We’ve been enjoying some books from the Elephant & Piggie series by Mo Willems for the last several weeks. The illustrations and stories are easy to understand and full of things to talk about. They also lead to very simple activities that take little preparation. I would recommend all four of the ones we’ve been reading. They are especially good for beginning readers as the words are large, simple and repeated. I’ll list them in the order that Gage likes them best.
Can I Play Too? Ages 3-5. 57 pages
Themes- Frienship, Making friends, Thinking outside the box for solutions, Inclusion
Snake wants to play catch with Gerald and Piggie and embarrassment, sadness, and determination come into play.
I hope I’m not spoiling anything here by saying that Piggie’s solution to the no hands problem was using the snake as the ball. Jason and Gage used his blue snake to play catch. There wasn’t a lot of catching , but he tried and he had fun throwing.
Should I Share My Ice Cream? Ages 4-6. 64 pages
Themes- Friendship, Sharing, Doing the right thing.
Gerald buys an ice cream cone and before he eats it he wonders if he should share it with Piggie. As he goes back and forth on whether to share, the cone melts. Piggie saves the day.
So, this activity took less than 5 minutes of preparation, just long enough to cut and tape together a “cone” for the (dirty) “ice cream”. We were able to watch the melting process in action without the mess 🙂 It took over 3 hours to totally melt.
I’m a Frog! Ages 4-8. 64 pages
Themes- Pretend play
Piggie pretends to be a frog and Gerald doesn’t understand what’s going on until Piggie explains how he too can pretend to be something else.
The picture is terrible, but you get the idea. After reading the story we all took turns pretending to be other animals and then guessing what they were. He’s mid-jump.
Pigs Make Me Sneeze! Ages 3-5. 64 pages
Themes- Friendship, Getting sick
Gerald thinks he allergic to Piggie because he can’t stop sneezing around her and is relieved to know that he is only getting sick and they can still be friends.
No pics with this one because aside from pretending to sneeze and taking turns saying bless you we didn’t really do much.
I can’t wait to check out more of the Elephant & Piggie series!
Stacy's Books 
You come up with the best activities for Gage! The books sound terrific!
These activities are necessary for Gage AND Mom. The days can be long 🙂
We like the Elephant and Piggie books too, but we haven’t yet read any of these ones. Our first experience was We Are in a Book, and we’ve also read Let’s Go for a Drive!
Just picked up We are in a Book! from the library!
Ooh, yay! Enjoy!
Those books sound so cute! I’ve never heard of “dirty” ice cream.
You wouldn’t want to eat it!
Aww. We love those books too. My favorite is Let’s go For a Drive!
I’ll have to get that one from the library!
I haven’t heard of this series, but they are just adorable! You came up with some great activities, too.
They are fun for kids and adults 🙂
Finally! Pictures of Gage. It’s about time, and he’s really growing up. Very cute.
Yes, Gage needs to be on here more. If only I wanted to blog about being a mom after doing it all day long 🙂
I admire your creativity. You should teach kids!
Hahahaha. I do have my degree in education, but it was for secondary. I never wanted to do the littles. I feel like the activities are more for me just to keep my brain from atrophy.
How fun! Great books and then combining them with fun activities that teach stuff. Awesome. Mom of the year, Stacy!
Thanks for the cheer, most days I need that 🙂
These sound like fun books. Mouse has her alphabet down and can recognize all her letters (capitalized, at least). She’s now learning to sound them out (the letters–not words. It’ll be a while yet before she begins reading, I’m sure). It’s so fun to watch them learn, isn’t it?
Gage isn’t really reading. We have started some sight words, but it’s hard for him to generalize and recognize them everywhere. It’s a start though.
I’ve only recently discovered Mo Willems and actually didn’t realize there were so many Elephant and Piggie books! (We own “We Are In a Book”). I love that you do all of these activities with Gage. What a good mama you are.
Thanks, Trish, but mother of the year award goes to you! I’d never consider taking Gage camping at this point 🙂