their horses festive for the new year. The horse printout came from OnColoring.com.

Preschool

Books: Max Celebrates Chinese New Year by Adria F. Klein and Bringing in the New Year by Grace Lin

Songs / Rhymes: “Welcome to the Library”, “Hello, How Are You?”, “Hi There, So Glad You Came”, “Let’s Go Riding”, “Open, Shut Them”, “Chinese New Year”, “The Hokey Pokey”, “I Wiggle My Fingers”, and “The More We Get Together”.

Craft: Horses for the New Year. Materials: Chinese New Year horses printout (on red paper), gold sequins, crayons, and glue. The preschoolers colored in their horses and then covered their pictures in glue. They used their fine motor skills (developing their writing muscles!) to apply the sequins to the glue.

Songs/Rhymes

Let's Go Riding

Sung to: "Are You Sleeping?"

Let's go riding, let's go riding,

Saddle up. Saddle up.

Everybody ready? Everybody ready?

Giddyup! Giddyup!

--PreschoolEducation

Chinese New Year

Sung to “Mary Had a Little Lamb

See the dragon dance and prance

Dance and prance, dance and prance

See the dragon dance and prance

On Chinese New Year’s Day!

Hear the firecrackers pop, pop, pop

Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop

Hear the firecrackers pop, pop, pop

On Chinese New Year’s Day!

-- PerpetualPreschool.com

Five Red Dragons

Five red dragons

Making such a roar
One danced away

And then there were four 

Four red dragons

Dancing 'round a tree
One danced away

And then there were three
Three red dragons

Dancing 'round you
One danced away

And then there were two
Two red dragons

Dancing in the sun
One danced away

And then there was one
One red dragon

Having lots of fun

She danced away
And then there were none

Storytime - The Year of the Snake: A Chinese/Lunar New Year Party

Toddler

Books: My First Chinese New Year by Karen Katz and Hide and Snake by Keith Baker.

Songs / Rhymes: “Good Morning”, “Hello, How Are You?”, “Open, Shut Them”, “Head and Shoulders”, “Hello Sammy Snake” with snake puppet, and “The More We Get Together”.

Craft: Sssssnakes. Materials: green construction paper strips, red construction paper tongues, crayons, glue, and tape. The toddlers glued their strips together to make a chain. When they were done, they glued on the tongues and drew on eyes. The idea came from DLTK's Crafts for Kids.

Preschool

Books: Max Celebrates Chinese New Year by Adria F. Klein and Ten Mice for Tet by Peti Deitz Shea.

Songs / Rhymes: “Welcome to the Library”, “Hello, How Are You?”, “Open, Shut Them”, “A Tooty Tah”, “Hello Sammy Snake” with the snake puppet, “I Wiggle My Fingers”, and “The More We Get Together”.

Craft: Sssssnakes. These ones were made with red, yellow, and black strips. Some preschoolers glued their strips together to make a chain, while others taped them together to make one long strip. See above.

A retired coworker let me borrow some of her Lunar New Year decorations to add to our festivities.

Songs

Hello, Sammy Snake (with snake puppet)

Sung to: "If You're Happy and You Know It"

Hello, Sammy Snake,

How are you?

Hello, Sammy Snake,

How are you?

With a slither, slither, slither,

And a hiss, hiss, hiss,

Hello, Sammy Snake,

How are you?

--Miss Mollie

Storytime - Chinese New Year

Books

My First Chinese New Year by Karen Katz

Toddler and Preschool

 

Yum Yum Dim Sum by Amy Wilson Sanger

Toddler

*Note: I grabbed this book in haste, something I rarely ever do. I only glanced at the text, and was quite embarrassed during storytime when I couldn't pronounce the food names. I probably wouldn't use this title again, but anyone familiar enough with the terms will find it fun.

Max Celebrates Chinese New Year by Adria F. Klein

Preschool

*Note: This is an easy reader, but perfect for storytime audiences.

Songs

If You’re a Dragon and You Know It

Sung to: “If You’re Happy and You Know It”

If you’re a dragon and you know it,

Show your claws.

If you’re a dragon and you know it,

Show your claws.

If you’re a dragon and you know it,

And you really want to show it,

If you’re a dragon and you know it,

Show your claws.

--Miss Mollie

*This is a song I made up at the last minute. Feel free to change it for your needs.

Four Red Dragons

Four red dragons

Dancing 'round a tree
One danced away

And then there were three 

Three red dragons

Dancing 'round you
One danced away

And then there were two

 

Two red dragons

Dancing in the sun
One danced away

And then there was one

One red dragon

Having lots of fun

She danced away
And then there were none

--PerpetualPreschool

Felt Board

Chinese New Year

Sung to: “Mary Had a Little Lamb"
See the dragon dance and prance

Dance and prance

Dance and prance

See the dragon dance and prance

On Chinese New Year’s Day

Hear the firecrackers pop pop pop
Pop pop

Pop pop
Hear the firecrackers pop pop pop
On Chinese New Year's Day

--PerpetualPreschool

Crafts

Dragon Puppets. Materials: Print out of dragon head and tail from Mrs. Walley's First Grade Website, two popsicle sticks, glue or tape, and an accordion folded strip of red paper. *I had volunteers cut the heads and tails out ahead of time, but preschoolers could cut them out on their own.*

Tape or glue the popsicle sticks onto the backs of the head and tail. Attach the strip to each piece, and you have your dragon! When ours were all finished, we sang "See the Dragon Dance and Prance".

Flannel Friday - Four Red Dragons

I almost didn't think I'd have an entry for this week's Flannel Friday, until I remembered my dragons from today's Chinese New Year storytime. 

Four red dragons

Dancing 'round a tree
One danced away

And then there were three

Three red dragons

Dancing 'round you
One danced away

And then there were two

Two red dragons

Dancing in the sun
One danced away

And then there was one

One red dragon

Having lots of fun

She danced away
And then there were none!

--PerpetualPreschool

The rhyme originally calls for five red dragons:

Five red dragons

Making such a roar
One danced away

And then there were four.

But I decided four was a good number for our group.

Melissa is hosting the roundup over at her blog, Mel's Desk. If you have a moment, take part in Melissa's invitation to Flannel Friday participants, submitters and readers alike, to share your FF experiences. And don't forget to stop by the Flannel Friday Celebration post, where Melissa has listed some awesome FF facts.

As always, you can find FF on Twitter using the #FlannelFriday hashtag, on Facebook, and on Pinterest.