Looking for new ways to inspire kids to use their imagination while encouraging creativity and openness to new ideas? You can create an imagination river craft activity that is based on The Nocturnals book The Kooky Kinkajou. What’s an imagination river? It’s a place to express yourself by drawing your favorite images or words. All you need is paper and some crayons, markers, or paints!

Step 1: Set Up a Storytime & Imagination Craft Party

Invite your students and patrons to your weekly storytime. Introduce the book and activity to your attendees and promote the activity on social media or in your newsletter. 

In The Kooky Kinkajou adventure, Bismark the wacky sugar glider is bored. He complains to his friends—Dawn the serious fox and Tobin the sweet pangolin—that he needs something fun to do. Then Karina the kinkajou swoops in with a burst of energy and shows the Nocturnals how imagination can turn a dull day into an adventure.



Step 2: Prepare for the Event

Gather drawing or painting materials and identify a smooth surface for each creator to work on—this could be individual sheets of paper, a large roll of brown paper, or even rocks. Your patrons can bring rocks from their backyards!





Step 3: Imagine the River 

Revisit the scene in Chapter 3 (page 24) in which Karina imagines that a bed of stones is a rushing river and invite the children to create an “imagination river” of their own.




Step 4: Create the Stones 

Distribute the art supplies and ask the children to draw (or paint) an image or word of their own choosing. 

Tip: To keep in line with the “bed of stones” theme, you could draw stone shapes on the paper ahead of time for children to fill in!
 

Step 5: Build the Imagination River 

Have each child place their image on the floor to create a “river.” If time allows, have each child describe his or her “stone.”




Don’t forget to share your creations in the library or classroom.