In the tall, tall grass.

Hi everyone! Welcome back to another edition of Tips for Tots!

In today’s post, we have another nature-inspired book that is perfect to read with your child during springtime! It’s called In the Tall, Tall Grass, written and illustrated by Denise Fleming.

In the Tall, Tall Grass takes us on a tour of the outdoors through the perspective of a little boy who is exploring nature. He encounters animals and insects amongst the plants, and each page is full of beautiful and colorful illustrations of what he sees.

Each page describes what the creatures are doing or the sounds they make, like:

"Crunch, munch, caterpillars lunch..."

"Stum, drum,
bees hum..."

"Stop, go,
fireflies glow."

"Slip, slide,
snakes glide."

The sound-based vocabulary words, bold illustrations, and catchy rhymes make this a perfect book for early readers who are learning to explore the world around them.
The book allows you to do activities with your child based on the critters that the narrator encounters.
Let's go over some fun ways to get your child engaged with In the Tall, Tall Grass!

Act out what the creatures are doing.

As you encounter action-words and sound effects for each creature in the book, have your child act out what the creature is doing, and imitate the sounds. This book provides an opportunity on every page for your child to use their imagination and emulate what they see!

Do Your own scavenger hunt.

After reading this book, you can take your child on an outdoor scavenger hunt to see if they can find any of the creatures from the book in real life. Make a list of the insects and animals that were shown in the book, and see how many of them your child can find in your yard, at the park, or any other natural location of your choosing! This is a great way to make Text-to-World connections, and to allow your child to learn about the world around them.

Hand-tracing art.

For this activity, your child can create their own tall, tall grass with tracings of their hands!
Simply trace your child’s hands on green construction paper, cut them out, and glue them onto a piece of blue construction paper to look like grass against the sky! Your child can then add doodles or stickers to incorporate critters throughout the grass.

Clothes Pin Craft

With this craft, your child can create their own little bee – and this one doesn’t sting!

Materials needed:

Directions:

• Wooden clothespins.
• Yellow paint.
• Yellow tissue paper.
• A black marker.
• Pipe cleaners.
• Black pompoms.
• Glue.

• Paint the clothespin yellow, and then use your marker to draw black stripes once it’s dried.
  
• Gather the tissue paper in the middle, and secure it with the clothespin.
  
• Bend your pipe cleaner into a V shape, and glue two small black pompoms to the ends to create antennae.
  
• Glue this to the top of the clothespin.
  

Your end result should look something like this!

Pom-Pom Caterpillar craft.

This simple and easy craft will make an adorable, colorful caterpillar just like the ones on the first page of the book!

Materials needed:

Directions:

• Multi-colored pompoms.
  
• Green construction paper.
• Marker, paint, or glitter glue.
• Googly eyes.
• Pipe cleaners.
• Glue.
  

• Cut the green construction paper into the shape of a large leaf.
• Make lines on the construction paper so it resembles a leaf – you can use a marker, paint, or even glitter glue if you want to add a bit of sparkle!
• Glue the pompoms in a straight line on top of the construction paper
• Glue on the googly eyes to the pompom at the front
• Cut you pipe cleaner into 2 small pieces, and bend them at the top to look like antennae. Glue these to the front pompom as well.

Paper Chain snake craft

The last craft inspired by one of the creatures in today’s book is a paper chain snake!

Materials Needed:

• Green construction paper (2 sheets).
  
• Yellow construction paper.
• Red construction paper.
• A stapler.
• Googly eyes.
• Glue.

Here is an example of a finished product!

Directions:

• Fold a sheet of your green construction paper and yellow construction paper into eighths. Then cut on the lines so you have 8 strips of paper for both colors.
  
• Fold a green strip of paper so the ends meet and form a circle. Staple the ends together.
• Loop a yellow strip through the green hoop, and staple the ends. Repeat until you’ve used all the strips of paper.
• Cut a large triangle and a small triangle out of your other sheet of green construction paper to make the snake’s head and tail.
• Glue the large triangle to the end of the paper chain, and glue on the googly eyes to make the snake’s head.
• Glue the small triangle to the other end of the paper chain to resemble a tail.
• Cut out a small, thin strip of red construction paper for the snake’s tongue, and glue it to the larger triangle.
  

That’s all for today’s edition of Tips for Tots! We hope you enjoy reading In the Tall, Tall Grass with your child, and doing some fun nature-inspired activities that are perfect for springtime! See you next time!