5 Ways to Bring Music Making into Your Home

Yesterday on my Facebook page, I shared a link to an article from TIME called "How Music Trumps Reading for Child Development". You can take a look at the article for yourself, but here are some of the key points:

• Informal music making between a parent and child has a greater impact than CDs or shows that teach music
• Informal music-making in the home from around the ages of two and three can lead to better literacy, numeracy, social skills, and attention and emotion regulation by the age of five
• Music making should be playful
• Voice is a great place to start

On my Facebook post, someone wrote "I have no money for lessons. What do I do as a homeschool mom. Any suggestions?"

YES! I have lots of suggestions for parents whether you homeschool or not.

1) Sing to your child - 

Whether you think that you can sing or not, it is SO important to sing to your child. Singing in early childhood not only helps with bonding between the parent and child, it build literacy, fluency, and helps your child to be tuneful. Not sure what to sing? Start with children songs from YOUR CHILDHOOD! These songs have stood the test of time and are a great place to start when building song repertoire for you and your child. 

These could be songs you sing together as well as songs that are just for them to listen to.

Here are some of my three year old's favorites to sing alone or with me:

1) Old MacDonald

2) ABC song

3) Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

4) Baa Baa Black Sheep (does your child notice that this sounds the same, or has the same melody, as Twinkle and ABCs?)

5) Ring Around the Rosie (with game - they LOVE it)

6) London Bridges (play as a family, making an arch and letting your child go through the arch, they love being captured when the bridge falls down at the end of the song)

7) See Saw Up and Down

Here are some of her favorites that I sing to her:
1) All the Pretty Little Horses
2) Under the Spreading Chestnut Tree
3) Hush Little Baby
4) The Crabfish

5) The Gypsy Rover

I also sing her several of my favorite songs from musicals. 

Need more ideas for building song repertoire for you and your child to sing together? I highly recommend any of Jill Trinka's CDs. Again, the point isn't just to listen to the CD in the car (although that is good), but to learn the songs so that YOU can sing them with or to your child.

The book includes the singing games, but if you just want the songs, they are available on iTunes as well. Listen to a sample here:

2) Make music with found sounds

Find different kinds of sounds around the house. These do not have to be "real instruments". Kids can turn almost anything into a noise maker. Pull out your pots and pans and hand them stirring spoons, fill empty butter containers or Easter eggs with things that they can shake. The possibilities are 

endless.

3)  Listen and MOVE to all kinds of music

My husband and I have very different tastes in music so our daughter has been exposed to so much in her 3 years. He is a 5-12 band teacher and he loves jazz so much that he got a double major in music education and jazz performance. He has exposed her to so many different things in that genre and she can identify most instruments after hearing just a few seconds of something. I was in music theatre growing up, so I love listening to showtunes. I also love listening to classical music, oldies, and a lot of things that are on the radio today (don't judge). 

One thing that you will find with kids is that when they are young they have the ears for all kinds of music and they are not judgmental about music that sounds "different", "out there", or "weird" like many adults will. We have been careful to let her form her own opinions about the music she listens to and not influence her opinion of a piece.

I strongly suggest exposing your kids to varied kinds of music.

The music becomes more a part of them if they PLAY with it. For kids, this may mean rocking to the music, patting their laps to help them feel the beat, dancing with your child, etc. They so desperately need to move to the music they are listening to.

4) Bring songs to life with illustrated picture books

There are SO many illustrated nursery rhyme and song books out there. Snatch them up! I usually don't use a book to introduce the song or rhyme to my daughter. If it is a rhyme we might act it out, do a fingerplay or actions if there are some to go along with it. If it is a song, I sing it to her a few times before I pull out the book because I want her to imagine whatever she will and not have preconceived illustrations in her mind. Let them use their imagination.

Here are some of our favorite books to sing (Note that not all of these are lullabies. You need some fun, silly books too!) 

Somewhere Over the Rainbow (I do love these illustrations)

This hardcover is one of my daughter's favorites. It has 170 different nursery rhymes and folk songs and includes favorites like "Hickory Dickory Dock", "Brahms Lullaby", "All the Pretty Little Horses", "Hot Cross Buns", "Little Sally Walker", and SO many more.

Oh my daughter thinks this one is hysterical!

5) Incorporate singing into make believe/pretend play

When playing with doll, puppets, stuffed animals, house, or whatever it happens to be, we find was to incorporate music, whether that is different high or low voices for different characters, sing-songy play, or just expression. My daughter has Joy and Sadness plush toys from the Disney Movie, Inside Out and she makes their voices sound different. What a fun way to play with expression.

