Freebie Friday! Fun High Five Positive Reinforcement Posters!

Yay for Mrs. Q and Freebie Friday! Check out her blog and other bloggers that linked up to her party HERE!

I just posted fun, musical high fives in my Music room this week! This idea stemmed from... you guessed it! Another classroom teacher blog! I found an idea for hand outlines and posters for practising sight words. Words were inside the hand prints and posted as high fives at the classroom entrance. Various activities were used as an exit slip with the high five sight words.

I decided to make some high fives of my own! This might be a great idea, or a complete disaster! I have posted my high five sign and high fives right next to the Music room door. Students will high five a statement that is true for them, relating to the Music class they just had. As they walk out, students high five their chosen statement.

Here is my original High Five poster:

Here is the black and white version of the High Five sign. I used this instead and printed it on lime green paper.

Here are some examples of hand outlines (there are 10 in total) that I have posted on my wall under the poster and that students can high five on the way out of class!

Click HERE for all of my high fives and both posters for FREE!

We will see! I'll let you know how it goes. It will be fun, but maybe too much fun! Noise in the hallway could be a problem after high fiving with the posters. Only time will tell! It's worth a try!

Thanks again to Mrs. Q for hosting Freebie Friday!

Monday Music Manipulatives! Found Objects As Music Manipulatives!

I am linking up with Lindsay at Pursuit of Joyfulness for her Linky party!

I'm all for being crafty and making stuff, but for something different I thought I would blog about munipulatives that you actually don't have to make. Random objects that are easy to reinforce singing concepts!

1. Hulahoops

I use hula hoops for helping students internalize melody and lyrics. I place a hula hoop on the ground and have a student stand inside the hula hoop. The rest of the class or choir sings while the student is in the hula hoop. When that student jumps out of the hula hoop everyone needs to sing "inside their heads". It is a blast and the kids love it. It really helps them internalize beat as well.

2. Skipping Rope

I nabbed this idea from one of my amazing university profs. JL, you know who you are :) I still use this with my students to kinaesthetically experience so-mi. The skipping rope is used as the line on the floor and I have one student jump across the skipping rope (slow enough for us to follow), jumping sometimes above the skipping rope line, and sometimes below. We follow along singing so and mi appropriately. The kids get a kick out of this one too.

3. Red and Green Paper

A Jeff and Randy special. Check out the amazing Kriske and DeLelles resources HERE. This is another way to internalize melody and lyrics. I love using this during musical rehearsals when we are doing memory work. Simply have a green piece of paper and a red piece of paper. When the green paper is held up, students sing. When the red paper is up, student sing "inside their heads". Another easy way to get student leaders involved.

4. Ribbon Wand

I love using these to warm up my younger choirs. We do vocal slides that match the movement of the ribbon wand. Once I have demonstrated, I choose a student leader to move the wand and we vocalize appropriately. F.U.N.!

5. Anything Cool to Use as a Baton

I have a a neat light up stick that students use when they are conducting the class. It's pretty cool and it was only a buck from the dollar store. I have also used glow sticks for the same purpose. Super neat.

6. Wooden Puppet Thing

Another Dollarama find, I use my little tiger and clown every year when I teach forte and piano to my kinders. You can get these little push button guys for only a dollar! When the little guy is "sleeping" kids sing piano and when he is "awake" we sing forte.

7. Gadgets Great for Singing

This book is awesome! It is a new one by Christy Elsner, published by Hal Leonard. I just bought it and I am pumped to use it. She shares ideas on how random objects can help singing technique. Her ideas include using Oreos, balloons, building materials and more to reinforce singing technique! Click HERE to check out the resource.

Thanks so much to Lindsay for hosting this great Linky Party! I am excited to see other manipulative ideas! Please click on her blog at the top to check out the other bloggers!

Come on back tomorrow for my Linky Party, 2/4 Tuesday!

Welcome Back Bulletin Board! And a random fox video...

After 4 days of school, and only 2 days with the kids, I am pooped!

My Music room was under construction, but I was able to get in there on Thursday and get most of my room set up. I started with this super cute bulletin board, an idea that I got from Made for Music Teachers. Click on her link for the printables! She got the idea from Mrs. King who you also need to check out if you haven't already!

