5 ouistitis...

I love the action rhyme 5 naughty monkeys and thought it would be a great one for our toddlers, but there didn't seem to be a French version out there and try as I might I was really struggling to fit the words to the tune myself.  I was on the verge of abandonment to be honest with you when I stumbled across "10 ouistitis" on Pinterest.  I quickly shortened it to 5 ouistitis as otherwise we would hardly have fitted any other songs in last week and set about thinking up a craft to go with it.

You can find the original 10 ouistitis song here:
http://www.charivarialecole.fr/comptine-des-10-ouistitis-a29491308

The lyrics to our first verse then were:

5 ouistitis qui sautent sur le lit,
l'un tombe et s'évanouit
Maman téléphone au docteur qui dit:
"Stop! Ça suffit de sauter sur le lit!"

A "ouistiti" is a marmoset and by using this word rather than "singe" (monkey) the tune works better - an inspired idea, and one which I wish I had thought of!

I took the inspiration for our craft this week from one we did way back in the early part of 2012 before I had started to blog about the group.  We sang the song "5 dans le lit" and made little lollipop stick people in an envelope bed.  Using this as a starting point I decided that we would make some monkeys that could both jump on the bed and fall off it.

To make your own you will need:
stiff card for the bed
felt/fabric to make the covers
foam/card to make the monkeys
lollipop sticks
scissors
glue

First draw a bed on the stiff card and cut out.  Cut out some of your fabric or felt to make covers and glue this onto the bed.  Set aside to dry.

Draw 5 monkeys on the foam or card - you can draw them freehand or find a free clipart picture to use as a template.  Cut them out and glue one onto each lollipop stick.

Make 5 slits in the bed big enough for the lollipop sticks to slide into.

Put the lollipop stick monkeys into the slits in the bed.  By moving the lollipop sticks up and down you can make the monkeys jump and if they jump too high, they will come out and fall off the bed :o)

Here are our fantastic jumping monkeys to give you some inspiration:

Happy singing and crafting! :o)

Enroulez le fil...

Little Imp is crazy about the song "Wind the bobbin" and has been for a little while, so I was thrilled when I happened across a French version of the song and quickly put my mind to coming up with a bobbin related craft.  After a few weeks of cotton reel collecting, we were ready to go ahead and introduce the song to the toddler group the other Friday.

In case any of you are unfamiliar with the song in English, here are the lyrics:

Wind the bobbin up,
Wind the bobbin up,
pull, pull,
clap, clap, clap.

Wind it back again,
Wind it back again,
pull, pull,
clap, clap, clap.

Point to the ceiling,
Point to the floor,
Point to the window,
Point to the door.
Put your hands together,
one, two, three,
Put your hands upon your knees.

The French version is not a direct translation but rather a similar themed song.  The lyrics, and translation, are as follows:

Enroulez le fil                             (Wind the bobbin)
Deroulez le fil                             (Unwind the bobbin)
Et tire, et tire                               (and pull, and pull)
Et tape, tape, tape.                     (and clap, clap, clap)

La la la la la la la la,
La la la la la la la.
La la la la la la la la,
La la la la la la la.

Enroulez le fil                             (Wind the bobbin)
Deroulez le fil                             (Unwind the bobbin)
Et tire, et tire                               (and pull, and pull)
Et tape, tape, tape.                     (and clap, clap, clap)

The children enjoyed winding the bobbin up and back and especially getting faster and faster through the "la la la" section.

Our accompanying craft was cotton reel printing, although I did get out the other stamps as well for a bit of variety.

The children had access to cotton reels and stamps and a lot of paint and came up with their own original and colourful print paintings - some also rolled the cotton reels through the paint and over the paper for a change.

Here are their fantastic paintings:

Happy singing and crafting! :o)

J'ai un gros nez rouge...

We have missed 2 Toddler Fridays as we were on holiday in France, I will post about Little Imp's adventures in a couple of posts as soon as I get chance as obviously the holiday provided plenty of opportunities to introduce some new vocabulary and phrases.  As well, of course, as giving her the chance to speak French to real French people instead of just me!!  Although, being 2 got in the way a bit here - although Little Imp has soooo much more French this year than last year, she was quite reluctant to speak French with anyone other than me acting all shy around strangers.  Last year she was far less inhibited by this and would merrily greet everyone we came across, ask for food in restaurants etc.  Hopefully by next summer her confidence will have increased again and she can really have a French filled holiday!! :o)

J'ai un gros nez rouge is one of Little Imp's favourite French songs at the moment and so I decided to introduce it to our toddler group last Friday.  It has a lovely catchy tune and is easy to put actions to - and who doesn't like pretending to be a clown?!

