Kids Can Make Board Books--Here's How!

Last month, we had a Writing Party for kids 5-8 years old about making a board book for a baby relative or friend. Turnout was huge! It was one of the most exciting writing programs I've ever done at the library. Kids and their families came and had a blast putting together books with flaps that lift and textures for a baby to touch.

In developing this program I had to first create a sample. The theme or premise of my board book (which I later gave to my baby nephew) was looking for a bunny and lifting flaps throughout, to find other animals there, then finding Bunny at the very end. Looking for something is a common premise in lift-the-flap books, and it introduces elements of surprise, as well as different vocabulary words, and builds up just enough suspense for an infant to take an interest in what's going on.

I showed the kids my finished, colored board book and then gave them some other examples of board books from our library's collection to help them get ideas for their own books.

Supplies:

• Blank board books
• Cardstock of different colors and heavy thickness
• Lots of sharpies of different colors! Regular markers will smear on these board books.
• Full-sheet labels (for printing out animal stickers, useful if kids want an illustration aid)
• Scissors
• Liquid glue bottles
• Lots of different fabrics: fleece, felt, wool, fur, faux leather, suede (I pre-cut the fabrics into squares about the right size, so that kids could just come to the table and grab them and trim them to the desired shape)
• Feathers

I printed color "flaps" on white cardstock and animal images on full sheet sticker labels, and put the sheets out for kids to take and cut out. You can download everything here:

Flaps to cut out

Stickers

Stickers 2

Kids had a lot of fun crafting their books, and parents were wonderfully helpful and engaged!

And then comes my favorite part... When the kids show off their books and read me what they wrote or tell me what they planned to write! Check out these budding authors. Those baby recipients are super lucky to be getting these books for Christmas!

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BvvH6gpAB8&w=560&h=315] [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrJVFzDuNVo&w=560&h=315] [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Oedou45BDE&w=560&h=315] [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6rMll7TLCE&w=560&h=315] [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8E3Um0vh-xs&w=560&h=315] [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjmfhZIzigE&w=560&h=315] [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJkx9ezyK3c&w=560&h=315] [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTNB9Ea8eGg&w=560&h=315]

I hope these videos and pictures demonstrate that writing workshops CAN indeed be fun for kindergartners, first and second graders, and they can draw big crowds and encourage developing literacy skills, especially when there is a craft or artistic element to the workshop! Can't wait to do another writing party, perhaps in the spring!

Poetry Creation Stations

This Friday, I'll be trying something a little different for my obligatory National Poetry Month session of our Kids' Writing Workshop. I purchased a few cool items that I want to share with the kids:

Haikubes

These are cubes or dice that have a variety of words you can choose from to make a haiku. The game is that you are supposed to roll a red cube that will give you a prompt, but I might leave it more open-ended for the kids. I liked exploring what words were available to me and tweaking them until I felt I had made a satisfactory haiku.

moonlight dripping, shines
her precious fire, licks the
surface of your heart

Paint Chip Poetry

This works even more like a game: first, each player draws twelve paint chips from the deck, and then draws a prompt card. Then you use as many of those paint chips as you would like to make a poem that responds to the prompt.

Blackout Bookmarks

In a twist on blackout poetry, we will be trimming our blackout poetry and laminating them to make them into bookmarks. The bookmarks are larger than standard bookmarks, but still a great size for using with even a small paperback book.

When I prep this for the kids, I grab a few of my favorite middle grade novels and photocopy a few pages from each. I look for pages with a lot of dense paragraphs and rich diction. I always try to encourage kids to scan the page and simply circle a few words that jump out at them. Just make connections, and you don't have to find a relevant word or phrase on every line.

Once they've done their circling in pencil, and tweaked it until they feel they'll have a strong poem, they are ready for the black markers!

Here's my sample. I was so jazzed to find a page that had lots of references to books, stories, and even a library! (This was page 394 from Marvels by Brian Selznick.)

Kids will be moving from one station to the next. I don't have a room with tables to work with tomorrow but we'll use clip boards and try to make it comfortable. I hope the kids have as much fun with this stuff as I did!

How to Make 3D Seussian animals

One of the workshops in my book involves creating a Dr. Seuss-inspired animal with a name that is a combination of different names from Dr. Seuss books. The handout gives kids a prompt to draw their animal, but if you want to get more crafty, you could also try making them in 3D!

You will need:
Pipe cleaners
Feathers
Pom poms
Googly eyes

Show the kids how to wrap a pipe cleaner around a pen or pencil to create a "body" that has more substance (and spring!) to it than a straight pipe cleaner would. It also allows for lots of ways to tuck in feathers and other features you might want to use to decorate your animal.

In my example of a birdlike Seussian animal, I also used a short segment cut from a straw, for bringing all the different colored pipe cleaners together, for giving my animal a clear separation like a "hip" for her legs and back, and for giving me an easy way to insert a tail.

I used liquid glue to glue the pom pom balls and googly eyes on.

I think it's important to infuse these writing programs with craft activities, as time allows. For the outreach I was doing where families were coming and going, it was a fun way to get everyone involved and engaged.