Music Melody Map

I remember doing this for music class when I was in Elementary School.  The teacher made this weird map of lines, symbols, squiggles, etc. that correlated to the melody of a musical piece. I remember specifically doing this for some of the Nutcracker Ballet pieces.

Anyway, I thought I would try it with my kids to teach them "Joy to the World" since it is a fairly simple song, but can be tricky due to holding out words over multiple notes. Using this method, we could sing the song over and over and hopefully keep their attention. You could do this for any song

I told them we were going to learn a new song, then showed them a poster that looked like this:

I had fun with them and asked if anyone knew the song. Of course I got lots of puzzled looks and remarks. So I had our pianist play the first few notes until they recognized it.  Then I sand them for it while I followed the "map" with my baton. (Baton's are excellent pointers...) 

Then I called on volunteers  to help me follow the map while the rest followed  with their fingers in the air. I also shrunk this down and put 4 on an 8 1/2 by 11 sheet of cardstock, cut them out, and passed them out to the older kids AFTER they had practiced in the air with me a few times.

 I asked for them back, but told them if they wanted one to take home and practice :) they could come by after primary to get one.

After a few repetitions, I'd ask them what words went to the blue marks, or the red marks, etc. They did really well!

How it works:

Blue marks: Joy to the world, the Lord is come!

Purple: Let earth receive her King!

Green: Let every heart, Prepare him room

Red: And Saints and Angels Sing! And Saints and Angels Sing!

Orange: And saints, and saints, and Angels sing!

Just follow the marks with your fingers to fit the words.

If this doesn't make sense, I could make a video...

...but then I'd have to sing a solo...

...and reveal my identity....

...but I would do it...

 ... just for you. :)

 So, let me know if I need to.

P.S. I have the PDF of the little pass out cards if anyone is interested. I really wish there was a way to just post those on here....does anyone know a way to do this?

I am Glad for Many Things

There are several songs about "Thanks" in the Children's Songbook, so we have been quickly learning a few.

One easy one to do (and one that most probably know already) is
"I am Glad for Many Things" -Children's Songbook pg.151

For this one, I started telling them what I was grateful for: my family.

Then I cued the pianist and sang the song for them.

When we finished, I had my "boing" ball and asked them
"What are you grateful for?"

I then tossed the ball to a child with a raised hand. (When they catch the ball, the ball goes "boing!"...at least most of the time...sometimes they had to punch the ball again....) They said something they were glad for and tossed it back. I did this for 3 or 4 children, then we sang the song again.

**I got my "boing" ball at Fred Meyer's for about $10.00

Pumpkin song pick

OOPS! I thought I had this one posted! Pumpkins are still in season though, right?! 

Our program is over! YAY! I don't normally get teary in public, but those kids definitely made it hard to keep the tears from flowing as we sang Families can be Together Forever with the congregation. They did absolutely fantastic. AND, I didn't even need the motivational chart!

For primary, after the program, we gave the kids a little break and just sang some of the fun "wiggle" songs. I wanted a fun way to choose the songs though, so I found this idea on sugardoodle posted by Amanda Fennema.

I took a pumpkin and printed our various facial features for our Mr. Pumpkin. I cut them out, and wrote a song title on the back. I chose a child to come up and pick a feature and put it on the pumpkin. I put double sided sticky tape on the back of the features and it worked ok. However, next time I will probably do it like ChicoandJo.com (the pictures below came from their site.)

For the eyes, I just wrote down one song title on one, and had them put up in pairs. You could write the same title twice, or you could just have them pick one eye at at time, so each eye has a different title. The kids really had fun making their own pumpkin face, and getting to do all those action songs.

I found templates for face features here:

Christmas Devotional

Our ward includes some senior citizens at a retirement home, located across the street to our chapel. The different auxillaries take turns doing a devotional for anyone who wants to attend, in their dining hall. It's the primary's turn in December. Our primary presidency has planned a special Christmas devotional that basically tells the nativity story with scriptures and songs.

I thought this is a great idea and thought it might be a great opportunity for your primary's as well. I know my kids love to meet all the "Grandma's and Grandpa's" after the program, and having had a grandparent in a nursing home, know the residents would love it even more.

Here is our program, but you could substitute other songs and scriptures:

Read:    Luke 2:1-5
Enter:    Mary and Joseph
Song:    When Joseph went to Bethlehem (we're going to have our Valiant 11 Boys each solo a sentence in this song = 5 solos)
Read:    Luke 2:6-7
Song:    Away in a Manger (3 CTR 6 girls will sing the verses and the primary joins in for the chorus)
Read:    Luke 2:8-12
Enter:    Shepherds
Song:     The Shepherd's Carol
Read:     Luke 2:13-14
Enter:     Angels
Song:     Joy to the World
Read:     Matthew 2:1-2, 7-11
Enter:     Wise Men
Song:     Silent Night


The Angels will be all the girls, the shepherds are the Jr. boys, and the Wise Men are the Sr. boys. Mary and Joseph are the two oldest boy and girl in the primary. We debated about how to have the characters "Enter" but we decided on having a "stage" where Mary and Joseph will be and then the children are either sides of the stage, sitting down. When it comes their turn to enter, they will  stand up and remain standing.

I am excited about this and the extra opportunity to remember the importance of this Christmas Season and share it with others.

presentation motivation

catchy title? Oh well, I tried. :)

I feel like my kids know the songs. They've worked really hard all year, practiced with their CD's. and they have them down. I also know that they can be strong singers with lots of volume from different activities we've played durring singing time. However, getting them to sing out in front of all those people, is another story. I've got a relatively shy group of kids with a few who can really sing out. When they do, the others sing out more. So I've been trying to think f something to help motivate them to sing out AND that I can use for the actual program, next week.

