We've recently got into reading Dr Seuss books and with World Book Day today I thought now is a great time to write about our Cat In The Hat Story Sack. A story sack contains activities to help you read and engage with a story and I'm really pleased with the way our Cat In The Hat story sack has turned out.
Plus, if you've got your own book related craft, game or activity why not link up below in the World Book Day Blog Hop
I made the story sack itself by tracing the book cover onto a pillowcase with a fabric pen and adding a bit of red with fabric paint. The story sack includes the book (of course!), peg dolls including a red box for Thing One and Thing Two, a block and puzzle game, printables and dry erase pens.
The peg dolls I've posted about already and you can read all about how I made these here. As we read the story I bring out the appropriate peg doll and give them to the boys who like to act out the story with them. They also like to retell the story using them afterwards.
Next up, is our fun Cat In The Hat related game. The idea behind the blocks is that in The Cat In The Hat book the Cat tries to balance many things without dropping them so to recreate this balancing game I scanned some pages from the book and cut out some of the items he tries to balance. I then painted some cheap wooden blocks white and glued (or modge podged) them onto the blocks.
These can then be stacked up to create your own balancing game.
I also printed out a close up picture of The Cat to create a puzzle. I divided it into 12 pieces and pasted these onto another side of the same blocks.
Here's the finished block puzzle.
And, here's the older two boys testing out their block balancing skills.
Finally, I also found lots of great printables from the Dr Seuss website Seusville and from Living Life Intentionally's free Dr Seuss printables pack. I printed out colouring sheets, mazes and some simple writing sheets, laminated them and added them to the story sack with some dry erase pens. The boys loved these and they encouraged them to talk about the story even more.
I thoroughly enjoyed the crafting involved in putting this story sack together, plus its been great for us all to engage even more with this book and for the fun to continue even after we've finished the actual reading.
How have you been engaging with books recently? In honour of World Book Day I'm co-hosting the World Book Day Blog Hop please share any book related posts that you might have. The Blog Hop opens 7th March, but runs till the end of April so there's lots of opportunity to link up.
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Those peg people cracck me up!! I am linking up our latest playschool post!
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing at Eco Kid Tuesday! Please join us again this week!http://likemamalikedaughter.blogspot.com/2013/03/nifty-thrifting-at-eco-kids-tuesday.html
Such a wonderful sack. I've pinned.
ReplyDeleteI love all of these games- you put so much effort into them.
We recently made blocks too- using Little Golden Books.
I hope you consider linking this up to The Children's Bookshelf on MOnday
I just LOVE this! It would make a fabulous gift as well. Thanks for sharing at For the Kids Friday at Sun Scholars! I am featuring YOU this week! Yippee!!
ReplyDeleteWhat a great idea! I love the book sack. Thank you for sharing at Sharing Saturday!
ReplyDeleteThis is excellent. I have started making story sacks myself and plan to post about them. I love your ideas.
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