Keep your students engaged and get them up and moving with these 5 fantastic movement ideas you can use right away and over and over again!

Download free Tideo rhythm cards that you can use to practice barred sixteenth notes, as well as ideas for sequencing movement.

A musical masterpiece is a simple lesson that combines music and art to create a collaborative lesson that embeds acceptance and kindness.

Happy 4th of July friends! Day 4 of our 31 Days of Kindergarten is all about Music and Movement in the Classroom. I love music and believe that no matter what language you speak or your ethnic backgro

5 easy (and free!) sub plans for the music room: Includes great ideas for sub plans, as well as a way to download the sub plans as an editable Word document!

Here's a list of fun activities you can do with preschool and kindergarten using rhythm sticks!

Do you use music in your classroom? I absolutely LOVE using music! I think it can help keep students focused and relaxed while working, I also think it’s great for classroom management, and I think it’s a wonderful motivator for students! Let’s face it… MUSIC can be quite MAGICAL in the classroom. However, for today’s post I am going to focus on how I use music to teach my students all about MOOD. {If you’d like a free copy of these resources simply click here.}You see mood is one of those abstract concepts that can be quite tricky to understand. That’s why I decided to use music in the first place. You see my students were having a hard time identifying mood in texts. So I decided to begin with music, something we are all familiar with. I also think that for kids it might be easier to “feel” mood in music. Especially since many of us choose music to listen to depending on how we are feeling at the moment. I began by introducing the term MOOD with the poster on the left. We then had a discussion on the types of music we like to listen to and […]

Ha'kyo Jung is a children's song from Korea that would be great for practicing half note, as well as pentatonic melodies.

Amasee is a fantastic song and dance that'll keep your students moving to the beat and learning about call and response form.

Fourth grade class wrote some terrific "sound songs". I got this idea from another music teacher. Thank you! It was a hit.

This is one of my favorite lessons. I’ve taught it in class before, and I have used it in several of my college courses as well. I have included all the elements needed to teach this lesson. …

Music class is an active, engaging, and joyful experience! This is especially true when our musical activities are grounded in creative and intentional teaching strategies. One of the most important teaching strategies has to do with teaching the difference between steady beat and the rhythm of

Walking Walking

Spring is one of my favorite times of year - each morning on my walk I hear birds singing and see rabbits hopping on fresh sprigs of green grass. And the flowers! Well, if you know me at all, you know how much I love flowers and especially irises. I have so many flowers planted around my house and particularly love the 20-something varieties of iris I currently have! This is a perfect rhyme and fingerplay for spring. Fingerplays are so underrated! Teach them to younger students as a fingerplay but bring them back to teach or reinforce rhythmic elements in first grade and as a canon experience for second grade, or add a So Mi or So La Mi melody, eventually adding in an ostinato or two. Transfer the rhyme and ostinati to non-pitched percussion, add timbre changes for each line and allow the students to decide how to perform it. For older students, use these as a basis for melodic improvisation or to walk the beat while clapping the rhythm or add a B Section with the names of egg layers - birds, fish, insects, turtles, platypus, echidna, reptiles, and lizards. Or have small groups of students create a movement story of one type of animal and perform for other groups to guess the animal. So many possibilities! For a better image, click here. Enjoy!

This Animal Actions Rhythm Game is the perfect way to get things moving and practice listening and note recognition skills at the same time.

DIY Song Cubes to help children learn music "old favorites" and practice finding and keeping the beat; for preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten.

I started back to school this past week with my kids on Tuesday. I had such a great first week and I am so excited to be back making music with them. We spent our first few days going over music room rules and procedures (click here to see rules post), emergency drills, and jumped right into making music. Can I just say that I LOVE pinterest! I found so many great ideas for back to school games through Pinterest as well as from Susan during Level 3. I thought I would share some of the really fun ones that the students enjoyed our first few days back: "Up The Ladder" is a great game for learning the names of your new students. "Down, Down Baby" is from the Amidons. SO FUN! Apparently this is a favorite, because it's being sung on the bus! Hickety Pickety Bumblebee is a fun one to use with K/1. In first grade you could review four voices with "can you sing (whisper, call, speak) your name to me". With kindergarten, it might be a bit intimidating to ask them to sing their name to you on day 1 of music, but let's be honest we are still learning all their names several weeks into the school year. Pull this out with them a little bit later (maybe after you have presented the four voices) and do this then. Mamalama: I learned this in Level 3, and we take it a bit faster than in this video, but it is SO FUN! I even had a student get the last part after just a few listenings. CRAZY! What are some of your favorite first day songs and activities? Still looking for ways to set up and decorate your room? This music room decor catalog will give you lots of idea, plus a back to school tip on each page!

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Looking for a fun way to teach children about form? This is one of my favorite lessons! Manipulatives and movement, what could be better?

