Beyond the Book: "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?"

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle is a book beloved by many. When it comes to those books your little one wants to read again and again (and again and again), I take an "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" mentality and spice things up with extension activities. We've revisited this book a lot over the last couple of years, beginning last summer during an animals theme in our Mommy & Me Camp. At one, wasn't quite at the point of sitting down for a story in the traditional sense. This book, however, has a great rhythm and simple text that even the youngest emergent readers can appreciate. To add a hands-on element, I collected black and white clip art prints of each animal in the story. My son was able to fingerpaint or paint inside a ziplock bag (for less mess and a different sensory experience) many of the animals and I colored in a few myself. I laminated the set and used it as we read and retold the story and he loved picking them up and playing with them.

This summer at age two, he can recognize the names and animal sounds as well as the colors of the animals. I added a circle of Velcro (the scratchy side) to the back of each animal in our set from last summer and we used it with our felt board for more story telling fun. My son had a great time selecting the animal as we read about it from the collection and putting it up on the felt board.

He had a great time retelling the story and recreating the scene even after the book was done!

 A little note about felt boards: we love them here, but store bought options can be a pricey investment. We have found some great boards and sets secondhand at a local thrift store. I've also made my own felt wall using a large sheet of felt tacked to a child-height space on our upstairs hallway. I use these smaller sturdy boards against an easel like this for vertical use and on the table/floor for horizontal use. You can easily make your own using sturdy cardboard to the size of your choice, felt and a stapler. I've also often used just a rectangle of felt itself--great for portable play and storytelling.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear is a great introduction to colors, animal names and my son has also added many animal sounds!

Our local library has been a great resource for extension ideas and activities. We recently checked out a set of books and materials to go with Brown Bear, Brown Bear, including a couple other books in the series, activity ideas and this block puzzle. Older kids could put each cube together appropriately to reveal a picture of each animal and my two year old had a great time stacking them and arranging them back in the rectangular tray. We also make use of our library to check out extra copies of a favorite book, what I call "yours and mine" copies--I like for my son to be able to have a board book copy to hold and look at as I read a larger paperback or hardback version. Audio versions are another great option, especially for traveling!

A few more ideas:

• Go on a color scavenger hunt to observe and collect items in each color from the book
• Make a book either with illustrations or photos in the style of Brown Bear, Brown Bear of members of your family or classroom
• Children/family members can act out the story each using a puppet, prop or costume of the animal 
• Laminated pictures are a great story add-on. They can be used as is, for felt boards as portrayed above, or as stick puppets. Made smaller, they can also be added to a sensory bin or used creatively for fine motor practice, as portrayed here:

Happy playing and reading alike!