There is no denying that summer is here in Miami. Hot temperatures, afternoon rainstorms, staying inside to soak up the AC. Yup, summer is definitely here! At the Children’s Resources Summer Camp, there’s a different theme for each week of camp. I love this, because it gives me a creative jumping off point for planning […]
Revamp your music classroom for the new school year! Explore fresh ideas for bulletin boards, organization, listening corners, and décor. Make it awesome!
This "Pumpkin, Pumpkin" music lesson incorporates songs, xylophones, circle games and more. It's a perfect music lesson for the Fall.
Let's Make Session Planning A Breeze
I have found some great teletherapy resources in the last few months but I am still missing all the games from my speech room. Now that I have figured out how to use my Osmo as a document camera I thought this would open up the possibilities of using some of my games during teletherapy! I went through my games and came up with six games/activities that I can play while screen sharing. I have tweaked some of the instructions just a little to make it work and some I changed up the rules to help be more specific in targeting goals. Here's a collection of six games to screen share during teletherapy! Rory's Story Cubes These little cubes are great for so many language and articulation goals! You can target naming/identifying pictures, using verbs, self-monitoring articulation skills, producing grammatically correct sentences, generating a narrative, and telling a story using sequencing skills just to name a few. While I was sharing about these cubes Hanna from My Literacy Space commented letting me know there is an awesome app too! I think the app is probably a better option to share during therapy as the dice are bigger. When I share the app I don't need to use the Osmo, but I just didn't take it apart. I followed the same steps as I would if I were screen sharing the Osmo (just opened the app I wanted instead of the Osmo document camera app). Kids on Stage This game can target understanding categories (animals, objects, and actions), following directions, and making inferences. First, spin the spinner, and then choose a matching card to act out. The other players in the game aren't supposed to see the card so I usually just have them turn around, or cover/close their eyes. First player to guess correctly gets a point and first player to 5 points wins! HedBanz Junior This one is played a little differently over teletherapy. We don't wear the headbands instead, we take turns flipping over a card and the other players in the group have to ask questions to figure out what the card may be. I like the junior version for my younger kids because all the cards are animals. With this game, we can target naming animals, following directions, taking turns, asking/answering questions, using articulation skills in conversation, and making inferences. Pickles to Penguins This fun card game is the best for practicing comparing and/or contrasting which is what it's all about! You flip over two cards and someone has to tell what the two objects have in common. I usually challenge my kids to see who can find the most similar characteristics (or differences depending on what we're targeting) between the two objects. Pictionary My drawing skills are not the best but this game is always a fun one! Pictionary is so easy to change depending on what you are targeting. I rarely use the cards that come with the actual game. Instead, if we're working on articulation skills I flash cards that contain the targeted sound (you also need to tell the other players to turn around during this part too). If we're working on verbs I use pictures of verbs and so on. We keep score by who can shout out the name of the picture fastest. When playing with kids over the computer we just use a marker and notebook paper but I do like that the game now comes with a dry erase board and marker! Spot It Spot It is one of my favorite games to play when we have a few minutes left in a session. Over teletherapy, I put down one card face up and then a pile of cards face down. I flip one card from the pile over at a time. I usually only change one of the cards each round. The person who can shout out the match first gets a point. First player to 5 points wins! I hope that gave you some ideas of how to can use games you already have during teletherapy. If you are unable to use the Osmo as a document camera or don't have a document camera/Osmo you could easily adapt most of these games by just showing the cards using the built-in web camera. Just be sure to tell any other players in the group not to peek when flashing the cards or dice.
Distance learning stressing you out? Learn about some FUN Zoom music lessons that you can do tomorrow for your elementary music students.
Free printable musical instruments themed I spy game for kids - a fun music game for kids to learn about instruments
Therapy Resources: We provide mental health professionals with worksheets, group activities, & more!
ACTIVITY OUTLINE Title: Musical Scattergories Domain: cognitive Population: Adult Mental Health (Forensics) Category: leisure activity,...
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
Fun and easy composition game for third grade and beyond with die cuts from the dollar store! Simple to make and use!
Pediatric teletherapy ideas. Pink Oatmeal has several resources to make your teletherapy sessions fun and that allow you to send home a program!
