Signing Savvy for Libraries

This article is part of our “Signing Children’s Books” series, which highlights children’s books and pairs them with pre-built Signing Savvy word lists to help you get started with learning and signing the vocabulary in the book. Reading and literacy is so important. By sharing these pre-built word lists, we hope to cut down on prep time for families that are just beginning to learn ASL and hope you can find more comfort in sharing literacy with our young deaf children.

In the book Piggies, Audrey and Don Wood created a beautiful take on classic finger play. The illustrations show cute little pigs dancing and playing on the tips of hands. Hands covered in mittens, bubbles, and even mud! The pictures are so creative, your little ones will want to look at the photos for hours!

The creators of the book have been nice enough to provide you access to illustrations for the kids to color and do activities of their own. Get free printables from the authors. Through Pinterest, you can also find many different fun and exciting Piggies learning activities to do with the children to extend their use of language and creativity.

I hope through the Piggies pre-built word list you will feel confident to share this story with your children.

Word List for Piggies

Signing Savvy is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking signingsavvy.com to Amazon properties. That means Signing Savvy may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking on an affiliate link, your cost will be exactly the same regardless, but Signing Savvy will automatically receive a small commission. Your support is greatly appreciated and helps us continue to improve Signing Savvy!

This article is part of our “Signing Children’s Books” series, which highlights children’s books and pairs them with pre-built Signing Savvy word lists to help you get started with learning and signing the vocabulary in the book. Reading and literacy is so important. By sharing these pre-built word lists, we hope to cut down on prep time for families that are just beginning to learn ASL and hope you can find more comfort in sharing literacy with our young deaf children.

Goodnight Moon is one of the first books every new parent reads to their little ones. It's simple and a classic. It has a copyright of 1947, yet it still remains on the best seller list today! Children love it!

I've found multiple activities over the years to do with this book. The activities work on vocabulary, counting skills and just explore the literature deeper. Here are several ideas for activities to do related to Goodnight Moon on Pinterest to help you get started.

My hope is that through the Goodnight Moon pre-built word list you will feel confident to share this story with your children.

Word List for Goodnight Moon

Signing Savvy is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking signingsavvy.com to Amazon properties. That means Signing Savvy may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking on an affiliate link, your cost will be exactly the same regardless, but Signing Savvy will automatically receive a small commission. Your support is greatly appreciated and helps us continue to improve Signing Savvy!

This article is part of our “Cooking Up Language With Signs” series, which features a recipe and accompanying sign language word list to get you started on an interactive cooking activity that is great for spicing up language learning at home or in the classroom.

What’s cookin’?

Today I’m cooking up Banana Monkey Bread. I chose this recipe as I was working on the article and word list for Signing Children’s Books: Five Little Monkeys Jumping On The Bed. This is a great recipe to pair with the book Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed. I LOVE Monkey Bread, but you can also find plenty of different activities to do online that can easily be connected to the Five Little Monkeys book series.

Start by spraying a bundt cake pan with cooking spray and then arrange the sliced bananas in the bottom of the pan. The bananas you just put in the bottom of the pan, will become the top of the monkey bread when you flip it after baking! This always confuses and amuses the kids!

The recipe I use calls for 2 cans of Pillsbury Grands biscuits, however, I ended up using one can of Pillsbury Grands Flaky Layers biscuits and then one can of Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls. Using the can of cinnamon rolls gave me frosting to drizzle over the bread ring after it finished baking.

Open the biscuits and cinnamon rolls and pull them apart into separate biscuits / rolls. Cut them into quarters (or 4 pieces each). This can also be a little math lesson. You can work together to figure out how one biscuit / roll can be divided into 1/4, 2/4 (1/2), 3/4, and 4/4 (whole).

Now you'll coat your biscuits / rolls in cinnamon sugar. Make the cinnamon sugar in a large bowl by stirring together 1 cup of granulated sugar and 2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon. Roll each biscuit / roll piece in the sugar mixture. Then arrange the cinnamon sugar coated dough evenly over the bananas in your pan. Top with the remaining 1 1/2 bananas sliced.

In a medium, microwavable bowl, microwave 1 cup of butter on high until melted. Add 1/2 cup of the leftover cinnamon sugar mixture and 1/2 cup light brown sugar and beat with a whisk until combined. Pour mixture evenly over the biscuit pieces in the pan.

Bake 30 minutes or until golden brown and thoroughly cooked. Let stand at least 5 minutes.

Place large plate on top of the pan and flip over and let the bread slide out of the pan. Put frosting from the can of cinnamon rolls on top of the monkey bread. ENJOY!!

Recipe

Enjoy making this tasty Banana Monkey Bread. Use the pre-built word list created to go along with the recipe to help you as you make this recipe.

Banana Monkey Bread

Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 55 minutes
Serves: 6

Ingredients:

• 3 ripe bananas, sliced
• 1 can (16.3 oz) Pillsbury Grands! Flaky Layers Biscuits
• 1 can (16.3 oz) Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 cup butter (melted)
• 1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
• cooking spray

Tools:

• bowl for mixing
• microwavable bowl
• plate
• spoon or spatula or whisk for mixing
• bundt cake pan
• oven
• microwave
• knife

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Spray bundt cake pan with cooking spray.
3. Slice bananas and arrange half of them (1 1/2 bananas) in the bottom of the pan.
4. Open the cans of biscuits and cinnamon rolls and pull them apart into separate biscuits / rolls. Cut them into quarters (or 4 pieces each).
5. In a large bowl, stir together 1 cup granulated sugar and 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon. Roll biscuit and cinnamon rolls pieces in the sugar mixture; arrange evenly over bananas in the pan.
6. Top with the remaining sliced bananas (1 1/2 bananas).
7. In a medium, microwavable bowl, microwave 1 cup butter on high until melted. Add 1/2 cup of the leftover cinnamon sugar mixture and 1/2 cup light brown sugar; beat with a whisk until combined. Pour mixture evenly over the dough pieces.
8. Bake 30 minutes or until golden brown and thoroughly cooked.
9. Let stand at least 5 minutes.
10. Place large plate on top of the pan and flip over and let the bread slide out of the pan.
11. Put frosting from the can of cinnamon rolls on top of the monkey bread.

Word List for Banana Monkey Bread

Signing Savvy is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking signingsavvy.com to Amazon properties. That means Signing Savvy may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking on an affiliate link, your cost will be exactly the same regardless, but Signing Savvy will automatically receive a small commission. Your support is greatly appreciated and helps us continue to improve Signing Savvy!