I feel like an old lady when I say things like “Where has the year gone?” or “I can’t believe it’s already December.” I guess throw me my knitted booties and tea, because that’s where I am at people. How is it already December?? Instead of snow, Winters in the Northwest often mean grey skies and rain. And more rain. So to celebrate, I picked a book with one of my favorite rainy day pastimes: napping! This week’s Sunday Stories selection is The Napping House by Don Wood.
If you have read Brown Bear or The Very Hungry Caterpillar a few (hundred) times too many, I highly suggest this book! Repetition is often what makes a book so alluring to a child. Just like in The Very Hungry Caterpillar when your child helps with “but he was still hungry,” you child will be able to help you “read” The Napping House. On each page a new visitor joins in on naptime, and many of the pages end with the line, “where everyone was sleeping.”
So not only will your child be engaged during this story because they can join along, but they are practicing speech and language skills as well! Aaannd, you can kiss that caterpillar goodbye (or at least take a much needed break).
Companion activities:
- Print out these visuals from Kiz Club (available in black/white and color) and have children stack them when a new character joins naptime.
- Color this color-by-number from Coloring Home.
- Act out your own version of the book with character toys or stuffed animals.
Speech and Language skills to target:
- Have your child make predictions if it’s the first time reading the story, or tell you what’s going to happen next if you’ve already read through it a few times.
- Have your child practice the phrase “where everyone was sleeping” if they are working on multi-word utterances. You can use small blocks or squares drawn on a piece of paper to tap along as they say each word.
- Practice prepositions receptively (“who is under?”, “who is on the very top?”) and expressively (“Where is grandma?”). Visuals are helpful when working on this skill.
- Practice using size concepts including comparatives (e.g., smaller) and superlatives (e.g., smallest) to describe the characters.
I hope you enjoy this book as much as I do! Maybe your child will be inspired to take a nice long nap 🙂
– Carmen
Engaged Speech Therapy 