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Boardman library hosts Candy Land event
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Boardman library assistant supervisor of children's works Karen Saunders read the book "The Gingerbread Boy" while displaying the gingerbread boy craft the children would make later during the Candy Land game event.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.A young girl prepared to jump over the candle stick and recite a nursery rhyme to complete the course during the Candy Land game event at the Boardman library.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.The children and adults listened to Karen Saunders read the book "The Gingerbread Boy" during the Candy Land game event at the Boardman library.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Karen Saunders looked on as a young boy threw his dice to determine which square he would advance to during the Candy Land game event at the Boardman library.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.A young girl crawled through a tunnel during the Candy Land game event at the Boardman library. Nine adults and 11 children attended the event.
By TIM CLEVELAND
The Boardman library hosted a new event on Dec. 23, called the Candy Land game, for children out of school due to the Christmas holiday.
“It’s a fun activity for the children,” Boardman library assistant supervisor of children’s works Karen Saunders said. “They do different activities as they go through the game. One spot they get to recite a nursery rhyme, one spot they get to stop and read. They get to match up colors, so it’s matching for the younger children.”
Saunders also read the book “The Gingerbread Boy,” and the children also made a gingerbread boy out of paper and a hole punch. After punching holes on the edge of the gingerbread boy, they threaded the holes with yarn. Saunders wrapped a piece of scotch tape around the end of the yarn to make a safe needle for the children to work with.
The one-hour event attracted a crowd of nine adults and 11 children. The children rolled a colored dice to see which square they would next advance to. They navigated through five different stations. At the end, they had to jump over the candle stick and recite a nursery rhyme to complete the course.
“For today’s activity, we just wanted something that all ages could do because the children are out of school,” Saunders said. “It’s a nice game that they can play as a family. It accommodates a lot of people.”
Saunders said she got the idea for doing the event from the Warren library.
“I had to make all the pieces,” she said. “I saw what Warren did because they did it recently. They have a lot more artistic staff than we do. Our version is really easy that any parent could make. We used felt, you can use construction paper. We just taped things on the felt that say go to this spot, then they go to that spot. Ours is a real simple version where Warren had very wonderful artwork.”
Saunders said she combined another popular game into the Candy Land theme.
“We wanted to incorporate Candy Land where they match the colors and follow the directions,” she said. “We have like Chutes and Ladders where they have a shortcut and they can crawl through the tunnel.”
Saunders said the game would be played the following two Tuesdays [on Dec. 30 and Jan. 6] due to the children being off school those days.
Saunders said doing the event would give some of the children a chance to recite nursery rhymes they might not have been aware of before.
“Just coming to the library as an enjoyable experience,” she said. “They’re going to recite nursery rhymes. A lot of kids don’t even know nursery rhymes, so they’ll have a chance to recite some. They’ll hear the story of the ‘Gingerbread Boy,’ which is a classic story.”