This summer we added nursery rhymes to our chalk time outside like this: 

Little Miss Muffet

Jack Be Nimble

If you are a homeschool parent looking for ideas for school age children, I would also recommend looking into different music educator workshops in your state or area, attending conferences, and being a part of professional organizations like OAKE or NAfME to get more training and ideas. As a Kodaly trained teacher, I think it would be great for homeschool students because the voice is the primary instrument used. You could also look into Suzuki lessons for the child and parent to take together, but for the purposes of this post, I wanted to really focus on early childhood music in the home.

What are some of your favorite ways to make music with your kids? Sound off in the comments below!

Products for Planning in the Music Room

I hope 2016 is off to a great start for you! I am linking up with Aileen Miracle today to share some of my favorite products for planning in the music room.

1) Ready Set Plan! - A Yearly Planning Guide for the Kodaly Music Teacher

I have blogged about this set and included a free sample here. Having these song lists, yearly plans and concept plans has been a huge help in keeping me organized and on track for the year. I can see what I hope to accomplish each month and continue working towards that goal with the appropriate song literature for each grade and concept they cover.

2) Concept Starter Pack for Grades K-3 by Aileen Miracle

In addition to my own concept plans, I love to peek in and see what other music teachers are doing to get more ideas. Maybe they have a song that wasn't in my folk song collection or a different idea on presenting a concept that is even better than what I had. This set from Aileen has given me some new songs to add to my concept plans for K-3. I also love the layout of her concept plans!

The next two resources are ones I don't have yet, but I am hoping to add to my collection of planning resources soon!

3) Purposeful Pathways

Roger Sams presented at KMEA two years ago and I loved his ideas for adding movement, improvisation, and composition into his lessons. It was a lovely blending of Orff and Kodaly that seemed so musical. I would love to try some of his ideas out with my students.

4) Zin Zin a Violin - Sub Plan by Shelley Tomich

Unfortunately, music teachers have to plan for the event that they might be gone. I've been eyeing this resource because I already have the book and it looks like a great lesson to add to my sub tub or leave next month when I am at KMEA.

If you are wanting to stock up on some great planning resources, Jan. 20-21 is a great time to do so! Teachers Pay Teachers is holding a site wide sale and everything in my store will be 28% off when you enter the promo code START16 at checkout. Start 2016 off on the right foot!

Thanksgiving Week {Take a Peek at my Week}

Looking for some ideas for your elementary music classes in the days or weeks leading up to Thanksgiving?

1) Ho Ho Watanay - I used this song with kindergarten and first grade this week. In kindergarten it was perfect timing as we are practicing loud/soft and introducing the term "lullaby". We also tapped on the feathers to the feel of the music (preparing the steady beat). In first grade, we review the beat tapping page, but then take it a step further and look at the rhythm of the song. It is great ta and titi practice. We play the rhythms on hand drums as we sing.

You can find slides for the song "Ho Ho Watanay" here. This file teaches loud/soft, lullaby, prepares and practices steady beat, prepares/practices rhythm of the words and ta/titi.

2) Children's Literature for Thanksgiving in the Music Room
I introduce the song "Ho Ho Watanay" with the book "Northwoods Cradle Song". I sing the song on the page turns following every page that reads "Sleep, little warrior, sleep. Go to sleep. Go to sleep." I have looked all over for a song or melody to go with this book from the Menominee tribe, but have not found one yet. Ho Ho Watanay is actually an Iroquois lullaby, but because of the theme of the book and song, I pair them together.

I used the book, "One Little, Two Little, Three Little Pilgrims" last week with kindergarten. They enjoyed comparing the lives of the pilgrims and Indians in the book. 

I love to use the "I know an Old Lady..." books. I have several of them and they may great "fill in the blank" books as Jo Kirk would call them. I sing most of the book, but give the students a special part to sing, in this case the "perhaps she'll die". Thank goodness she doesn't die in this book. She just inflates until she becomes a balloon in the Thanksgiving Day parade. Hopefully none of us eat that much over Thanksgiving! ;)

3) Pumpkin Patch Rhythm Compositions

I had to be gone a couple days this month, so I left this "Pumpkin Patch Rhythm Composition" activity for a few classes while I was gone. It was easy for them to do while I was away, gave them more practice writing and working with a specific set of rhythms. I had them do these compositions with a partner and then on a later day, they combined with another pair and taught the other pair their composition and created one long composition out of the two that was 16 beats. The group of four then performed them for the class when I was there, so I was able to use it as a composition and performance assessment and assess two different skills. Working with a partner and then teaching their composition to another pair was really neat to watch. I could tell that because they were writing, manipulating, and teaching it, they really "got it". 

You can find this Pumpkin Patch Composition lesson here.

4) Turkey Trot Rhythm Races

My kids love rhythm races. They are fun and competitive. I love that it gives me a chance to see which kids really are getting it. I divide the class into teams. My classes have about 25 kids, so I do five teams with 4-5 kids on each team.

