How to Not Get Lost in Storytime

For one thing, make sure you can find the library

This is part two of an answer to Elizabeth, who asked,

Do you have a format that you follow for laying out your storytime to have everything at hand? I’ve been struggling with this aspect–I want to have everything right there, spelled out so I don’t ramble yet I don’t want it to appear that I’m constantly checking my notes and reading. Sometimes rhymes come easily to me, other times no matter what I cannot keep them in my head and struggle to find where I am. Do you have any suggestions? Thank you!

In part one I rambled about the different notes and agendas I’ve used during storytime. In this post I wanted to talk a little about how you can also use your content, structure, and pacing of storytime to help you stay on track, look focused, and rely less on notes.

Don’t use as much material you have to memorize

The less you have to memorize, the less you’ll naturally need or want to rely on your notes for prompts. Here’s a few quick ideas for making adjustments: Switch out songs with multiple unique verses for ones with recursive verses (less Baby Beluga and more Spider on the Floor), or introduce a “song of the month” and sing it every week. Use at least one song you know backwards and forwards in every storytime, even if it’s not repeated from week to week. Take out one “Five Little Somethings” rhyme every week and instead use the flannelboard as a discussion prompt or for an open-ended game.

Have the same opening and closing routines

Many of us do this already since it’s so great to signal to the kids when storytime starts and stops with familiar cues. However, don’t be afraid to double down on the familiarity and use super old favorites for these parts of your storytime: Happy and You Know It, The More We Get Together, even Twinkle Twinkle Little Star–anything that you and your group know well. Either kids are working to focus their attention at the beginning of storytime, or they have just about used up all their staying-put mojo at the end, and in both situations pulling out the tried and true can be a great strategy that helps them AND you.

Recycle transitions

I like to say a little something more than “OK what’s next” when I move from activity to activity in storytime, but that doesn’t mean every transition is an artisanal crafted gem. For instance, in the middle of every baby storytime, we sing, “A Hunting We Will Go” and I put matching clip art on the board for each verse. As I take down the clipart after we sing, 95% of the time I say, “We’ll play with those pictures after storytime, but right now it’s time for another book!” Look for well-traveled paths in your storytime where you tend to move from one type of activity to another (opening song to first book, second book to de-wiggle-ing stretch, etc) and build yourself a serviceable little Honda of a sentence that you can use every storytime and that will take you from point A to point B with no fuss.

Physically arrange your materials

Another trick is to use a basket or box or table to line up or stack your books, felt set envelopes, song sheets, whatever you use in the actual order you are going to use them. Then you’re in a habit of reaching to the same place each time you’re ready for the next activity. You could even put a sticky note on the book cover or prop envelope, with a written prompt for what to say next to the group, and glance at it as you pick up each item.

(I just read the book The Organized Mind by Daniel J Levitin, and in it he talks a lot about improving your chances of remembering things by “offloading” as much of the task as possible outside your brain. [Read the book! He is a MUCH more elegant explainer than I am.] I realized that a lot of the things that have been successful for me take advantage of this strategy: I use piles, use notes, use structure, use cues, and then my brain has less to keep track of, and I stumble a lot less, and have more neurons available for the rest of the material.)

Take a breath and look at your notes

Notes are great to have on hand, but not if we don’t give ourselves a second to look at them! I look at them twice: Once before storytime, and then during storytime. Before storytime I will take a minute to look at my plan, and will sing a line or two of each song to get the tunes into my head, or rehearse a rhyme out loud. I’ll think of transitions to say in between, then set the paper or cards or whatever in position ready to go.

Then during storytime, I make sure to look at those notes again! Slipping in a very short pause in between activities will allow you to take a breath and glance at your notes. Let yourself really focus on what they say–one trick is to intentionally sound them out in your head rather than just run your eyes over them. Most of the time this pause is going to feel a lot longer to you than it does to your audience! But it gets you in the habit of coming back to your notes in between each activity, rather than running through a few things on your agenda without looking at the notes and then all of a sudden not being sure where you are in the list.

An extra pause can give you the time to run the first line of a rhyme through your head, or to sing the first line of a song to yourself to set the tune. I sing more a cappella than with CDs/MP3s in my storytimes (personal preference) and one thing I will do is start slapping my thighs to the tempo I want to set, and do a couple bars of slaps before I start singing. This gives the group something to do (start slapping or clapping too) and focuses the children’s attention while giving me time to think or hum the start of the tune to myself. Then I take a breath and start singing feeling more confident and less rushed.

What’s your advice? What do you do to keep track of things in storytime and not forget bits and pieces as you go?