Although anything but revolutionary, this is what I came up with.

I went to msn clipart to download the smiley's. (just did a search for "smileys"). For the board, I trimmed down a bulk cereal box (you know, the kind you get at Costco), so that it would be nice and sturdy. I had a spool of ribbon laying around, that still had the "wrapping" on it. he ribbon had one layer of a clear plastic, the same width as the ribbon, so I actually sewed the ribbon to it, threaded it through the board, and then taped the other side down.

I am happy to e-mail you the pdf, so you can just print, cut and assemble. Just leave your e-mail in the comments. You can resize the font and images to make it work for whatever board you have.

ON the back, I figured out where the ribbon would need to be for the different achievements, and made corresponding marks. This way, I don't even have to look at the front to figure out where the ribbon is.

I tried it yesterday, and it worked awesome. The kids eyes were glued on me, and it helped them forget how big the chapel is...at least I think it helped. :) The measurements are about 16x9, so it won't be too distracting to the rest of the crowd. I'm only planning on "conducting" them when they need it.

Good luck to everyone and their programs!

Teaching rhythm

Another idea by Trisha...

To learn a song that has a strong beat (like How Firm a Foundation), here's another idea.

I made rhythm sticks out of 5/8" dowels cut into 8" lengths. I found 3' and 4' dowels at our local building supply store.

I made enough sets of sticks so that at least half of the children had a set. If a child didn't get a set of sticks first, they clapped. And we switched sticks often so that all of the children had a chance to clap and use the sticks.

First, I had us all clap or tap out the beat. The beat never changes in most of the Primary songs. Each song is usually composed of three or four beats in each measure. The beat just goes on and on. You can talk quite well while you and the children are clapping/tapping the beat. I repeated "The beat goes on and on. It never changes" to the beat a couple times to emphasize the steadiness of the beat.

Second, we all practiced clapping/tapping out the rhythm. For the rhythm, you clap or tap each time there's a note in the song. It usually works out to a clap/tap for every syllable in each word. For example, How Firm A Foun-Da-Tion, Ye Sa-Ints Of The Lord with every capital letter indicating a clap/tap.

When the children had the rhythm under control, I switched it up.

One side of the room kept the beat, while the other side of the room clapped/tapped the rhythm. That way, they could hear the differences between the beat and the rhythm. And then we switched sides.

You could use a teacher or member of the Presidency to lead one side of the room while you lead the other side. I used one of our 11 year-old girls that was musically talented and who was leaving within the next week to attend Young Womens. She loved it. The kids loved it too.

We repeated both verses of How Firm a Foundation several times, but the children didn't seem to notice all the repetition while tapping/clapping the beat or the rhythm of the song.

Italian fun

This post is an idea submitted by Trisha...

Thanks for the great idea!

(If anyone else has an idea, to share, let me know!)

Because most music words are Italian, I decided to teach the children some common Italian music words while reviewing songs for the program.

I used the following pairs of words:

* Forte (loud) and Piano (soft)

* Allegro (fast) and Largo (slow)

* Staccato (crisp, detached) and Legato (smooth, connected)

* A capella (without music) and Con musica (with music)

* Regazze (girls), Ragazzi (boys), and Insegnanti (teachers)

I used an online translation site to find the translations for girls, boys, and teachers. The site also says the words for you so that you can hear the correct pronunciation (http://www.oddcast.com/home/demos/tts/tts_tran_example.php?). It works for other languages too. Want to learn Head, Shoulder, Knees, and Toes in another langugage? This site is extremely helpful for that. There are other such sites out there, but this is one of my favorites.

I dressed in a trench coat, with a hat, and big sunglasses. I was a detective and I invited the children to play detective with me to figure out some Italian words that have to do with music and singing.

For Junior Primary, I hid the pairs of words in numbered envelopes under their chairs so that they could help me find the missing Italian words.

Then, I had the children with the number one words come up to the front and hold their words.

I had a "magic wand" (a digital drumstick with the power off). I told the children my wand could read Italian, so they had to guess what each word meant based on how my wand responsed. I'd read each word by running the tip of the wand across each word. Then, my wand would respond in a corresponding way. I'd then ask them what they thought that word meant in English.

* Forte (very large movements)

* Piano (very small)

* Allegro (very fast)

* Largo (very slow)

* Staccato (robot-like, sharp)

* Legato (flowing, almost dancing)

* A capella (sharp, cut off motion towards pianist)

* Con musica (pick up/include motion towards pianist)

* Ragazze, Ragazzi, and Insegnanti (point towards girls, boys, or teachers, or point to pictures on the board or on a poster, or walk around tapping a few gently on the head)

For Senior Primary, I also put "How?," "Who?," and "When?" wordstrips on the board. For each set of words, they helped me deduce if that pair of Italian words helped us know WHO shoudl sing, WHEN we should sing (or sing with accompaniment), or HOW we should sing.

We sang through several songs in the program with a different set of words for each song. The children had to watch the wand carefully to know how to sing the song at any given moment because the wand would switch back and forth between each word in a pair. If they needed extra practice with a song, a helper got to come up and direct the wand with the appropriate motions for the Italian words used with that song.

At the end, we sang through a couple songs using all of the Italian words together. They really had to watch me and my wand then!

I also sent home a straw with each child. The straw had a little paper flag taped to the end of it. The "flag" listed all of the Italian words we learned that day. I told them they could practice their Italian and music with their families.