Distance learning stressing you out? Learn about some FUN Zoom music lessons that you can do tomorrow for your elementary music students.
New to teaching music virtually? Feeling overwhelmed? I've got you covered. Learn how to teach music online from a full time virtual music teacher.
Bucket drumming for kids is a great boredom buster and gross motor activity for toddlers, preschoolers, and kids of all ages!
Here are some fun and simple music games for kids, that are also educational. Play them at home or in class.
Freedom Homeschooling lists free homeschool art curriculum for all grades. Art tutorials, art appreciation, and more!
New to teaching music virtually? Feeling overwhelmed? I've got you covered. Learn how to teach music online from a full time virtual music teacher.
It's a rainy evening and the 1st graders in your children's choir are extra wiggly. You need a quick change-of-pace to keep their attention and get through rehearsal. Been there? I think we all have. There are lots of games you could play, but I like choosing games and activi
TheseSUPER HELPFUL VISUAL CUE MATSare perfect for teaching lots of skills while playing GO FISH with different card decks for speech therapy practice or for teachers in the classroom WHILE HAVING TONS OF FUN! ************************************************** CONTENTS: What's the one go-to game/activity that every SLP uses at least a few times a year? GO FISH!!! My students needed to work on carryover.... and we know how they can sound great at the word/phrase level, but once they are in spontaneous conversation, it falls apart. So I made these visual cue mats to help with articulating students’ names correctly, using correct syntax (not Do you got?) and saying Go Fish correctly. So many of my students were saying “gold fish or goed fish!” These have been amazingly helpful in teaching them so many different skills. I also like to model a session for the teacher to show her how she can help correct errors throughout the day by having the child correct a speech sound error while she is modeling ‘good speech’. These are also great for teaching appropriate winning/losing, eye contact, multisyllabic words (kids names these days, right?), and also a teacher can use number cards, letter cards, etc. My teacher loved these and really saw/heard how many errors the kids were making with speech at the conversation level, and how easy it was to correct them and model the words. It was a giant success! These were great for my apraxia kids too! P.S. I made some with CAN I HAVE and DO YOU HAVE because some kids are working on velars and using CAN helps get in one more carryover word for practice. I hope you find these helpful! CONTENTS & DIRECTIONS: 1. GO FISH VISUAL CUE MATS (p. 4 – 23) - LAMINATE and use a DRY ERASE to write students’ names. Use these to teach your students how to use clear speech and correct syntax while playing GO FISH. 2. GO FISH RULES CUE CARD (p. 24) Use this to teach other good game playing skills. 3. CARDS/MATCHES EXPLANATION SHEET (p. 25) Use this to teach the difference between counting cards and counting matches. If you have any other suggestions for this product, feel free to email me. I’d love to add more to this helpful product! Have fun! Monae :) Related Products ⭐ 100 PAGES Speech Auditory Bombardment WORKSHEETS color & No Prep black & white ⭐ ARTICULATION FUN BUNDLE PLUS BONUS TURKEY/CHICKEN BOOK AAC SPEEC ⭐ ARTICULATION GIRLS FUN SPEECH THERAPY "L" worksheets ⭐ SPEECH SOUNDS POSTER Speech Therapy WORKSHEETS ⭐ SPEECH THERAPY PHONOLOGY FUN /s/ blends worksheets Also, check out Monae’s Books & Language Packets for developing and improving receptive and expressive language skills for children with language and/or learning disabilities. Some of the skills these books target are vocabulary development, social skills, and behaviors. They are very engaging, very easy to use, and kids LOVE THEM! *************************************************** Teachers and Speech-Language Pathologists will find using these stories make teaching these skills fun and easy.
Free Printable Sound Scavenger Hunt
How to teach Seesaw using movement and manipulatives in the elementary music classroom.
Solfege is a useful tool for developing aural skills and teaching music-reading. Here are some step-by-step strategies and resources for introducing it into your elementary music classes and children's choir rehearsals.
How on earth can you effectively do formative assessment on hundreds of students a week in music class? EXIT TICKETS are the answer! Use them for any skill you are working on. Tried and tested tips and tricks are discussed in this blog post.
Using "no print" PDFs or interactive PDFs in speech therapy over the computer is a great way to target goals in teletherapy
Articulation Books for TH, SH, CH, and J sounds in speech therapy. Tips, strategies, and activities to incorporate into speech and language.