 My bulletin board!

And that is supposed to be a NEST not a weird canoe! 

Bach, get it? Like the composer? Like "back"?! Like a chicken sound?! I love it.

Speaking of animal sounds, ever wonder what sound a fox makes? This video is hilarious! Maybe not for your students, but just for your own entertainment. I'm sure after your crazy first weeks back you yourself need a brain break like I did. Hahahaha. And here it is:

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and make sure to SLEEP! You need it!

2/4 Tuesday Linky Party! Four Neat Finds for the New School Year!

Welcome to the first ever Stay Tuned Linky Party! Steps on how to link your blog to our party are found at the end of my post. If you are here just to look at ideas, be sure to check out the linked blogs below! 

Here are my four ideas for the 2/4 Tuesday!

1. New Musicals!

I'm so pumped for the new school year! Here are two of my favourite new musicals from Hal Leonard. They are both great!

Have a peak at Arf On the Rooftop! HERE

Have a peak at Summer Camp HERE

2. Mozart Printables!

I am so excited that I found these! I am going to use them for my first composer bulletin board.

Thank-you Sara Bibee for creating this excellent resource!

Click HERE to download the super cute Mozart printables! 

3. String Instrument Video

I am pumped to share this with my grade 2 and 4 classes when we do our orchestra units! This video features sound examples of each of the string instruments. Check it out!

4. My Freshly Painted Desk!

Can you guess what my favourite colour is?! I painted my desk to brighten up my room a bit this year. I love it! Who knew you could paint over nasty laminate so easily?! Click HERE for an easy to follow tutorial from Centsational Girl.

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!

How Instruments Are Made Videos!

Yesterday was the last day of school! Yippeeeeee!

When school is almost done and it's always nice to find easy, low key and interesting activities to do with the kiddos that are also at least somewhat educational!

I found some really interesting videos of how different music instruments are made. 

I had grade 4, 5 and 6 students watch the videos and complete (in writing) the following statements...

"Something I knew before watching this video was..."

"Something I learned from watching the video was..."

"Something I found interesting was..."

Here are the three videos that grade 4-6 students responded to last week.

How It's Made- Cymbals

How It's Made- Acoustic Guitar

Making a Djembe

Enjoy!

-Steph

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

Try Thinglink! Way more fun than Powerpoint!

I've fallen in love with Thinglink! It's like interactive Powerpoint. 

I am working on some traditional drumming songs from Ghana with my grade 1 and grade 3 students. I will post about the resource I often use for African drumming later this week. 

It's so important to give students some context when learning songs from different cultures! I will otften show some videos, photos, maps, share stories, etc. to give more meaning and in-depth understanding to what we are learning. Using Thinklink is perfect because you can put all sorts of different information in ONE PLACE!

Here is a photo of the Thinglink I created for students about West African Drumming:

First, I selected a free use photo for my Thinglink. Then, I added touches (those are the question marks). For each touch I could add a link to anything on the internet (videos, definitions, sound clips, photos, etc.) and also include some of my own text.

Click HERE to use my West African Drumming Thinglink with your kids FOR FREE!

Click HERE to join Thinkglink for free and create your own pages to share with your kids!

What did I say~ so much more fun than Powerpoint!

Let me know what you think!

- Steph 

Cool Find! Mozart Finger Puppet!

I found the coolest thing at a local and amazing toy store, Kite and Kaboodle! A Mozart magnet! And then I picked it up and realized it was also a MOZART FINGER PUPPET! Whaaaaat?! Last one there too! It was my lucky day today!

You can check out finger puppets including Mozart, Beethoven, Veri and Puccini, as well a variety of many others including (Obama, Rosa Parks and Salvador Dali) HERE at the Unemployed Philosophers Guild website. The site is so fun and full of great gift ideas so check it out! My Mozart puppet will be great to use with Fun with Composers resource! Click HERE to see that resource!

My Mozart just loved coming home with me! 

He got along with Lola right away! 

After getting settled in, Wolfgang found my metallophone and started composing...

And playing his compositions for us!

He is so fun that guy! I can't wait for the kids at school to meet him!

- Steph