Since I traveled to Texas last week to visit a friend, I thought I should share a "cowboy" activity! I teach Cowboy Joe to my 4th graders at the start of the school year. I originally learned in it my Level 3 Orff training, and have adapted it a bit to work for my students. First, I teach the body percussion, encouraging students to listen to me model the pattern and find where the "trick" occurs. Once the kids can do the body percussion, I introduce the poem in conjunction with the body percussion. Then, we turn the body percussion into a clapping came with a partner, changing the snaps to partner claps. After that, the students are allowed to create their own clapping game and body percussion with their partner to go along with the song. We share those ideas out. Then, we make it a name game, going around the circle. Each student individually replaces Cowboy Joe's name with their name, i.e. Cowboy Tyler or Cowgirl Alicia. They also replace Mexico with the street that they live on, i.e comes from New Street. Then, the entire class completes the last two phrases of the poem, inserting their classmate's name on the last phrase. If you want to take it to another level, the students can transfer the levels of body percussion to three different unpitched percussion instruments. Enjoy my favorite "Cowboy" activity. Yee-Haw!

There are many ways to celebrate diversity and honor a multicultural classroom. Help create a classroom environment that has students explore and appreciate other cultures and diversity. Allow students to break through cultural barriers, so they learn to appreciate different ways of celebrating or communicating, and bring the classroom community closer together.

"Shoo Fly" is one of my favorite songs to teach. The students love it! I typically use it with 2nd or 3rd grade to add some nice "orff-...

Students in first and second grade are learning about Rondo Form. A song is in rondo form if it has an A section that is repeated several times, with new sections in between each A section. An ex…

Today I'm giving a glance into my first day of school lesson plans, from TK - 5th grade. In the first day of music class, students are arguably the most attentive they will be all year. This puts a unique pressure on the first day's lesson plan to set the tone for the rest of our time together.

Students have an never-ending source of energy each day. This set of energizers is to help you make the most of your student's energy. It will help to reenergize your students as well as refocus them throughout the day. There are 50 energizer activities in this set. Each card has instructions as t...

Pentatonic Songs

Any music teacher who has used great rubrics can tell you how helpful they are. Any music teacher who has created great rubrics can tell you how much time and effort it takes to develop them. That&…

Product Description Gleaming bells with beautiful ringing sounds bring joy to the world! Young children love composing their own music with C Major tuned bells. As they get older, children can follow the color-coded sheet music to play familiar songs. C - D - E. Line up the bells and play them one by one. It's the start of a song! Kids are IMMEDIATELY motivated! Eight lovely classic songs on sheet music include: Mary Had A Little Lamb, Old MacDonald Had A Farm, Jingle Bells, Twinkle Little Star, Row Row Row Your Boat, Joy To The World, London Bridge, and Lullaby. Understanding music can be easy for any beginner if they have the right instrument. Start a life-long musical journey with the Musical Hand Bells. Musical Hand Bells A set of 8 metal hand bells in C Major Scale Encourages physical control, musical learning A simple and beautiful way to get started playing music Metal bells resonate beautifully Color-coded, labeled sheet music for easy playing Songs include Mary Had A Little Lamb, Old MacDonald Had A Farm, Jingle Bells, Twinkle Little Star, Row Your Boat, Joy To The World, London Bridge, Lullaby Includes 8 hand bells and song sheet Handles made of durable plastic Bells each measure 5 x 3 inches Bells made of strong metal Related Categories:

Learn how to incorporate awesome and easy creative movement activities into your music class. Read this post for tips and ideas!

One of my favorite songs to bring out in the spring is 2, 4, 6, 8. I can use this with any grade level that is preparing or practicing beat vs. rhythm or is practicing ta and titi. The dance that I learned with this song is set up in longways sets with each student facing their partner. Phrase 1: Take four steps towards your partner Phrase 2: Shake hands with your partner Phrase 3: Right hand turn to trade places with your partner Phrase 4: Take four steps backward into your partners old spot IDEALLY the head couple sashays down to the bottom of the set during phrase four and the other partners move up a space to start again and there is a new head couple, but you can work up to that. Sometimes they need extra time to get down there, especially if you are teaching it to the whole class at once. Some of my kids won't remember to go because they march backwards instead, but I don't make a big deal out of it. I just add a little rhythm improv between repetitions to get them down there and then we start again I should have made my kids listen a few more times before joining in on the singing, as you will hear that some of them throw in a la and make the last phrase ta titi ta ta. Once we really honed in on the rhythm of the song and read it with ta's and titi's that fixed that right up. Here are some of the visuals and manipulative I use with this song after they have learned the dance. When practicing steady beat or working on beat vs. rhythm, I can pull out this slide and students can pat beat on laps while I point or they can take turns tapping at the board like the teacher. I also have slides for prepping the rhythm of the words as well as with stick notation. Click here to find these ready made slides to use in your classroom. On a different day in ta and titi practice stage, I divide the class into small groups and I pass out baggies that have foam flowers that I picked up from the dollar bin. On the flowers, I have notated (in stick notation) the phrases of the song with one phrase on each flower. Students work in groups to put the song together. When they have the song notated I come around to each group and they perform it for me. I hope this gives you some fun ideas to try with your kids!

