Been a little while, hasn't it? I have just been posting things to various Facebook pages, but this would have been a rather large post, and I want to be able to share it with people, so...here's your photo dump! Does this mean I will start blogging regularly again? Who knows? It's not as if I have anything else taking up my time :)
Several years before Covid, we shifted our Halloween program to a Mad Scientist Training. That allows families who aren't comfortable with Halloween to participate, and gives us an excuse to explore some messy STEAM projects...all over the library!
We had 18 stations throughout the library. Each center was designed around a Halloween-type picture book. When kids completed 13 or more (or not, I wasn't checking), they got a bag of goodies from me and a certificate declaring them an official Mad Scientist. Based on number of bags given out, I would say we had about 200 kids and grown-ups.
In no particular order:
Skeleton Hiccups by Margery Cuyler. Kids used his bones (Q-tips) to make pictures.
Next to it we had a "Bonus Center"...because I forgot to include it in the checklist, and I wasn't reprinting them all.
Last year Kevan Atteberry posted a different monster drawing every day in October, and they were so abso-freaking adorable I had to print them all out. He is doing the same this year! They make fabulous story starters:
We live in a heavily Hispanic area, and I am always careful to make sure people understand Dia de los Muertos is NOT "Mexican Halloween". BUT, we do want to commemorate it, so we have an ofrenda featuring authors and illustrators who passed away this year, and these awesome sugar skull pictures/masks. (Daniela's Day of the Dead by Lisa Bullard)
Pumpkin Trouble by Jan Thomas is a fun read-aloud, and lends itself to some coloring - don't let the same colors touch!
A Very Witchy Spelling Bee by George Shannon. How many words can you make out of the letters in Happy Halloween? This and the previous two centers were in our reference area - they were the quietest and least messy!
These ghosties had either red, blue or green dots on the bottom of the sticks. Kids had to guess which theirs would have before picking it, and they got a prize if they were right. Either way they got the sucker!
The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams is another favorite for story time. What are you afraid of? Participants wrote their answers on post-its and added them to the posterboard.
I went first:
but others had plenty to say:
Otter Loves Halloween by Sam Garton. Catapults! Those candy corns went EVERYWHERE. A couple kids got them into the buckets, but I mostly nailed parents every time I tried to demonstrate.
The Teeny Tiny Ghost by Kay Winters left us some secret messages (written in white crayon). Kids painted over the papers with watercolors to reveal the message.
Too Many Pumpkins by Linda White - another story time classic. What can you make with them?
I kept several bags aside and changed them out throughout the program, because this one got quite sticky! But fun.
We talked a bit about different shapes and how triangles are stronger than squares.
Frank Was a Monster who Wanted to Dance by Keith Graves. Except he didn't. No matter how many alka seltzers we put in with the dried spaghetti, it wouldn't move. It worked in practice! Ah, well, that's science - sometimes things don't work the way we expect them to.
Aaaargh! Spider! by Lydia Monks. We looked at different types of spider webs and made some with glue and glitter. There. Is. Glitter. Everywhere.
A drying table (or two) is highly recommended!
Creepy Carrots by Aaron Reynolds. Mega Blocks to build something to keep the carrots contained!
The carrots.
Before mermaids do construction, they sing a song or two.
For Boo-la-la Witch Spa by Samantha Berger we gave our brooms a makeover - and worked on patterns.
Bats at the Ballgame by Brian Lies. Using wind power to make our bats fly.
Anancy and the Haunted House by Richardo Keens-Douglas: spider races! All you need is some plastic spiders and straws.
How Big Could Your Pumpkin Grow? by Wendell Minor. Two pumpkins with scales, rulers, protractor, and some nontraditional ways to measure such as string and paperclips.
We had a photo op station set up on the stage:
With the treat bags and extra craft supplies hidden under black tablecloths. One of the best investments I ever made.
And of course, plenty of volunteers! I put out a call to the teens who volunteered all summer, and ten of them showed up! Pizza 9 donated three large pizzas and we had a snack and drink station set up in my closet for them. I put them in pairs so they could trade off when they wanted to run and get something. They helped kids with projects and kept utter chaos from reigning while I was pretty much stuck in the meeting room with the messiest/loudest activities. They stayed after and helped clean up. Some of them were there for 4-5 hours! Many were in costumes...and I didn't get good pictures of any of them :(
We all had a great time. I hope this can help anyone else working on activities for their library or school! If you would like the files I have for these projects, message me with an e-mail and I will send them along.
