I'm so excited: CMEA (Colorado Music Educators Association)'s conference is this week. I haven't been since I was pregnant with my daughter AND I'm presenting two sessions this year (nervous and excited about that.) But, also, I'm really excited because Mary Alice Amidon it will be presenting this year too! I LOVE the resources that the Amidon's have produced. They are high quality and a must for every music teacher's library: This year they came out with a new resource and one of Mary Amidon's sessions will be on this book: There are a lot of high quality songs for your little ones in this book, including this gem: My kinders sang this song this week, it's totally cute! For the first half (Once there was a snowman, snowman, snowman. Once there was a snowman, tall, tall, tall.) they start in a curled up position on the floor and SLOWLY rise so they are standing tall at the end of that phrase. Then for the second half of the song they SLOWLY descend, back into the curled up position. In the book, they state that you can have your students make up new versions: ie. "once there was a snow fort," "once there was a snow girl," etc. I will be using this song in my Manipulative Mania session on Friday, sponsored by ROCKE (The Regional Organization of Colorado Kodály Educators). Here's a little preview at what we'll be doing with it AND will be available for purchase at ROCKE's Make-n-Take session on Saturday. (There will be a couple other ideas presented on how to use the snowmen die cuts, as well). With snowmen die-cuts, I made beat charts for my kinders. Essentially, with a beat chart, they keep a steady beat while tracking the beat. This reinforces the literacy fluency skills that they are working on in their classrooms (your kinder teachers will love that!) and is a pre-music reading activity. Here's the beat chart (notice I gave the snowman on the left a black hat. This helps these little ones know where to start. .. some of them still struggle with right and left. .. ): And here are some of my kinders singing the song while tracking the beat (I made enough for all of them to have a chart to use. You can also do this with half a classroom set and them sharing with a partner): See that little kinder in the white shirt in the picture below? That's my all time favorite kindergartner (I can say that, I'm his mom!!!): If you're going to CMEA, I'm presenting two sessions: one on Thursday, January 24 at 10:20 called "Upping the Ante" and the "Manipulative Mania" session on Friday, January 25 at 1:50. Don't forget to attend Tanya LeJeune's sessions: Thursday, January 24, SMART board assessments at 3:00 Friday, January 25, Electronic Engagement at 8:00 with a repeat session at 11:30 The ROCKE Make-n-Take is on Saturday, January 26 from 10:30-12:30