Every day I made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for my toddler who looked forward to biting into the diagonally cut first half while making sounds of yummy delight and showering me with the same compliment: “Mmmm…! This is the best sandwich you ever made Mom!”
One day as I was making the same daily sandwich, he peeked his thick blond-headed self up to the counter and commented…”Oooh! I wonder what it will taste like?!”
One of the joys of reading to children is to see them light up when you repeatedly read the same book over a period of time. Even though they have heard the book multiple times, they enjoy the sounds, cadence, and flow over and over.
This last month I read the book Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina each week. It’s a classic and has a nice rhythm children love to repeat. It is also a book in which children can help you finish sentences, which is a great way to help the cognitive skills of listening and responding, rhyming, and language vocabulary skills. Read almost to the end of the sentence, pause and stop; with a hand gesture, encourage children to finish the the sentence with what they remember.
The new monthly book at story time is Tell Me the Day Backwards by Albert Lamb, a wonderful book about a baby bear who is tucked in and has a tradition of sharing the day backwards with his mom.
Enjoy the cozy months going into winter!