Alas! I am back from a long vacation. Before I share my beautiful experiences through a dedicated post. I decided to first write a little fun activity we did just today. M loves her storybooks and I truly enjoy reading them to her. Last month we tried making some artwork inspired by the storybook illustration. I also shared some tips for drawing inspiration from storybooks. If you would like to recall my post.
See here.
Moving on, this time we tried enacting our little story through toys as props. This story is " The Land of Toys". Its about taking care of our toys. The little boy Ken is bored with his old toys. While he is sleeping all his toys decides to leave and go to the land of toys. Ken woke up and sees his toys disappear through the door. He follows them and reaches the magical world of toys. Where he rescues his toys from the gang of evil toys. This is a little brief about the storybook originally written by Keiki Yoshida.
Here is how we enacted the story.
Scene 1: Ken's Room and his toys.
That is Ken's Bed room
Ken throws his toys around the room shouting Boring Bear! Boring Robot! His mother comes into the room and says- " But those toys are new , Ken!". "They are boring! I want new toys." Says Ken.
When Ken is sleeping. The toys talk to each other saying" Why doesn't Ken want us any more? " and decided to leave.
An angry Robot throws a wooden bead at Ken. He wakes up with a start. All his toys have disappeared.
Ken follows them and find three building block. As he touches each block, his body becomes smaller. He is Shrinking.
Scene 2: He opens the door and reaches a magical place with enchanting music. A Horse welcomes him-" welcome to the Land of Toys!"
Ken Says sorry to his toys and rescues them. They all ride in the toy cart and come back home.
The original story has more detailing and characters. We both enjoyed enacting our favorite storybook with our own toys. Here I am sharing some
Tips for enacting a storybook from my experimentation.
1# Choosing a Story
For us this play idea came instantly as this story is one of our favorite read along story. You can chosse any story that your kid loves and would want to hear over and over again.
2#Give Voices to the characters
While you read the story to your kid, try giving them voices and styles. M loves the dialogs and imitates my voice tone while I am reading this story to her. These vices will tell kids more about the character.
3# Arrange a setting
Try to focus on the various scenes of the story. for example there are two basic scene setting in this story- Ken's bedroom and the magical land of toys. These setting can be developed in consultation with your child which makes it even more fun.
4# Let the kids narrate
Start by prompting how the story starts and let them take lead in how the story goes. I was surprise to hear the exact dialogs that M was reciting to be precisely how it is written in the book. They actually pay attention!
5#Moral of the story
It is always a good idea to discuss the characters and their actions in the end. After reading this story, I always tell M to take care of her toys as they might go to the Land of Toys while she is sleeping. Enacting the story gives them a better understanding of the morals behind the story.
I hope you enjoyed our little narration. I would to hear your ideas on how you make the storytime interesting. Please leave a comment below.
Now all you have to do is to wait for this to dry. Our Sun Catcher needed about 48hr to dry completely. After it is completely dried, You can make a small hole into the section between the marbles. Hang it using white cotton yarn.Your Sun catcher is ready. 
