Thanksgiving is coming soon. what are YOU thankful for. I, personally, am thankful that my theory teacher is at a conference and we missed two days of theory class. Ha ha! Just kidding... So here are a few Thanksgiving-oriented activities for your classes. If anyone knows the origin of this song, please let me know. To be honest, I can't remember from whom or where I learned it. The next song is obviously based on the tune of Zum Gali Gali. The change in text and the accompanying plate game I learned from my good friend, Dr. Michele Paise who is now a professor at Cumberland University in Tennessee. So all kudos for this one go to her. Thanks, Michele! Another extension could be the typical Orff idea of using word chains to create a larger rondo form. So small groups of children could create food word chains (Example: Turkey, mashed potatoes, hot biscuits, corn) to perform with body percussion and then with un-pitched percussion as small group compositions. The word chains are short, so they would have to repeat the chain at least 4 times to make it more substantial. So for instance a group could perform the chain twice with words and body percussion sounds, and then twice with only un-pitched percussion playing the rhythm of the word chain. Or they could layer in their words perhaps. One student could say and play corn over and over, then the person playing turkey could join in, then mashed potatoes, then hot biscuits. Let students be creative and come up with unique ways of performing their words chains. Don't insist that every group must do it exactly the same way. In what other subject in school can students be creative and make their own choices? The final performance would alternate singing the song with group 1 performing their word chain, then the song, then group 2 performing their word chain, and so on. Have a great week!