Over 20 themed brain break ideas! Perfect for home, therapy or the classroom!
Get set for back to school in teletherapy with these digital activities! Learn about fun and interactive games and activities to get students warmed up in virtual speech therapy sessions.
The Yellow Brick Road Blog is a website dedicated to providing music teachers with fun education resources for serious music literacy.
5 Dollar Store or Aisle Finds For Therapists
It happens at every level, at every school I’ve ever taught in. A student asks, “can we play freeze dance today?” I’m always torn. I want my students to have fun and …
We’ve put together a list of materials that we’ve created and/or can be used for E-Learning/Distance Learning/Remote Teaching. This post is being updated as we create new content –…
We are living in unusual times, to be sure. My school district, along with many others around the world, is closed indefinitely in an attempt to slow the spread of covid-19 (known widely as coronavirus). As we go through this time of uncertainty, I know many of us are scrambling to find ways to continue to provide music learning opportunities for our students without actually being in school. Whether you're hoping to move to online / virtual teaching, provide students with online resources, or put together no-tech resources for families without internet or technology access, here are some resources to help. 1. Virtual Teaching If you're looking at setting up an online classroom or teaching virtually, Michelle from The Musical Rose has been teaching music virtually for a few years now and she has put together resources for music teachers looking to teach online. Click here to visit her website, where you'll find links to her social media accounts where she is posting her most updated content, and click here to view the slides from her FB live presentation on using Zoom and Nearpod, along with general tips for online teaching (including general music and ensemble rehearsals!). If you have a private lesson studio as well, Ashley Danyew has some excellent ideas and resources to transition private lessons and studio group classes to online teaching. Click here to read her post, where she outlines different online platforms for live lessons, pre-recorded videos, and activities to send home, templates for letters to send to parents, and other advice for private lesson teachers. Jack Miller has more tips for setting up your studio space, planning out your lessons, and more in this post. 2. Online Resources If your students have reliable internet and device access, there are plenty of resources available for music teachers, and many are being offered for free temporarily to support school closures or already offer free options! Check out each of these below to explore these options- obviously this list is not exhaustive, so feel free to share others you love in the comments: SmartMusic (was offered free through June 2020 to closed schools) MusicPlayOnline (free resources were offered during school closures) Solfeg.io (free plan available) Prodigies Music Lessons (their YouTube channel has lots of free lessons) Of course there are plenty of online resources that can be used as tools or exploration opportunities: Chrome Music Lab Incredibox SFS Kids Classics for Kids Carnegie Hall: Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra Mixxx: Free DJ Software Word Synth For more ideas incorporating technology in music teaching, my top recommendation is Midnight Music. Katie has been involved in music education technology for years and she has excellent resources and information on her website- go explore her site right here. You can also find more ideas in Facebook groups specifically dedicated to sharing ideas for online music teaching during school closures, so if you are on FB you can search for those as well. 3. No Tech Resource Ideas For my district, we are preparing paper and pencil packets for students. We are not one-to-one with devices, nor does every family in our district have reliable internet access, so we have chosen to provide resources that can be accessible to everyone. If you are looking for student learning resources that don't require technology or internet access, Charissa from Music with Mrs. Dunc has a free take home packet you can download here for elementary general music. The packet includes rhythm and pitch practice, composition, and more without any need for technology! Here are some more ideas you can use with a range of grade levels: Interviews: have students interview family members about their musical backgrounds and interests. What is their favorite song right now and why? What instruments do they play? What does music mean to them? Who are their favorite artists? Students can record the responses they get and also answer the questions themselves. Instrument invention: have students invent a new instrument. They could draw a picture of it and describe how it is played, how it's constructed, and what it sounds like, or they could make one out of recycled materials. Hand-washing dance choreography: have students choreograph a short dance routine incorporating the different ways we're recommended to wash our hands (scrubbing nails, between fingers, etc). Check out this one for inspiration. Listening log: have students write down music that they hear each day. Depending on the age, they can also record information about the songs, like the title/ artist, genre, mood, time signature, tempo, instrumentation, etc, or they could draw a picture in response to the music. Singing log: have students write down songs that they sing each day. They can sing along with a recording, sing by themselves, or sing with their family. Soundtrack of my life: have students create an imaginary album that shows who they are. They can make a list of song titles, and for each song describe the music- this could either be done by asking students to come up with their own imaginary songs or by having students find existing songs that would describe aspects of their personality/ life. Students could also design an album cover to go with it, write liner notes, etc. Instrumental / choral practice: of course if students have sheet music for choir songs, instrumental method books, recorder music, etc then they can practice their music! Include tips for independent practicing, fingering charts, etc to help students maintain productive practice. 4. Professional Learning Opportunities With more flexible schedules and some extra time on our hands, this is a great time to do some reflecting and learning ourselves! Elisa from Music Ed Mentor has compiled a list of online professional learning opportunities for music teachers in this post, and you can find more ideas including book and listening recommendations in these posts below: 5. Specific Lesson Ideas and More I'm now compiling all of my closure- related posts, from specific lesson ideas (packets, online, and virtual teaching) to reflections on equity, parenting, meal planning, and more on one page. Please be sure to head there for my latest updates: With all of the information and debating swirling around, let's remember to be deliberate and compassionate. Let's all help each other as we forge new paths- please share ideas in the comments to help other teachers support their students!
