Five Favorite Pins of September!

Thanks to Aileen at Mrs. Miracle's Music Room for hosting Five Favorite Pins of September! Here are my five favourite (note the Canadian spelling :) ) pins of September! I hope Aileen does one for October too! I love this idea for a Linky Party! Please check out the other blogs that have linked up!

1. Musical Groceries Centre

Click on the link to go directly to Ashley Queen's blog for teachers. It is EXCELLENT! This is a cute and fun centre using fake fruit to create rhythm patterns.

2. Rhythm Cubes

This rhythm cube idea is a great pin and is originally from Music a la Abbott. Can't wait to make these bad boys.

3. Parts of a Listener Poster

I want this for my room! Check out the pin, originally pinned from Andrea Knight on Teachers Pay Teachers.

4. Awesome Bulletin Board

I love this idea. I wish I had a big bulletin board outside my room for this one. The original pinner is not named. If this is your board, let me know so I can recognize you!

5. Online Metronome

This is cool and could be used in conjunction with my Tempo Cat posters and my Tempo Turn!

Happy pinning and thanks again for the Linky Party Aileen!

DIY: 3/4 Practise Using Ice Cube Trays!

So, instead of doing something that would prepare me for the first week of school... I decided to work on a little project for centres. Oh well! Here it is:

Ice Cube Tray Rhythms

This is yet another idea inspired by classroom teachers! Ice cube trays are often used for ten frame math work and I thought, "Hey! I want to come up with an idea using them for the Music room!"

I went to Dollarama and found something even better: An ice cube tray divided in groups of THREE! I immediately thought it could be used for practising 3/4 metre.

And it's blue! Yay!

I also grabbed small white circular sticker labels.

And I picked up a few baggies of glass stones.

Once I was back home, I got started. 

Using a black pen, I wrote rhythms on the STICKY side of the stickers. 

Next, I stuck those guys to the flat bottom of the stones.

And voila! All ready for the kids to practise working with rhythms in 3/4!

And now maybe on to doing something that will prepare me for next week!

Sweet Dollar Store Finds!

I was so inspired the other day by my good friend Renee over at 

The Reading Corner. She found some really great dollar store finds! 

So good, that I decide to take a little trip to Dollarama myself!

Here's what I found!

1. Mini Hockey Nets.  

 My brother was obsessed with mini sticks growing up! I have many students who are also hockey lovers. Wouldn't it be fun to make a hockey target shot game out of these and have rhythms hanging as targets? Oooooo the possibilities!

2. Cd Cases

I thought I would adapt my Note Name Battleship game to fit into a CD case! Neato! I was looking for folders for that purpose and found these instead! 

3 for $1! Woot woot! I'll try it out and let you guys know what happens :)

3. Stylus Pen

 I totally copied Renee on this one! I bought a stylus for my new iPad too! Two bucks baby!

4. Ice Cube Trays!

I am most excited about these! Yay! At first glance they just look like ice cube trays, big whoop. But just wait! They can magically turn into tools for students to manipulate rhythm patterns in 4/4, 3/4, and 2/4! I love spying on classroom teacher blogs! I get great ideas from those gems... I've seen word and math work being done with ice cube trays, and thought... "Hmmm, I must have a use for these..."

5. Cute Pencil Case

 Unfortunately, I didn't find a cute iPad case but I did find this super adorable pencil case. I will keep my favourite pens, pencils and markers safe in here!

And ta-da! There ya go, five cool finds from a Dollarama. Love it!

What treasures have you found?

Please comment below and share a fave find that you have bought from a dollar store! 

Busted! An awesomely fun DIY music game!

I love games and so do my kiddos!
During the month of June, I included this fun game in our primary centre rotation.

BUSTED!

What you need:

A container of some sort. I used empty Lysol wipe containers.

Coloured tongue dipressers. I got mine from Michaels.

A thin permanent marker that you will write rhythms with. Don't forget to include some BUSTED sticks! I did 1/5 eighth notes, 1/5 quarter notes, 1/5 quarter rests, 1/5 half notes, and 1/5 Busted!.

I made a nifty label! For the upper elementary ones that I will do next year, I think I'll make a vertical label...

Put all of the sticks inside the container, with the rhythm side of each stick at the bottom.

And voila! Your game is ready to be played!

