Punching the clock

In honor of daylight savings starting (and to remind myself of the fact that I accidentally set my clocks the wrong way one year), we talked about time this week for storytime.  Considering that we had mostly preschoolers, I kept the minute hand at 12 and just concentrated on the hour hand.  I had a toy clock with me that we could practice with.
We started off by singing a version of this song: http://www.songsforteaching.com/jimrule/ticktocktimeclock.htm
I changed it a little by singing "Tick tock, tick tock, goes the big clock. I know the time is ___ o'clock."
We started at one o'clock (using the toy clock) and sang it through about 6 with me changing the hours each time. Since they mostly had the hang of the melody and words by that point, I asked if we could speed it up. Because really, what kid doesn't love singing faster and faster until it's almost impossible to understand the words?

Book 1: The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle
Eric Carle does such a good job teaching concepts.  I have read The Very Busy Spider before to a storytime group, and it's a wonderful book on its own, with animals trying to talk to the spider at different times during the day.  Then I found this version that is a board book with a movable clock right in it.  Bonus!  So I was able to change the hands for every time an animal interacted with the spider and the kids could tell me what time it was.

Book 2: What Time Is It, Mr. Crocodile? by Judy Sierra
I used the Very Busy Spider clock for this book too, where Mr. Crocodile plans out his day (culminating in catching, cooking, and eating the monkeys) but is foiled by those same monkeys during each hour of the day. Naturally at the end he writes out a new plan for tomorrow which includes playing with and cooking for the monkeys.

Activity: Making clocks
The logical activity with all this would be having the kids make their own clock. Sometimes I buck the "logical" trend, but this time I just went with it. I knew I was going to be gone at a library conference for 3 of my weekly storytimes, so I wanted something not too complicated for my substitute.  Printed out this template from Enchanted Learning, and had them glue the clock to a page that said "I get up at ________ I eat lunch at ________ I go to bed at ________" Put the hands on using a paper fastener, and there you go. Simple clock craft.

Used this theme the week of March 15, 2010.