Think of how great it would feel to have a fun themed way to move!?! The Ocean Themed Yoga Cards and Printables are your answer! Your kids can move like their favorite ocean creatures in an activity that they will love, and so will you. With your purchase you will receive a downloadable PDF file. Read more details below.
Let's get physical.
Few moments in this school closure situation have been more difficult for me than the short time I had to grab stuff from my deserted classroom at school to take home with me to use for distance learning. This is not how music teaching is "supposed to" look! But I took what I thought I might need and now I've set up a small corner in my basement to record videos of myself and create lessons for my students while we're apart, so here's a look at what I grabbed and how I set up my space. My basement is primarily my daughters' play room, so there were several things already there that I've pulled in for my purposes: a keyboard, some percussion instruments, and even a dry erase easel. The other things I brought home from school: recording microphone puppets/ stuffed animals (well, minions actually) storybooks scarves a poster small percussion instruments one octave set of boomwhackers ukulele cajon glockenspiel dry erase staff board Here's a quick tour of how I set up my space- I also explain some of the reasons why I chose to bring home certain things in the video: I hope this helps give you some ideas if you're trying to figure out what to bring home yourselves or wondering how to set up a space for videos or live teaching! I'd love to see what others have come up with- let me know in the comments what you grabbed from school or how you've set up your school stuff at home.
I am SO, so excited because… FRANKIE’S BACK! In case you missed him at Halloween or Christmas… click those links. Your fav frog is back, and I’ve again teamed up with some amazing SLP blogging buddies to bring you FREE Speech Therapy Valentine’s Day activities! As usual, it all starts with a song. Since my...
Make your own free bingo cards at myfreebingocards.com
In Australia, we are three quarters of the way through our academic year. For me personally, this means, as Head of Faculty, that most of our HSC major works are due or are being examined over the next couple of weeks. We had our Year 12 Visual Arts class submit their Body of Work last […]
I was inspired by another blogger, Emily at thesweetestmelody to make my own "Fall Rhythms" pack. Used it yesterday with kindergarteners an...
Rhythm Cup Explorations is the popular cup-tapping rhythm program that works in piano lessons, music classrooms, & any place students need to learn rhythm!
Learn all about the Colors of the Rainbow with these FREE virtual preschool 30-minute videos and bonus printable play packs.
This is a digital calm down corner that students can use at home or in the classroom for distance learning. The virtual calming tool leads students through a step by step process to identify how they are feeling and strategies they can use to feel better. What's Included? Interactive Google Slides (TM) that lead students step by step through a simple calming process. First, students identify how they feel. Then they pick a strategy to try. They check back to see if that strategy helped or if they should try another one. 18 Calming Strategies: Students choose strategies that work for them. Interactive features are included where applicable. Printable PDF checklist of strategies for students to track which ones work for them. Who should buy this? This resource is great for teachers, parents, school counselors, and others who are engaged in distance learning or would like to incorporate technology. Ideal for students in elementary school. Tech Requirements This resource requires access to Google Slides (TM). (c) Social Emotional Workshop 2020
