Halloween Favorites

Kids love Halloween. As a kid, it was my favorite holiday. I loved getting to dress up and go trick or treating. Here are some of the tricks and treats from my music room this week:

Skin and Bones is so fun to play with any age! I turn the lights off, students sit in a circle and I go around the outside of the circle singing the song and I use an egg shaker to shake on the "oo's" just for a fun sound effect. On "boo" the whole class is usually scarred. I have best success with this game around 3rd grade, but it's fun all the way up through 5th grade. I've seen lots of fun variations on games for skin and bones on facebook recently. My favorite (though a little creepy) was to have the kids all lay on the floor and rise up to a sitting position on to "oo's" then lay back down. I will have to remember that for next year. This song is perfect because I am about ready to present low la! It is a really easy repeated part to play on the Orff instruments too.

This morning I did rhythmic dictation using Q tips as "bones" with my fifth graders. After a few practice rounds, they got to create their own four beat bone rhythm pattern. It was a little difficult to get the tiri-tiri's to stay so some are falling down, but you get the idea! They loved it!

Monster Mash Freeze Dance has been a big hit today. I play the song Monster Mash, but you could use any spooky dancable song. When I pause the music the kids have to freeze like the picture. This activity is fun way to get them moving and isolating different parts of their bodies. They have to think creatively for some to figure out how to make their bodies best match the pictures:

They have to really think creatively for some to figure out how to make their bodies best match the pictures:

These are available on my TPT store here:

We are busy practicing ta rest:

During prep, we may just play a singing game. I play this one kind of like Closet Key. My students sit in a circle. I put a witch had in the middle and select a student to sit by the witch hat (they don't wear it because you just never know about head lice). I go around the circle with a penny and hide it in one student's hands. The witch has three guesses of where the penny is. The kids really enjoyed playing this game.

Reviewing high low in prep for sol-mi:

I found these great Halloween erasers at Target in the dollar bins to use on our high/low staff:

Pitch matching: 

The students would not see this. Teacher sings "What will you be on Halloween night?" (s mm s m ss m s) Students answer in their singing voice with whatever they will be (ex. I will be a black cat - ss mm s m)

I cover a mallet with Kleenex and drew on eyes and a mouth and now have "Spooky the Ghost". The kids love to sing to Spooky. He can only hear us if we use our singing voices! :)

If you have a different Halloween puppet that would work too, but this is so easy to make!

Children's Literature:

The Halloween House can be sung to the tune of Over in the Meadow. Instead of counting forwards, it counts backwards, which is a lovely skill to work on with kindergarten. 

Here's a little video of me reading a portion of it so you can get the melody I use.

What's going on in your music room? Share some ideas in the comments!

Lindsay