Books
Nobody Likes a Goblin – This is a very entertaining role reversal book. We often hear the story of the brave adventures that fight off Trolls and Goblins, discover hidden dungeons, rescue maidens, and bring back riches. But what if the adventures are the bad guys? What if they are the ones kidnapping? Stealing? Well… now it up to the Goblin to go save the day!
My six year old would also say that this is a good friendship book. It helps kids to see that we shouldn’t judge people by what they look like. Also teaches empathy on how it feels when people are mean to someone without getting to know them.
Julia’s House for Lost Creatures, Julia’s House Moves On, and Julia’s House Goes Home –
Each of these books are packed with surprises around every corner and creatures galore, Ben Hatke tells entertaining and educational stories in this picture book trilogy. These make the perfect Halloween books (without being too spooky) because they are full of magical creatures: Trolls, ghost, goblins, kraken, mermaids, the list can go on and on. These books also teach great life lessons for kids. They teach helping out, persevering, reworking problems until you get it right, and accepting others. Looking forward to reading Julia’s House Goes Home when it Finally comes out end of October 2021.
Little Robot – Okay, this may not be very halloweeny but it is a great book by Ben Hatke. This is actually a graphic novel which makes it perfect for young readers. There are lots of robot sounds that young readers can sound out and very few traditional words. Young readers can look at the pictures and follow this fun story on their own. My kids love robots right now so this book frequents our house form the library many times.
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Craft
Materials
Colors – crayons, markers, or Colored Pencils
Scissors
Tape or Glue
Directions
- Download your Free Dancing Goblin Printable. Color the goblin.
2. Cut out pieces for Goblin. Make sure to cut out rectangle for body and leave white tabs on body parts.
2. Fold the rectangle on the dotted lines. Glue or tape the body.
3. Use glue or tape to add arms, legs, and head. Then wiggle the body to make your Goblin Dance.
Activity
Materials:
Couple boxes of Green Jello – I used 3
Large bowl or container
Creatures for activity – Plastic snakes, plastic spiders and insects, eye balls, witches finders, etc.
Paper plates for sorting
Directions:
- Pick what type of creatures you will like to use. We did snakes, Insects, and Arachnids So we could practice sorting and graphing. But you could use any creatures and you could put halloween items in to like eye balls, witches fingers, or other things.
2. I made three boxes of Jello but this will depend on your container size. You may want it to cool a little or you can add some ice in before adding creatures. Once you have all the creatures in place and fridge until set.
Once set you can use tweezers and sort the creatures. Free Creature Graph Download to make a bar graph.
Creatures for Dinner
My kids love special dinners! After reading Ben Hatke why not have a dinner full of creatures.
Ghost Meatballs – Check out Chef John’s recipe for Meatloaf Ghosts
Skeleton bones – Casarecce Noodles are the perfect noodle to look like bones. Prepare with a little marinara sauce.
Veggie Muffin Spider – I like to buy those Garden Lite Veggie Muffins sometimes for our veggies. Adding 8 pretzel and some candy eyes makes the perfect spider.
Peach cup pumpkin or cutie pumpkin – This is an easy one, use a permeant marker color a jack o lantern on a peach cup or clementine.
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