The teams stand in lines next to their team color turkey. I read/clap/or play a rhythm and one player from each team races to the other end of the room. When they get there, they see piles with turkeys of their team's color. They must locate the correct rhythm and bring it back to their team. The first team to bring back the correct rhythm gets 2 points. If they bring back a correct rhythm, but they are not first, they get 1 point for their team. If they bring back an incorrect rhythm, they get 0 points and they have to go take it back because they will eventually need to find that rhythm.

(Photo shared from the classroom of Shelley Potter).

You can find this game here.

I hope you have enjoyed a peek at my week and some of the things I am doing right before Thanksgiving!

10 Music Teachers to Follow on Pinterest

When I started my second year of teaching I slowly began to see that I could find things on Pinterest besides DIY projects, recipes, and cute outfits. I could find ideas to for the music classroom. Now, there weren't a ton of music education pins back then, but there were some really great ones that gave me fresh ideas to bring to my music room. Now, my music Pinterest boards are so many things.

- A way to organize resources by concept

- A way to share my ideas

- A way to save the stellar ideas of others

- A glimpse of what I hope for my music room

If you have never used Pinterest before, you really must check it out! You can search for pins or boards using the search bar, and follow any person or board that interests you. If you are looking for some new boards or music teachers to follow, check out this list and you will see some of the best resources for elementary music teachers.

1. Lindsay Jervis from Kodaly Inspired Classroom

That's my Pinterest page! Check out my favorite boards, Kodaly Inspired Music Classroom, where I pin my very favorite ideas for my classroom as well as resources I have created, and my board, Children's Literature for the Kodaly Music Class.

2. Aileen Miracle from Mrs. Miracle's Music Room

I love Aileen's board, Music Education Games, which is full of games for the Kodaly Inspired Classroom. You should also check out her Music Centers board. It has so many great ideas and resources to help you attempt centers in the music room, which is something I would like to gradually do more of.

3. Amy Abbott from Music a la Abbott 

Amy has a lot of great boards. My personal favorites are her Music Education Blogs which links to tons of her amazing blogs posts and her Elementary Music - Listening board which has tons of great links and videos for listening lessons.

Notice the red box that says "Follow". Somehow I wasn't already following all of Amy's boards. You can select individual boards to follow or follow all of a pinner's boards by clicking that red "Follow" button. Now, I am following all of Amy's boards! :)

4. Cori Bloom from Rhythm & Bloom

I love Cori' Classroom Organization and Storage board! It is filled with a lot of little tricks to help you keep your space organized. You should also check out her Music Listening board to see some of her amazing resources to incorporate more listening into your music lessons.

 5. Tracy King THE Bulletin Board Lady

Be sure to check out her board, Mrs. King's Music Class. This links to a lot of her blog posts and products. You should also follow her Bulletin Board Ideas. Now, she is the Bulletin Board Lady after all, so she doesn't just have one board for bulletin board ideas. She has pinterest boards full of pins for back to school, composers, and every month of the year. There is no shortage of bulletin board ideas here.

6. Jena Hudson from Sew Much Music 

 

When checking out Jena's boards, be sure to follow Music Class Ideas, which includes all kinds of ideas to try to incorporate into your music classroom. I also have gotten a lot of great ideas from her Technology in the Music Classroom board.

7. David Row from Make Moments Matter

If you aren't already following David, you probably just need to go ahead and follow all of his boards. They are seriously chalk full of some of the best ideas out there! First you should visit his My Classroom board to get a peek at what he is doing with his kids. I also love his board for Teaching Form. So many great ideas!

8. Sara Bibee from Music with Sara Bibee 

Check out Sara's board Music With Sara Bibee to see all of her amazing resources. You might also love her Elem Music board. It has some great videos of singing games!

9. Elaine Ford from Mrs. Ford's Melodies

If you visit Elaine Ford's pinterest boards, scroll down a bit to find her music ed boards. She has a great board called Classroom Ideas that is full of music classroom organizational and decorative pins. So much inspiration! I LOVE LOVE LOVE her board Music & Literature. I've already found some new books to add to my wishlist from this board.

10. Brittany De Laruelle from Make Music 

Brittany's boards look super organized and her board covers make it easy to find anything you might be looking for. My personal favorites of her boards are Melody Concepts and Rhythm Concepts boards.

I hope that gives you lots of boards and/or music teachers to follow on Pinterest! What would we do without Pinterest?

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As a part of my #ThankfulMusicTeacher blog posts, I want to say a special "Thank you!" for all of the teachers who are using my resources in their classrooms with their kiddos or in their planning. Take a picture of a resource in action (it can even be a freebie from my store) and post it on my Facebook or send it to me at LindsayJervis@hotmail.com to receive one free item from my store of your choice ($3 or less). I will be sharing these photos on my Facebook and/or blog, so please let me know if I need to cover any student faces. Happy to do that! :)

(Ends 11/30/15)