Book to Boogie is a monthly series that pairs picture books with dance and movement activities for preschool story time. The series is curated by Kerry Aradhya of Picture Books & Pirouettes and written by a different guest writer each month. We hope that children’s librarians, as well as classroom teachers and dance educators, will find these activities useful and fun!
Book to Boogie: The Bus is for Us
by Amy Seto Forrester
This month I’d like to share one of my new favorite story time books for toddlers: The Bus is for Us by Michael Rosen and Gillian Tyler.
The rhyming text of this book celebrates modes of transportation with the bus always coming out as number one. You could ride a bike, train, or plane. You could wish for a ride on a fish, take a trip on a ship, or even ride in a sleigh. “But the best is the bus. The bus is for us.” The soft watercolor illustrations feature a multicultural cast of kids as they imagine all the wonderful ways to travel.
Short sentences and a large font make this a great choice for a toddler or preschool story time.
Pair it with an early literacy tip for parents about the importance of talking with your child. You might say something like “So many different types of transportation are shown in this book! As you go about your day, talk about the transportation you observe. Talk about the color of a bike, the sound a train makes, or how fast a car is going. Talking with your child allows him or her to learn and practice new words. Studies show that the more words a child knows, the easier it will be for him or her to learn to read when it’s time.”
There are a variety of ways to add movement to your story time when reading this book. Here are a few:
- Add movements for each mode of transportation. If the kids are sitting down, have them do the motions with just their hands and upper bodies. If you have the space, have the kids stand up to allow for full body movement. Some movements could be done in a circle. For instance, everyone could “drive” their cars in a circle one way and then everyone could turn around and ride a train the other direction.
- The endpapers at the beginning of the book feature the bus during the day with a big, shining sun. The ones at the end feature a night scene with a wistful moon. Have the kids make their arms into a circle above their heads at the beginning and ending for a sun and moon. This is a great way to bring attention to endpapers as a part of a book and would be an easy way to incorporate an early literacy tip for parents on print awareness.
- Sing “The Wheels on the Bus.” This is a fun story time song because it’s so well-known that nearly everyone can sing along. For a fun twist, use scarves, shaker eggs, or rhythm sticks while you sing it.
- Have the audience repeat “The bus is for us.” The kids at my toddler story time loved doing this. You could even add clapping or stomping to this refrain to emphasize phonological awareness.
- If you’re reading to preschool or kindergarten kids, ask them to think of other ways to travel. The more imaginative and sillier the better! Have the kids help you come up for a body movement to go along with each mode of transportation.
If you’re a themed story time kind of person, this book fits into several fun themes. For a transportation-themed story time, try reading this title along with Supertruck by Stephen Savage or Red Truck by Kersten Hamilton and Valeria Petrone. If you want to stick to buses, try My Bus by Byron Barton or How Will We Get to the Beach? by Brigitte Luciani and Eve Tharlet.
Have you read this book to kids? What kinds of movement did you incorporate? Please share in the comments!
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