Tag: Deborah Underwood

Posted in picture books, Preschool Reads

STEAM-pressed flipped fairy tale: Jo Bright and the Seven Bots

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Jo Bright and the Seven Bots, by Deborah Underwood/Illustrated by Meg Hunt, (Sept. 2022, Chronicle Books), $17.99, ISBN: 9781452171302

Ages 4-7

The creators of fun flipped fairy tales Interstellar Cinderella and Reading Beauty are back with a fun tinkering tale that will be popular in STEM/STEAM storytimes, fairy tale storytimes, and any time. Jo Bright is a tinkerer with a talent for building bots despite the selfish queen not sharing her supplies. Even Mirror-bot knows the score, telling the queen that “your bots are great, ’tis true, / but Jo Bright has become / a better bot-builder than you”, sending the queen into a tizzy and getting Jo dropped off by a dragon’s lair. Turns out, the vegetarian dragon took to the woods to escape the queen, too, and bonds with Jo, who creates seven bots to keep the lonely dragon company. When the queen discovers that Jo is still the superior bot-maker, she takes things even further! Mixed media illustrations are just plain fun, with adorable robots, diverse and interesting background characters, and a likable blue-haired heroine with a talent for creating. Endpapers add a little extra fun to the story. The rhyming verse is easy to read and makes for a lively readaloud. Pair this one with Ashley Spires’s The Most Magnificent Thing (2014) for a fun STEAM story, and leave out some LEGOs for post-storytime play.

 

Posted in Toddler Reads

Storytime: Quiet/Loud

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

As mentioned before, I’m going to start posting some of my more successful storytimes here. One of most popular storytimes was my Quiet/Loud storytime, done for 4 preschool classes earlier this year. I did the “Loud” portion of the program first, because I let the kids get as loud as they wanted to (and boy, can 4 year-olds get LOUD); the Quiet portion of the storytime calmed them down so I didn’t leave a riled up bunch of children for the teachers!

This was a fun storytime in part because both books are wrriten by the same author: I read Deborah Underwood’s The Loud Book! and The Quiet Book, which talk about different types of loud (fireworks loud) and quiet (right before you yell “surprise!” quiet). The kids loved yelling along with all the fun, different types of loud, and giggled at some of the facial expressions I came up with for different types of quiet.

the_loud_bookThe-Quite-Book_01

After The Loud Book, I recited a rhyme with the kids:

Action Rhyme: Loud and Quiet
Quietly, quietly, not a sound
I’m listening and listening
As I look around
No sounds as I nod (nod)
No sounds as I clap (clap)
No sounds as I tap my hands on my lap (tap)
Loudly, loudly, stomp and clap! (stomp and clap)
Loudly, loudly, stomp and clap! (stomp and clap)
Loudly, loudly, stomp and clap! (stomp and clap)
All that noise! Well, fancy that!

Source: http://preschoolstorytimeoutlines.blogspot.com/2007/02/noise-storytime.html

After reading The Quiet Book, I taught the kids a fingerplay:

Fingerplay: Quiet Mouse

Here’s a quiet little mouse (hold up thumb)
Living in a quiet little house (hold thumb in fist)
When all was as quiet as could be (look around)
OUT! Popped he! (pop out thumb)

Source: http://melissa.depperfamily.net/blog/?p=868

This was such a fun storytime! I think I’ll try it with my picture book storytime group here at the public library.