November, a storytime on togetherness

Trying to get that fall feeling going on here while it's still regularly reaching 80° outside.  Where is my sweater weather???

In recognition of Native American Heritage Month, I plan to use at least one book written or illustrated by creators indigenous to the US or Canada in every storytime.  My theme for week one is Togetherness.

First book was Walking Together by Elder Albert D. Marshall and Louise Zimanyi, with illustrations by Emily Kewageshig. Although this is more of a Spring book, I believe the central idea of existing in harmony with nature makes sense with autumn harvests and preparing for winter.  After I started reading, one kid kept repeating "slide, slide" and I was a little confused.  

But that sure does look like a slide, or at least a great sledding hill, doesn't it?  The kids had fun identifying all of the animals in the rest of the book.

We did a little freestyle dancing to March Together by Aaron Nigel Smith and Shine and the Moonbeams from All One Tribe.

Our next book was We Are Together by Britta Teckentrup.  Fun cut-out pages revealing more and more friends as you go along.  The kids were engaged, but not particularly interactive.

The next song was The More We Get Toegther by The Learning Station.  One of the kids made a special request for another song, My Hoodie by DJ WILLY WOW!, so we had an extra dance break.

We finished up with Grilled Cheese? Yes Please! by Tim Kleyn.  This might have been a little long to be book three, but it has some nice call-back lines.  The kids got grossed out by the idea of mayo on a grilled cheese.  I guess they all grew up with grilled cheese with margarine or butter, the way I did.  Is it a regional thing?  It put a little damper on me trying to get the kids to do the "tsss" sound after "Bread. Cheese. Mayo."  But they definitely got into repeating "Whoosh! Crack!" during the storm scene.

Finishing up, we did a coloring page from the Trolls Band Together movie.