If you are unfamiliar with the song, there are lots of animated versions on youtube which are fun to sing and dance along to.

The lyrics  and our actions are as follows:

J'ai un gros nez rouge  (Point to your nose)
Des traits sur les yeux (Pretend to draw lines above you eyes)
Un chapeau qui bouge (Mime moving a hat on your head)
Un air malicieux (Wink)

Deux grandes savates (mime having two big clown shoes to walk in)
Un grand pantalon (mime having big baggy trousers on)
Et quand je me gratte (scratch a pretend itch)
Je saute au plafond! (jump up in the air)

My literal translation for those that would like it:

I have a big red nose
some lines above my eyes
a hat which moves
an air of naughtiness

2 big slippers
baggy trousers
and when I scratch myself
I jump up to the ceiling!

Obviously a song about a clown needed a clown craft and so this week we made clown faces.  To make your own you will need:
a paper plate,
a pompom,
coloured card/foam for the hat,
felt pens,
glitter,
a glue stick,
coloured wool for the hair,
any other collage materials you like

We started by getting the mouth, nose and eyes on to our paper plates.

Next, we added the hair.

We then made and glued on our clown's hats and finally added the finishing touches with the glitter and any embellishments we wanted.

Here are our fabulous clowns to give you some inspiration:

Happy singing and crafting! :0)

coccinelle, demoiselle...

Last Friday's session introduced the comptine "Coccinelle demoiselle" a French nursery rhyme about ladybirds. 

As is often the case with nursery rhymes there are several versions, generally it is just a case of the colours being in a different order.  Anyway, for the version that  we sang the lyrics were as follows:

Coccinelle, demoiselle,

Bête à Bon Dieu,

Coccinelle, demoiselle,

Vole jusqu'aux cieux.

Petit point blanc

Elle attend.

Petit point rouge

Elle bouge.

Petit point noir

Coccinelle au revoir!

To accompany the song, our craft this week involved making our own ladybird hats. 

To make one of your own you will need,
a long strip of card (well long enough to wrap around your little ones head)
red collage materials - we had a variety including felt, paper, tissue paper, crepe paper, foam, ribbon, shiny paper, etc
black paper,
spot stickers,
a pipe cleaner,
a pencil,
a stapler

First make 2 holes in the top centre of the strip of card and thread the pipe cleaner through.  Wrap each end of the pipe cleaner around the pencil to make the twisty antennae shape.

Use the red collage materials you have to cover the cardboard.

Cut a semi circle out of the black paper and glue onto the cardboard below the antennae for the ladybird's face.  Add a face using googly/sticker eyes, felt pens/glitter glue etc.

Give your ladybird some spots using the spot stickers.

Wrap your cardboard around to make a hat shape and staple at the right size for you little one's head.

Here are ours to give you some ideas:

Happy singing and crafting! :O)

Les petits poissons...

As we haven't had the paints out for a while, I decided on a song that I had a great painty craft activity in mind for.

The new song is called "les petits poissons" the little fish and there are a few different versions out there. The one I settled on has 3 verses the first about little fish, the second about little birds and the third about little children. I chose this version as I felt it gave us the most options to dance around and do some actions during our sing song :0)

The lyrics are as follows:

Les petits poissons dans l'eau

Nagent, nagent, nagent, nagent, nagent.

Les petits poissons dans l'eau

Nagent, nagent bien que les gros!

Les petits oiseaux là-haut

Volent, volent, volent, volent, volent.

Les petits oiseaux là-haut

Volent, volent bien que les gros!

Les petits enfants charmants,

Dansent, dansent, dansent, dansent, dansent.

Les petits enfants charmants,

Dansent, dansent bien que les gros!

So, as I said, the craft to accompany this song was a nice messy painty craft of the little fish in the sea. Before all the children arrived I had covered the table with bubble wrap and put out blue, green, white and sparkly blue paints with an assortment of brushes, rollers and sponges.  The children all looked very impressed when I told them they had to cover all the bubble wrap with the paint any way they wished to make a nice sea colour :0)

Once the bubble wrap was well and truly covered in paint, I gave each child an a3 sheet of white paper to print the sea background onto. In my mind this was going to give us a beautiful bubbly sea effect and I was not disappointed, the prints looked great! :0)

Whilst the backgrounds were drying. Little, the children got washed up and I got rid of the painty bubble wrap. The table was then ready for part 2 of the craft, making little fish out of craft foam to then glue onto the prints.  We then had fantastic pictures of little fish swimming in the water - just like the song - and here they are:

Happy singing and crafting! :0)