Click HERE for the game instructions and HERE the FREE printable label!

Music Centre Ideas- Fun for June!

Oh my gosh! I just realized I haven't posted in 3 weeks! Ah!

As things are beginning to wind down, (only 5 days left!) I thought it would be perfect to have the children do centre work. It has been the perfect thing to do in June! 

Grade 1 and 2 students have been doing a rotation of three centres during the last two Music Classes.

#1 ROBOT RYTHMS

Check out the "how to" HERE

#2 NOODLE RHYTHMS

#3 WRITE A RHYTHM

I can't take credit for any of these ideas though! Lego rhythm activities are all over the internet! I've seen many noodle activities on Pinterest, but my favourite is Mrs. King's, over at her blog. And my friend Renee over at      The Reading Corner swears by Dollarstore page protectors for numerous activities in her classroom!

Stay Tuned for the new additions to this week's centres!

-Steph

Music Note Name Jenga!

I have my grade 4 to 6 students do small group or independant work on days that I want to work with a small recorder group. Music Note Name Jenga has been our best hit yet! Even better than the amazing Staff Wars and Note Name Battleship! 

I have seen various ways to transform Jenga into a music game. I came across a great version over at COLOR IN MY PIANO. Joy uses many music symbols in her game. I wanted my students to focus solely on note names so I created a game that had treble clef notes only.

HOW TO PLAY

Students stack the blocks as you do in regular Jenga. Students take turns pulling blocks. Each time they pull, they must show their block to the group and name the note. If they get it wrong, that students must pull again. I made a rule that a player only needs to pull a maximum of two blocks, even if they make more than one mistake. The student who is responsible for the blocks toppling over loses. 

They LOVE it!

HOW TO MAKE IT

First of all I bought a cheaper version of Jenga (on sale at Target) for $5.00. I bought two. I then simply drew a treble clef note on each block... well it wasn't that simple. 

I thought I'd be honest and share photos of my marker testing process on the little wooden blocks. It's pretty funny actually.

Attempt #1:

 I used a regular tipped Sharpie for this one. Ew. Gross. I also spent 2 hours trying to make lines on these blocks perfect. I used Post-its to try and make straight lines. FAIL.

I didn't give up though! Attempt #2:

 WAY WORSE!!! Hahahah. This really made me laugh. I used a Uniball rollerball pen for this one. Finer lines, but it bled WAY more. And yes you're right, I didn't use the Post-it strategy. This should actually be on one of those Pinterest FAIL sites. 

I wanted to give up! But I believed in the activity and in the great game of Jenga.

Attempt #3:

Meh, it's not perfect, but it works for me! I used a fine point black Sharpie for my entire second game of blocks. No Post-its, the marker followed the wood grain quite easily to make a straight enough line.

Yay Jenga!

What games do you transform for the Music room?

Please share!

- Steph

Music Symbol Memory Game- FREEBIE!

Hello y'all! I created this Music Symbol Memory Game to add to my grade 4-6 centres. 

Click HERE to get the free PDF file! 

I am going to print it off, cut the cards out, glue front to back and get 'em laminated! 

Ta da!

- Steph

Rhythm Robots!

I am currently getting music centres organized and I am having so much fun! I came across a great idea from Sing A New Song. She uses lego blocks with her students in order to build rhythms. I was in Dollarama yesterday and came across these! A pack for only $3.00, so I bought two. 

I bought mini labels and cut them to fit the blocks.

I was going to keep these rounded off pieces out of our centres, but then I thought they looked like feet! I thought, "We could make robots!"

Students will have three different activities to do at the Robot Rhythms centre. While in pairs, one partner builds a robot with the blocks. When finished, their partner must clap and say the rhythms from head to toe and then toe to head. Partners then switch jobs.

The second activity is similar, except the student rolls a die before building their robot. The number they roll, will show the amount of beats their robot must contain.  

I still really like the idea of how Sing a New Song has the students build their rhythms similar to the photo below, because they will read it from left to right, as they would in standard notation. I am including blocks in the centre package that will be able to be used in this way. The left to right rhythm building will be the third activity and again the die will be used.

I also found our robots a friend at Dollarama! You gotta love Christmas stuff out at the same time as Halloween! I also love that this guy is so ugly that he's cool!

Have a great week and comment about your favourite music centre activity that students in your classroom do!

-Steph