House of Burke: Quick As a Cricket Action Game

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It's Book Club Play Date time again! Our book this month is one of my childhood favorites: Quick As a Cricket by Audrey Wood. Ironic that this is one of my favorite books since anyone that knows me knows that crickets are one of my least favorite living creatures, BUT this book full of comparisons and positive self messages can't be beat!

Now that the weather is FINALLY gorgeous out, it's been great to get out and run wild! We have been loving bringing our books outside to read in the sunshine. Holding your monthly Book Club Play Dates outside minimizes the mess in the house and encourages little ones to connect nature with literacy!

Quick As a Cricket was the perfect jumping off point for a fun action game! This book introduces a lot of different actions and emotions which are perfect to explore further with a toddler. We lay the book out on the ground and went through each page acting out the emotion or action. It was fun seeing how Kingston interpreted each one!

Check out that awesome sad face below!

Acting out the phrases in the story incorporated gross motor skills, and allowed K to get some of his energy out! He was running, jumping, squatting, crawling, and up and down off of the ground throughout.

He was even able to incorporate his little brother in the activity! When we got the pages "gentle as lamb" and "nice as bunny", Bentley received lots of hugs and kisses from his big bro. It was so sweet to watch, and I was happy to see that he equates being nice and gentle with the baby! (Now if only he would remember these phrases ALL THE TIME!)

He is a fantastic little actor, and gives a pretty mean stinkeye! His interpretation of cold and hot was pretty awesome too. He was full on shivering for "cold as a toad" and wiping his imaginary sweaty brow for "hot as a fox".

Of course he had no problem acting out STRONG as an ox and LOUD as a lion! Quick as a Cricket would make quite the comedy show.

This activity required NO set up at all, and was so simple to do. It also held Kingston's attention really well since HE was in charge of acting out and interpreting the actions and emotions on his own. With a larger group, you could all sit in a circle, have one adult read the story, and each child take a turn in the center of the circle acting it out!