Preschool Storytime: I Broke My Trunk

The time of year has come when I have to officially decide what storytime themes will make the cut and which ones will have to remain a Pinterest dream until the next school year rolls around. Well, the year just couldn't come to an end until the brilliance that is Mo Willems made an appearance.

As soon as I found Lisa's I Broke My Trunk project at Thrive After Three, I knew I had to try it. I printed Lisa's template for Elephant on white cardstock and then filled him in with colored pencils, laminated him and used tongue depressors to make him into a puppet. For the other puppets, I just printed them on letter-size pink and blue paper. Easy peasy.

I was sure to make a "before" Piggie and an "after" Piggie, if you look closely, you can see a bandaid on the left Piggie's little snout. That was a big hit! If you want to try it, I just took a normal bandaid and cut it down to size, it was perfect and so easy.

Super-Library Assistant-Extrodanaire, Stella sat next to me and while I read the story, she "acted it out" with the puppets. The kids were rolling laughing when they saw Gerald's truck wrapped in gauze. It was so much fun!

When we reached the end of the story, I unveiled his "trunk" and they squealed with delight when I blew on the party favor. I even snuck a little science in as we talked about how the air was inflating the party favor.

I used white cardstock for the kids' Elephants, as well. They colored them, cut them out and then the adults punched a hole for the trunk. I didn't print the Piggies or the animals Gerald balances on his trunk, they wouldn't have had them time to cut all of them out. Maybe next time...

Per Lisa's advice, I purchased the blowout party favors from Oriental Trading because they are essentially noiseless, hurray! (The teachers loved me!) They worked perfect, but did take a bit of time to be shipped, so if you're planning to do this, give yourself a couple weeks.

Just in case you missed it above, here is the template.

This was so much fun, I can't wait to do Mo Willems again. Next time... Don't Let the Pigeon. Oh, the possibilities!