We love songs. During the month of October we love to include some common Halloween songs and rhymes in our daily activities. We also read a lot of books that we can sing, dance, and chant along to. Below are some of our favorites.

GET A FULL WEEK OF HALLOWEEN THEME ACTIVITIES IN OUR PRINTABLE PRESCHOOL LESSON PLANS.

More Resources for Little Book Lovers

The best way to encourage a love of reading is to provide kids with many opportunities to engage with a wide variety of books that are of interest to them. That’s why we share so many books lists on Fantastic Fun and Learning. We want to make it easy for you to find great books your kids will love. Over the years we’ve also discovered some helpful tools for connecting kids and books.

Digital libraries are one very handy way to do this. Epic! is one of our favorite online libraries. It’s full of over 25,000 books, learning videos, quizzes and more for kids 12 and under…and it’s free for educators. Click here to learn more and sign up.

Book Boxes are another fun way to get kids excited about reading. What kid doesn’t love to get a special delivery in the mail?! The crew over at Bookroo finds the best little known books that you won’t already have in your library, and they send them to you each month. Take a peak inside a Bookroo Box here.

Book-Based Activities are also a lot of fun for kids. Jodie over at Growing Book by Book has saved us all a ton of time and created a full year of Book-Based Activity Calendars so that you can extend the fun with a special book each week.

Featured Halloween Books

 Shake Dem Halloween Bones has been one of Lovey’s favorites since she her first Halloween. Even at 10 months old she enjoyed the rhythm of the song and she would “shake shake shake dem bones now.” Now that she is older she recognizes many of the familiar characters from other storybooks and fairy tales.

Spider on the Floor is the book companion to the popular children’s song by Raffi. It isn’t specifically a Halloween book, but the spider theme fits well. We love acting out this book with a creepy crawly spider toy. The more dramatic the better! The song by Raffi is also available on Amazon.

The Spooky Wheels on the Bus is a Halloween version of the “The Wheels on the Bus.” Kids easily recognize the familiar tune and join in singing along as the bus travels through town picking up passengers on Halloween night.

Five Little Pumpkins is a board book version of the traditional pumpkin rhyme. Dan Yaccarino’s illustrations are bold yet simple. This is a book my youngest loves to “read” on her own now that she knows the rhyme.

The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything is another fun song that invites kids to join in and dance along. It’s a cumulative tale that is also great for building comprehension as kids are encouraged to remember the different “visitors” the Little Old Lady encounters on her walk home. In addition to reading the book, we love the song from Music with Mar.

In We’re Off to Find the Witch’s House four friends are walking to the witch’s house on Halloween night. Along the way they are a bit spooked by a host of spooky creatures, but everyone’s a little relieved with the surprise the find once they get to the witch’s house.

The 13 Nights of Halloween is a Halloween twist on “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” This is another popular tune that kid quickly identify with and can join in singing along to. For each of the 13 nights leading up to Halloween Mummy has some spooky, slimy gifts to share. The illustrations in this one do include some icky eyeballs and more “spooky” features than most of the other books on the list. As with any book, please review it before reading to your child.

In the style of “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt,” We’re Going on a Ghost Hunt tells the tale of children off to find a ghost. Like the traditional version, this chant encourages kids to stand up and join in the adventure.

Monster Mash bring the popular song to life with fun illustrations. Kids (and adults) can’t help but sing along.

There Was An Old Monster! is another one of Lovey’s favorites. It isn’t specifically a Halloween book, and it’s one that stays out on our shelves year round. In the style of “There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly”, this monster swallows ants, a bat, a jackal and more. We absolutely love the song sung by the author’s daughter, Adrian. You can hear the song on the Scholastic website.

If You’re A Monster And You Know It is another book by the Emberley’s. To the tune of “If You’re Happy and You Know It,” kids are excited to join in and pretend to be monsters. Along the way they’ll twitch their tails, stomp and growl, and more. You can listen to the song for this one on the Scholastic website, too.

Love song books? You might also enjoy these book lists related to popular Christmas songs.

                        

GET A FULL SET OF HALLOWEEN THEME ACTIVITIES

Watch this short video to see just a few examples of the types of activities and printables included in this set:

The 132-page Halloween Lesson Plan Set includes hands-on activities and these additional printables:

1) -at Word Family Bat Game (in color and b/w)

2) Candy Corn Science Experiment Recording Sheet (in color and b/w)

3) Candy Corn Uppercase, Lowercase, and Beginning Sound Picture Puzzles for Letters C, A, N, D, Y, H, O and R (in color and b/w)

4) Candy Corn Counting Cards 1-10 (in color and b/w)

5) Halloween Costume Syllable Sorting Activity (in color and b/w)

6) Haunted House Colors Board Game-3 variations to work on color recognition or color word recognition (in color and b/w)

7) “Look at the Costumes” Emergent Reader-3 variations

8) 0-35 Halloween Number Cards (in color and b/w)

9) Halloween Roll and Graph Math Game (in color and b/w)

10) Halloween Picture-Word Cards (in color and b/w)

11) Build a Jack-o-Lantern Pumpkin Mats and Shape Pieces

12) My Jack-o-Lantern Recording Sheets-2 variations, one to focus on shape recognition and one to focus on writing

13) Spider Number Mats and Ways to Show Numbers 0-10

Also available on Teachers Pay Teachers.

Hands-On Holidays eBook

Less stress, more connecting this holiday season? Yes, PLEASE!

From the arrival of fall to Halloween to Thanksgiving and Christmas, the last four months of the year can be a wonderful opportunity for making family memories and spending time together, but they can also be stressful as we try to collect ideas, recipes, and activities to try together.

Stephanie Morgan, founder of Modern Parents Messy Kids, a site that’s been voted Best Craft Blog in Parents Magazine and one of babble.com’s Top 50 Craft Mom Blogs, recently released a new eBook to help us have a little less stress and more time to connect with family this year.

Stephanie’s goal is to make it easier on all of us to enjoy the holidays with our kids. Hands-On Holidays is 100 pages full of her family’s very favorite ways to connect as a family over the holiday season. I love the convenience of having so many ideas in one place, and most of them are simple enough for even my toddler to participate in.

The book includes picture book suggestions, DIY decor, activities, and treats. Bonus sections also offer even more ideas to enjoy. Click here to view more details.

 

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