The Lion Inside

‘The Lion Inside’ written by Rachel Bright and Jim Field explores the idea that we all have a mouse and a lion inside us and that we can be brave even when we are small. The story is beautifully written and illustrated and it’s a firm favourite in our bedtime routine. This easy to set up small world literacy activity brings the magic of the story to life for toddlers and children.

Set Up

The previous day, my toddler and I painted an old Amazon box to create the rock that the lion sits on and the mouse lives underneath. My son is currently going through a mixing paint stage where it all turns grey, so I used this to my advantage.

I used our trusty black tray that I use for all sensory and messy activities because the high sides keep the sensory resources inside the tray. The story describes the scene as ‘a dry dusty place where the sand sparkled gold’ so I used a mix of cous cous, quinoa and gold glitter to create the floor. I had some rice which I had dyed green left over from a previous activity. The foliage was bamboo from the garden and the mouse was a present I had received years ago and he normally lives in the garden. I have spent ages looking for the perfect African animals and these are great from Amazon. Although they are a little expensive, they are worth every penny.

As with all of these types of small world literacy activities my toddler and I read the story together upstairs before he plays with the small world set up. He was immediately intrigued and this really did offer him an irresistible invitation to play and learn. He named all the animals and got so excited when he spotted the mouse. The first thing the mouse did was head up to the top of the rock to speak to the lion.

We played with this small world for a long time and we revisited it a number of times in the afternoon. On occasions my toddler opened the book to check where all the animals should be.

It was really easy to tidy up afterwards and I didn’t want to waste the landscape so I poured that into a tupperware box to use at a later date. This small world literacy activity was so quick and easy to set up and such a hit with my toddler that we will definitely be doing this activity again.