Apparently, I was bitten by the creation bug these last few months! I have several new products that I would love to share with you all!
This is a great lesson for older students. Grab the wonderful book by Anna Harwell Celenza and you are set! There are assessment pieces, as well as a fun stick game at the end.
For students of all ages, these listening glyphs are a wonderful assessment piece. You can choose one of the preselected pieces with the glyphs or use the generic ones to choose a song of your own!
This project is great for older students to share their favorite song! Students will dig into the meaning of the song and share it through writing, creation and an optional project.
If you're looking for a fun brain break, check out this Japanese game! It's very similar to rock, paper, scissors and has modifications for a variety of learning levels.
This last one is my personal favorite! My students are obsessed with "Happy!" from Despicable Me 2. Not only does it have a fun beat, but the words are positive. Pharrell Williams just put out a children's book of his famous song. This product includes a lesson plan for the book, assessment worksheets, movement ideas and a body percussion routine. EEK - I can't wait to use it with my students!
Be on the look out for a few sales coming up, too! Bye for now!
I went to an awesome workshop this summer all about singing games. Today, I'm going to share one of my favorites with you: Crow Rooster! I can't wait to bring this out for the first week of school. It's great for the older students to refresh their head voice.
I like to add a fun twist on it with beanie baby roosters. You can find them on eBay, at garage sales, or you might still have some in your house. I use the bigger ones, but the mini ones work well, too. I have ended up with 15 because I (hopefully) won't have more than 15 pairs in my classroom at once.
With all singing games, there are variations from teacher to teacher. The original game directions are listed above, but I'm going to share with you my variation.
Crow Rooster
Divide class into partners, putting one across from the other about two feet apart. This should make 2 straight lines down your classroom. Give one partner the rooster to start.
Leader (teacher) starts the song, with students taking four steps backward on the beat. On the echo, students take four steps forward to their original position.
On the first "crow rooster," the first partner tosses the rooster to the other partner. On the echo, the rooster is tossed back to the original partner.
The last line should be clapped and patted. Clap the rhythm of "ku ku ri ku, ku ku ri ku" and pat the beat for "work for everyone." Repeat. (Students with the rooster should do their best at clapping and patting).
If the rooster was dropped during the "crow rooster" part, that pair is eliminated. They sit out, still singing, clapping and patting.
All pairs that are still in the game take a step back. Repeat the song.
After each time, the gap gets bigger and bigger. More pairs are eliminated until there is a winner. The kids love to see how far they can get and still catch the rooster!
The "crow rooster" part is a great way to get kids into their head voice at the beginning of the year. The tossing of the rooster is also great for kinesthetic learning. Sometimes my lower voiced students need that tossing motion to reach higher notes. It's also a nice reminder of the difference between clapping the rhythm and keeping the beat. Finally, the kids LOVE a competition! My room is quite large, so I'm excited to see how far they get - especially those athletic kids that have been at sports camps over the summer.
Hope you enjoy this fun lesson for the first few weeks of school!
Ha, sorry! I learned this song in elementary school to the tune of "Danse Macabre" and it's stuck with me ever since. Here's the video from YouTube that I like to use.
Anyways, I thought I'd share some Halloween activities my classes have been doing.
In the Hall of the Mountain King - Grieg
This is the first year I've really delved into Grieg. I love the music and the melody really sticks in the kids' heads! I start introducing it in Kindergarten and 1st grade with Eric Litwin's (Pete the Cat!!!) song from The Learning Groove. It takes the melody and puts in words like "I can shake my shaker egg and sneak around the room." It's fun to add egg shakers and a little movement once the students have learned the melody.
As they get older, I show my intermediate students a short cartoon of the story.
It's only about 5 minutes, but also adds in the "Morning Mood" music, which many of the students recognize. In the future, I'd like to add a literature connection. I've seen some great picture books online, but haven't picked one up yet. Soon!
I also add rhythm sticks to the main theme, with the help of Malinda Phillips' great active listening resource! Check it out - it's free :)
From there, we move on to actually feeling the beat, tempo and dynamic changes in the music. If you follow my blog, you know I LOVE Artie Almeida. She has a wonderful guiro and kickball lesson for this piece. I tried it with my third graders last week and we had so much fun! I used basketballs because we don't have enough kickballs and it still worked out just fine. Here are some pictures from my students engaging in the music:
It was Character Counts week, so they're all dressed up in the careers they'd like to have.The basketball coach had to come get the balls for practice at the end of the day, but we had a good time while it lasted. Artie's lessons are truly wonderful resources. I encourage you to check out her videos on YouTube and purchase this resource. You won't regret it!
Some other activities we are doing this week are:
singing the story "There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat!" with melody from Kristin Lukow
Halloween melody patterns from Aileen Miracle's 13 Nights freebie
Halloween vocal explorations and "create your own" template from Amy Abbott
Witch Witch (so-mi activity) and game from The Yellow Brick Road
The last game we are playing is a favorite of my primary students! I discovered it on Pinterest last year and the students just love it. I can't seem to find the right recording for it, though. There is a faster version and a Denise Gagne version that has a different melody. I kind of plunked it out on my own and adapt it to my student's singing ability. Here's the video of the song I use and the game:
It's really fun and a great way to reinforce steady beat. What Halloween or seasonal activities are you doing this week with your students?
I love the song "Bounce High, Bounce Low." It has so many things in it for the students to learn! I am using it with 2nd graders for concepts, but I hope to glue it to the 1st grade curriculum by the end of this year.
To start, we play a singing game. The students are in a circle, with one person holding the ball. We all sing "Bounce high, bounce low. Bounce the ball to Shi-loh," but replace "Shi-loh" with a student's name. The ball is bounced to that student and we keep going. Granted, it is not the most exciting game ever but the students like it and it is awesome for helping with names at the beginning of the year.
The students review steady beat, as well as "ta" and "titi." Then, I introduce our new solfege hand sign "la." The students have already heard of "La" through the book series "So-Me" by Stuart Manins. I highly recommend you purchase these books. They are great! The kids love singing So-Me's name and remember it forever. They are pricey, but they introduce rhythm, melody, different sounds and high vs. low. They are also awesome for a sick voice day because the author reads the stories on his CD that comes with the books. http://www.westmusic.com/p/so-me-storybooks-set-of-12.htm
Anyways, we learned about "La-Me" who is So-Me's older brother. They now get to see where La is! We use the powerpoint to see the picture relationships, sing the song, show the handsign and see it on the staff.
Finally, we add instruments! The students love the boomwhackers and they are a great way to reinforce our district goal of student-centered classrooms. I divide the students, explain to them about boomwhacker notation and we get started! They are given 10 minutes to work together before performing in front of the class. It's also a nice way to introduce and reinforce audience etiquette. The students listen to one another, clap, and encourage each person's playing. I love it! They are so brave to get up in front of their classmates and play - I couldn't even do that until middle school! It really helps them out as we prepare for our program in December.
What other ideas do you have for Bounce high, bounce low? I love songs that teach so many different things :)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