In this blog post I'm going to talk about what I think are the five best activities you can use in your learning centers rotations!

Music education ideas, activities, games, and songs | Technology tips for the music classroom | Resources for the elementary music room.

I've seen several posts on FB pages about what to do at the end of the year. If you've been here before you know I started a tradition a fe...

I learned this song from my KTIP mentor, Alicia Franklin, during my first year teaching. I introduce this song in kindergarten and we sing it everyday when we line up. I sing the first note as a fermata and hold it until every student is joining in and doing their job to line up. There are hand motions to accompany the song. On the first word "my", we raise our hands in the air (this makes it easy to see who is actually paying attention in line and ready to sing the song). Then, we do what the song says. Phrase 1: place hands back Phrase 2: exaggerate good posture Phrase 3: take 2 fingers, point at eyes then straight ahead Phrase 4: hands return behind back Phrase 5: zip lips, pretend to put in pocket, hands return behind back, mouth is closed When the kids get to 1st grade, the song only makes guest appearances when we need help remembering how to line up or when I want to see if they can apply the musical concept we just learned. Using the Song For Assessment Assess Tempo If we learned about tempo that day, we may choose a tempo (largo, moderato, allegro) and sing our song accordingly. They may also get to line up to a tempo. I may ask them to show me allegro feet, largo feet, or moderato feet to line up. Depending on how much time is left in class, I may do this individually or in small groups. If I do it individually, I usually take notes in my grade book for a performance assessment. Older students can watch the conductor and respond to accelerandos and ritardandos. Assess Dynamics If we learned about dynamics that day, we may choose a dynamic level for the entire song (piano, mezzopiano, mezzoforte, forte) or watch the conductor to see how the dynamic levels change throughout the song. Older students can usually remember a pattern to assign different dynamic levels to each phrase. Similar to the game discussed above, sometimes we can line up with piano feet (tiptoeing) or forte feet (stomping). Again, depending on the time remaining in class, this is either done individually or in small groups and is sometimes used as a performance assessment. Assess Melody If we learned about melodic direction that day, we may use our hand levels to show the melodic contour. (That's why I like the simple shape of this melody going upward then downward.) If we discussed pitch, we may sing it in a high key or a low key. Assess Harmony If we learned about minor harmony (Halloween), we may choose to change the song to minor and make it sound spooky. (All the kids LOVE this!) Assess Timbre If we discussed different types of voices (speaking, whisper, calling, singing), we may choose to use different voices to use throughout the entire song, or we may change our voices for each phrase. I also have voice cards that I can hold up and show the students what to change to. (View the next post for printable voice cards.) Assess Rhythm If we discussed rhythm (long and short sounds), we may sing the song exaggerating note lengths in tenuto or staccato style. If we discussed a fermata, we may choose one or two words to have a fermata and sing those words really long. Coda These are just a few examples of how I use our line up song for assessment. Sometimes, instead of telling them how to sing it, I let the kids pick a variation to sing. Again, I only sing it every time with kindergarten; and they never get tired of singing it. It only appears occasionally with older grades. It appears sometimes as a warning to those not ready for the hall: "Do we HAVE to revisit kindergarten and sing the line-up song?" Their behavior is quickly corrected. Many older students LOVE the line up song, as it brings nostalgia from kindergarten. Even if you have a line-up song already in place, you could probably use these assessment strategies with your song as well. I would love to hear other ideas to use line-up songs as assessment tools. If you have some more ideas, please comment below.

I originally wrote this post for Homeschool Share. Trying to clean up the site, and moving this one here. Sometimes in the middle of a four digit subtraction problem, I find one of my children on the verge of a brain meltdown–as in brain juice is starting to run out of his eyes, or leak …

This is an easy & fun game to help preschoolers and toddlers practice playing and recognising Do Re Mi. Great fun - especially with a real balloon!

This exciting two-level course is packed full of colourful picture scenes, games, music, and movement ideas to develop speaking, listening, and pre-writing and writing skills. Use Magic Time on its own, or combine it with English Time to create an eight-level course.

CHICKEN ON A FENCE POST This is just one of my favorite songs to do with 3rd grade for tika-tika (4 beamed 16th notes) as well as in 4...

Listening journals in Music help develop musical literacy as students learn to think critically and explore their own emotional responses to music.